Historic victory in
Supporters of defeated President Diouf will be adopted through a referendum, the suppression of the useless Senate, the dissolution of the national assembly and local councils and the organisation of new free and democratic legislative and local elections under a new electoral code and an independent national electoral commission. The programme envisages emer-
THE second round of the Senegalese presidential election held on
March 19th 2000 surprised everyone, both in terms of the scale of
Abdoulaye Wade's victory (Wade was the candidate for the opposition Coalition Alternance 2000) and the degree of good grace shown by his defeated rival, outgoing president and Socialist Party candidate Abdou Diouf.
BIRAM BAKARY
FTER his defeat, Diouf showed no
A hesitation in congratulating his
_rival, thus undermining those in his party who might have been tempted to carry out a coup that could have plunged the country into barbarism. Through this gesture, Senegal has initially escaped the spiralling of post-electoral conflict and a good example of democracy has just been given to the whole of Africa
Diouf was beaten in every town in
Senegal and in Dakar Wade won in every polling office, with 76.39% of the votes
This was a tidal wave in favour of change and the defeat of the Senegalese party-state resembles a real peaceful democratic revolution whose outcome is still uncertain.
The first round of the presidential election on February 27th saw a weakening of the party-state, the Socialist Party (PS in power since 19601). Abdou Diouf obtained 40.3% of the vote and Abdoulaye
Wade 30.9%. The result represented a first great historic victory for the Senegalese people in the face of fraud, corruption and the complicity of a partisan administration.
Discontent
How was it possible? In Senegal, discontent is general. The people have suffered greatly from the various structural adjustment policies, devaluation and so on.
Many jobs have been lost in recent years and youth unemployment is endemic. The
"We are born retired and we youth say, don't want to die retired". Radical rappers have made a big contribution to the alienation of the youth from the system.
Despite the government's technocratic discourse about growth (5%), the people
24 International Viewpoint #321 May 2000 reply that growth cannot be eaten and that they need to eat, be cared for, and find work. Poverty has got very much worse, while in the midst of the electoral campaign PS deputies secretly increased the wages of members of parliament. The immorality of this kleptomaniac gangster regime served to radicalise youth, who broke with their traditional abstention and voted in large numbers. The PS, worn out by power, has experienced significant divisions and splits. Two former ministers,
Djibo Ka and Moustapha Niasse, left the
PS to form their own party and ran against
Diouf in the presidential election. Their departure marked the culmination of a profound crisis in the recomposition of the political-bureaucratic bourgeoisie, which has held power since independence. There were no less than three presidential candidates originating from the ranks of the PS. The opposition, ranging from the left parties to the liberal Abdoulaye
Wade, took advantage of the PS's dislocation to create a coalition to beat Diouf.
The unity of this coalition is founded around a programme for a government of transition of one year's duration. It envisages profound institutional reforms, in particular the elaboration of a new constitution which gency social measures to help the poor and job-creating workshops for the youth but above all it prioritises good governance and the struggle against endemic corruption.
### Fraud
The last parliamentary elections in 1998 saw 60% of the electorate not voting, essentially because of the multiplicity of lists, which favoured the PS's fraud. The Coalition Alternance 2000, which brings together the PDS led by Abdoulaye Wade, the left pole (And Jef/PADS led by Landing Savané, the LD/MPT, the PIT, the MSU, the UDF/mboloo-mi) and three other small parties, essentially includes all the political parties which mobilised for democratic conquests in Senegal. Abdoulaye Wade was chosen to head the Coalition list because he was the most representative candidate.
Why did the left not present an independent candidature? For the parties of the Senegalese left, what was at stake in these elections was putting an end to 40 years of the PS party-state and unfreezing the existing system to throw up the bases of a gen-
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The two candidates who campaigned on religious themes, Ousseynou Fall and Cheikh Abdoulaye Dièye, only got 2% of the votes, confirming thus the desire of the citizens to separate politics from religion. The marabouts supporting Diouf were not
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Several factors explain the unprecedented defeat of Diouf in the second round.
