A sentence, chosen by a media (not just any in terms of propaganda for African heads of state) to launch the interview with Macky Sall which is to be published tomorrow Monday, May 30, 2022. “My work as President is far from complete”. If the context surrounding these words is still unknown to the general public, Social Networks have already drawn their conclusion: Macky Sall wants to seek the votes of the Senegalese in 2024.
But it must be said that the latest outings of President Sall on the question of the 3rd term are not to discourage those who accuse him of wanting to force the lock of the Constitution. On January 1, 2020, during a major interview he gave to the Senegalese press, he put his Ni Oui Ni No to the question. “I cannot speak of a third term and the reason is simple. If I say that I will not be a candidate, those who are with me will no longer work. They will try to see how they will succeed me. If I say that I am a candidate, the controversy will swell more and it will know no end, ”he replied.
Recently, on May 5, by receiving the Young African Leaders at the Palace for a dinner, Macky Sall went further than a third candidacy. He clearly expressed his desire to put an end to term limits in Africa. “Since we want more democracy in Africa, we say, we must limit the mandates, be it. But if at the same time, the procedures that date back to the 1960s are the same ones that condition disbursement, when will these schemes put in place have a balance sheet? So, every five (5) years, we will fire regimes, it will be an eternal restart, contrary to the idea of development, “he explained.
It should be remembered that Macky Sall himself wrote in black and white in his book, “Le Sénégal au Coeur”, published before the Presidential election of 2019, that this mandate he was seeking at the time was his “second and last term”. Previously, both he and the former Minister of Justice and no less Constitutionalist, Ismaila Madior Fall, had clearly explained how it was impossible for the current President to stand for re-election in 2024.
More clearly, Article 27 of the Constitution says: “The term of office of the President of the Republic is five years. The mandate is renewable only once. No one may exercise more than two consecutive mandates. This provision can only be revised by a referendum or constitutional law”.
In 2024, Macky Sall will complete his second term as head of Senegal. Unless he returns in 2029, to seek the votes of the Senegalese again, to “complete the work” he says he started, after leaving power in 2024, no law allows him to run for the next country’s presidential election.
But let’s wait to know the context surrounding this sentence from Macky Sall, which is already setting the web ablaze.
pressafrik
–
/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/elespectador/ADV5KIDRFRHOVHWJJ7QII2RLHM.jpg "Democratic spirit and electoral defeats")
