[ 2021-03-07 ]

‘Descend on streets’: Senegal opposition calls for mass protests
Senegal has been embroiled in protests over arrest
of opposition leader Ousmane Sonko

An opposition movement in Senegal has called for
three days of protests starting on Monday after
days of clashes between police and supporters of
opposition leader Ousmane Sonko.

At a news conference on Saturday in the capital,
Dakar, the Movement for the Defence of Democracy
– which includes the leading opposition party
Pastef – urged people to “massively descend on
the streets”.

At least five people have died in protests that
began on Wednesday before Sonko’s court
appearance for questioning on accusations of
rape.

Sonko, 46, was detained on the way to court and
arrested for disturbing public order after
hundreds of his supporters clashed with police who
were blocking unauthorised protests. His lawyer on
Friday said he was now charged with rape and
making death threats.

Violent clashes between police and opposition
supporters continued in Dakar and elsewhere
through Friday, in the worst unrest the country
has seen in years.

On Saturday, protesters burned down a military
police station in the southern town of Diaobe and
ransacked several government buildings, a
government official told Reuters.

A 17-year-old boy was killed by gunfire during the
clashes, the official said. He was the fifth
person to die in protest-related violence.

The clashes in Diaobe came as the 15-nation
Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS)
called for “all parties to exercise restraint
and remain calm”.

In its statement, the West African bloc also urged
the government “to take the necessary measures
to ease tensions and guarantee the freedom to
demonstrate peacefully”.

The statement came a day after Minister of
Interior Antoine Felix Abdoulaye Diome said the
protests were “unprecedented and uncommonly
provocative acts” organised with the support of
“identified occult forces”.
Diome condemned looting and damage to public and
private property during the protests, and
described the violence in the street as “acts of
terrorist nature”.

Some residents, however, said a coronavirus
pandemic-linked curfew and general dissatisfaction
with President Macky Sall, who took office in 2012
and was re-elected in 2019, was also increasing
public anger.

“While Sall has boosted the economy during his
mandate, it seems that some of them feel left out;
there’s a deepening of the void between the
haves and have-nots,” said Al Jazeera’s
Nicolas Haque, reporting from Dakar.

“There’s a feeling that this protest is not
just about politics – it’s about a social
movement,” he added from outside a looted
supermarket where local residents stopped by “to
get anything they can: a can of food, toilet
paper”.

“They’ve really stripped that supermarket
bare, even taking the fridges out, and that shows
the level of desperation among the people that are
protesting and particularly among many Senegalese
who feel frustrated after a year of restrictions
because of the global pandemic,” Haque said.

Sonko, who came in third in the 2019 polls and has
a strong following among young people, is due back
in court on Monday to answer the rape charge. He
has denied wrongdoing and said accusations are
part of a pattern by the authorities of making up
criminal charges to block opponents from standing
in elections.

The unrest comes amid uncertainty about whether
Sall, 59, will seek a third term.

Senegalese presidents are limited to two
consecutive terms, but Sall launched a
constitutional review in 2016, raising suspicions
he intends to run again.

With a population of 16 million people, Senegal is
often heralded as a beacon of stability in a
volatile region.

Source - aljazeera

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