1. All the candidates who wanted change came together in the 2nd round inside a front called FAL (Front pour 'Alternance). Djibo Ka of the Union for Democratic Renewal finally decided to support Abdou Diouf despite previous declarations. This betrayal was very badly received by the people and URD militants who organised demonstrations in front of his house. The people showed they would no longer tolerate political traitors.
2. The people were sick of 40 years of the party-state and deeply desired change. This victory is first and foremost a victory for youth (50% of the population is under 20 and the voting age is 18). They mobilised very strongly and assured the security of the voting booths against the PS. Also women, who are more affected by poverty, are strongly engaged in the fight for change.
3. Some religious leaders who had advocated a vote for Diouf were disowned by the people. Others preferred to let the citizens choose freely. The consciousness of the people has been strengthened on the necessity of separating the religious from the political while respecting freedom of uine democracy. Given that a divided PS Sopi, (the Wolof word for change), was a had experienced difficulty in crossing the popular demand and everybody wanted to 50% barrier at the last parliamentary elections, it seemed possible to beat this party through a broad Coalition.
The PS called the left's alliance with the liberal democrat Wade an alliance against nature. But it would be hard to imagine anything to the right of the PS in economic terms. This party has applied all the ultraliberal policies of the IMF and the World Bank, has privatised water, electricity, telephones and transport, has suppressed assistance to the peasants, lowered prices to producers and so on. The labour code has been revised to encourage greater flexibility, the rights of workers have been undermined and in the public service there has been a drastic slimming down. Thus the debate with the PS was not ideological, as it would pretend, but rather political.
see Diouf go.
While the regime had planned every kind of electoral fraud, the opposition grouped inside the Front for the Regularity and Transparency of the Elections' succeeded in thwarting a good few of its plans thanks to its mobilisation of hundreds and thousands of people in unitary demonstrations. On February 27th, the day of the first round vote, Diouf was crushed in the all the main towns of Senegal and the anti-Diouf vote in the urban areas compensated for the vote in rural areas where fraud was the rule. The elections saw an extraordinary eruption of youth, who mobilised throughout the electoral campaign and assured the security of the voting offices against the professional frauds of the PS.
belief and worship.
4. Civil society organised through a number of NGOs in a front for control of the electoral roll. It was thus possible to correct the electoral roll and remove many dual inscriptions — the corrected electoral lists were then put at the disposition of the political parties, limiting electoral fraud.
5. The free radio stations did extraordinary work throughout the campaign, broadcasting objective news and giving the results on a quasi-instantaneous basis, thus blocking any possibility of the publication of false results.
### Party atmosphere
Throughout the country there was a party atmosphere. The victory revived an immense hope and freed the Senegalese people who had felt themselves in prison. International Viewpoint #321 May 2000 25
"AT the dawn of the 21st century, our country, Senegal, despite all the economic potential that it has enjoyed since decolonisation, is at the end of the queue of African countries. Since independence, the same political party has guided the destinies of our country; thus for 40 years we have been governed by the Socialist party, a Party-State
The reign of Abdou Diouf is marked today by a deep crisis of confidence, a moral crisis in society and a crisis of authority. To these crises is added that of Casamance which will soon have lasted 20 years - every day soldiers fall on the field of honour, children are misled to die for a lost cause and there are numerous innocent victims. The regime of Abdou Diouf and the Socialist Party has killed hope among the young who can no longer live in unemployment. It has worsened insecurity in households, making more inroads every day on their meagre purchasing power, while rendering jobs more
Abdou Diouf and the Socialist Party have tarnished the image of our country at the
African level and our relations with the neighbouring countries have worsened considerably. In committing the serious error of involving our national army in the Guinea-
Bissau conflict in contempt of the lives of our soldiers and national opinion, the government has shown its incapacity to lead our country on the road of peace in the sub-
Our country is in crisis, in insecurity and in danger. We must save it to rebuild it together. Throwing out Abdou Diouf and the PS on February 27th 2000 will give birth to an immense hope, put the country back to work and give confidence to investors.
