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Senegal: President Wade and Macky Sall face off in 2nd round vote
Opposition candidate Macky Sall (l) and incumbent president Abdoulaye Wade
Abdoulaye Wade received an unlikely phone call from the president conceding defeat after the 2000 election. Now many wonder whether Wade himself will be as willing to step aside if he loses Sunday’s runoff vote after 12 years in power.
Already Wade’s decision to seek a third term at the age of 85 has infuriated many Senegalese, some of whom booed him as he voted last month shouting: “Old man, get lost.”
He fell short of the 50 percent needed to avoid a runoff, receiving only 34.82 percent. He faces off Sunday against the very man who ran his last campaign five years ago, former Prime Minister Macky Sall, who received 26.58 percent and now has the support of the dozen other opposition candidates who ran in the first round.
On the streets of Senegal’s capital, vandalized posters of Wade’s face have his eyes scratched out. His convoy also was hit by rocks in the final days of the runoff campaign.
“In the short term, a Wade victory won fairly or foully would be tremendously controversial. I think he’s kind of pushed Senegalese patience to the limit. And I think it would be understood as a fraudulent election by many Senegalese,” said Jennifer Cooke, the director of the Africa program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
“His victory would be a bridge too far. Even if he wins legally, it will be assumed that he won fraudulently.”
Wade has overseen unprecedented economic growth in this country of more than 12 million on Africa’s western coast, with new buildings sprouting up everywhere across the seaside capital of Dakar.
