FAYE : FROM PRISONER TO PRESIDENT IN 20 DAYS (Watch Video)

 44-YEAR OLD SWORN IN AS SENEGAL’S YOUNGEST PRESIDENT

Two weeks ago, Bassirou Diomaye Faye was in prison. Now he is Africa’s youngest president after winning Sunday’s delayed election.

Senegal has inaugurated Faye as its president, completing the previously little-known opposition figure’s dramatic ascent from prison to the palace in just weeks.

The left-wing pan-Africanist was sworn in on Tuesday after sweeping to a first-round victory in the March 24 elections on a pledge of reform. At age 44, he is Senegal’s youngest president.

“Before God and the Senegalese nation, I swear to faithfully fulfil the office of president of the Republic of Senegal,” Faye said in Diamniadio, near the capital, Dakar.

In 2014, Ousmane Sonko (then 39 years) invited his friend and fellow tax worker, Diomaye Faye (then 34 years), and other political newbies to form a political party, PASTEF. The Party was led by Sonko and dominated by young Senegalese. Faye was the Secretary General while Sonko was the leader.

In 2017, PASTEF competed for the legislative election, but they only got 1 seat out of 165.

In 2019, Sonko stood as the Presidential candidate of PASTEF, while Faye was his campaign manager. At the Presidential election, Sonko finished third with 687,523 (15.67%) votes, behind President Macky Sall (1st) and former Prime Minister Idrissa Seck (2nd).

In 2022, PASTEF participated in the National Assembly election and won 56 out of 165 seats. It became clear that Sonko was in strong position to win the 2024 Presidential election.

In 2023, President Sall's government convicted Sonko on a trumped-up charge just to block him from running for President. The Government equally arrested Faye and imprisoned him just to keep them out. By July 2023, the Government disbanded PASTEF as a political party. Later that year, the government disqualified Sonko from running for President citing the conviction. But Sonko and PASTEF had a backup plan, Faye. Faye was sponsored as a backup candidate for President while Sonko challenged his disqualification at the court. Though the court reversed it, the government didn't implement the reversal.

Faye was released from prison on 14^th March, less than two weeks before the election, along with popular opposition figure and mentor Ousmane Sonko after a political amnesty announced by Sall.

“It’s the culmination of a long struggle for democracy and the rule of law,” said Aissata Sagna, 39, a factory worker who worked on Faye’s campaign. “This is a day of celebration for us, even if we have lost young people killed during the demonstrations.”

Human Rights groups said dozens of people were killed in the protests and about 1,000 were jailed.

The election was scheduled for March 24 after the opposition resisted its proposed postponement.

At the election that was held on March 24, Faye polled 2,434,110 votes (54.34%), defeating the immediate past Prime Minister Amadou Ba who polled 1,603,713 votes (35.8%). Mr Ba was the candidate of President Sall ruling coalition.

Faye campaigned on promises to clean up corruption and better manage Senegal’s natural resources. His victory was seen as reflecting the will of young people frustrated with widespread unemployment and former colonial ruler France, seen by critics to be using its relationship with Senegal to enrich itself.

 

In his first speech as president-elect, Faye – commonly known as Diomaye, or “the honourable one” in the local Serer language, promised to fight corruption and reform the economy.

A practicing Muslim from a small town, Faye has two wives, both of whom were present on Tuesday.

Before the election, he released a declaration of his assets to show transparency and called on other candidates to do the same. It listed a home in Dakar and land outside the capital and in his hometown. His bank accounts totaled roughly $6,600.

The election tested Senegal’s reputation as a stable democracy in West Africa, a region that has experienced coups and attempted coups. It followed months of unrest ignited by the arrests last year of Sonko and Faye and concerns that the president would seek a third term in office despite constitutional term limits.

“Finally, we can breathe,” the cashier at the American Food Store supermarket in Dakar said, representing the feeling of Senegalese as the former tax office transited from poisoner to president in a fortnight.