Thus, we can, through working, attain a higher growth whose fruits would be shared equitably in the nation. At the end of this millennium, our parties, conscious of their responsibility to save the leaking canoe which is Senegal, have decided to unite their forces to defeat Abdou Diouf by supporting Abdoulaye. Wade as their common candi-
In uniting our forces, we wanted to respond to the long-expressed wish by the overwhelming majority of our people to see the opposition unite to finally rid Senegal of the regime of Diouf and the Socialist Party. We have put the essential forward in stressing our convergence, our common struggle from the beginning for a new government and the economic and social development of our country. To get rid of Abdou Diouf and the PS, change the system, the men and the politics of regression, to build the bases of a new Senegal where life will be good for all, that is the meaning of our Coalition.
The new government which will be formed after our victory in February 2000 will implement a short-term programme called the Programme of the Transitional
Government. It will appeal for the mobilisation of all popular forces in a participative manner to reach the objectives set. It will act after the elections to assure a transition of one year to pass from the current dispersed presidential regime to a parliamentary regime, through a referendum which will be organised for the adoption of the new constitution and the organisation of new free, democratic and transparent general elections, of members of parliament and municipal, rural and regional councillors. Through this programme, the new government will give the people clear strong signs of our desire for a clean break with the methods of government of the country and of management
That means, among other things, that the transitional government's actions will be carried out in the name of transparency, rigorous management, a break with the politics and practices of the Party-State and permanent dialogue with the citizens through their representative associations, in the search for solutions to the problems of the country, the active involvement of these latter in the implementation of solutions, of unfailing respect for republican principles and the norms of the state of law. It will seek to create a political, economic and social climate capable of restoring confidence to the people, and hence to mobilise them and put them more effectively to work, through
* Senegal
The composition of the future government of transition is still awaited and already there is much jockeying for position among the parties. The next parliamentary elections will be decisive for putting the PS in the dustbin of history but already the party is deeply divided and some members of its political bureau demanded a collective resignation of the PB after the defeat. The change of government is a catastrophe for the kleptocracy. After his election Wade demanded that all those who managed national companies and property should remain on the national territory and undertake to carry out an audit of the country and particularly the companies, which were the milk cows of the party-state.
### Immense hope
The change has aroused immense hope and the task will be difficult, so great are the demands after 40 years of suffocation. The measures which will be taken by the government to meet the expectations of the people and the young in particular will be decisive as to their behaviour at the next parliamentary elections. The left, which has played an active part in the defeat of Diouf, will be in government and for a party like And Jef/PADS (in which Senegalese supporters of the Fourth International participate) this would be its first such experience since its creation. Its political future will depend on its capacity to respond to the aspirations of the people. One of the big challenges the new government will face will be the resolution of the crisis in Casamance (a region in the south of Senegal where a pro-independence movement has been in armed conflict with the central government since the 1980s). In voting totally for change the Casamance has shown that it did not want Diouf. Already President Wade has arranged to meet the leader of the MFDC (Movement des forces Démocratiques de Casamance).
But the PS is not dead even if it has been wounded. The perspective of the dissolution of the national Assembly, reform of the constitution, the next parliamentary elections will be the occasion of various political recompositions which cannot yet be predicted. In any case, the parties of the left pole will be confronted with the necessity of affirming their own identity while allowing no possibility to the PS to reconstitute itself in parliament through opportunist alliances. 26 International Viewpoint #321 May 2000
Programme of the government of transition extracts)
which confuses the interests of the nation with its own.
precarious. It has sold off our national enterprises.
date in February 2000.
Our victory in February 2000 will open a new era for Senegal.
of the national resources which have been those of the PS.
making them understand the interest that they all have in acting in this way."*