I could have not written a single line of this column of the day and shared again an article from October 2023 which was entitled « The spoilt child of the Republic and his dystopian universe ». Ousmane Sonko, by presenting himself before his flock and supporters to heat up a political pack and prepare electoral cattle, tied hand and foot, to entrust him with the majority in the National Assembly, at a time when all the hopes of some of our compatriots are drowned in the waters in the North and East, distinguished himself as a perfect scriptwriter of alternative realities. He began by refuting the floods in Bakel with the overflowing of the Senegal River, and went so far as to say that food supplies in quantity and the necessary assistance were already distributed in the disaster areas. With the spontaneity of social networks helping, videos of disaster-stricken populations were uploaded in the wake of his intervention, with his speech in the background. Of the ongoing tragedy from Bakel to Podor, via Matam, Tambacounda and Kédougou, he will say that it surely has criminal origins and that investigations will be carried out to identify the culprits. One cannot do worse in insensitivity and especially nonchalance, at such an important station in the state apparatus.

Read the column – Senegal drowns in its rivers

In the column I mentioned above, I said the following: “Since March 2021, consecration by blind violence of our slide as a society into a crazy sequence that is the fruit of limitless activism by political entrepreneurs, culpable and criminal passivity of state services and an abdication of critical thinking among opinion makers (intellectuals and media) to make way for primary partisanship, the absurd has taken over everything. Senegal ultimately resembles a dystopian universe where everything works backwards. Nothing that should happen in a normal country is now done according to the rules of the art.

The attacks on Justice that some « card-carrying » magistrates are comfortable with, or the blatant bias in the press in favour of a man who should be prosecuted for treason and designated a domestic enemy, after all the acts he has committed to weaken the Republic, are enough to make us pinch ourselves to get out of this damn nightmare. I will go further by saying that we are all prisoners of a dystopia of which Ousmane Sonko is the stage director.  He will have wanted by all means to make himself king, using all stratagems, to end up making himself omnipresent in the public debate. And this, in all possible incongruous postures. He will have imposed himself as a Leviathan of consciences, a sort of bulimic Big Brother begging for sympathy and attention everywhere, by making public opinion the privileged relay of all his vile tricks. Many people, by mimicry and ripple effect, accommodate all his whims, forgive all the abuses of his pack, bow to the weight of the insolence of his supporters.”

Read the column – Dear candidates, dare to debate before asking for our votes

I didn’t think I was saying it so well, because Ousmane Sonko will personally confess to his supporters during his meeting on October 19, 2024, that he has never been sick enough to fall into a coma, much less on the verge of death during his internment in the Special Pavilion of the Main Hospital in Dakar. Perhaps we should think about rewinding all the events that happened in this terrible window and see what was true and what was based on a tragic comedy. In a shaky way, he will say that he used tricks to gain time and stratagems to counter a power that wanted his skin. After all the damage, all the indignation and all the troubles that were born from the imaginary illness of the patriot in chief and all the twists and turns that surrounded his detention, we are entitled to say that this man has never respected his compatriots, and even less his activists. The countless deaths, the lives destroyed in the wake of his troubles with Justice, the manipulation of the masses and politico-religious elites, all this will have contributed to paving a royal path to access power and continue like an ogre to exist in the public space. I concede to him a malicious finesse to fool so many people and to blindly bring them into his cause to endorse all his statements, to the point of fighting tooth and nail against anyone who opposes a contrary thought or a lucid reading. The alarmist interventions of several political figures, civil society and the media are still fresh in our memories. The “requiems” with hot tears to raise awareness among religious leaders are quite funny when we look at them today with hindsight and the revelations of the main person.

An acquaintance with whom I had heated exchanges and severed ties following my chronicles on the imaginary illness of the leader of the Pastef party and his logic of dragging the Senegalese into alternative realities, wrote to me following the confessions of the all-powerful Ousmane. He was honest to swallow his pride and say that he was duped by a politician for whom he had affection, and was offended that an entire state machine was set in motion to make him suffer martyrdom. I remember that he cursed me at the time, telling me that I would have the death of his hero on my conscience and that my hands would be stained with blood. It is ridiculous to see how much the game of a politician who hesitates at nothing to achieve his goals can impact human relations to the point where we become adversaries, even enemies, quick to attribute the worst intentions to others. This is the case as long as we do not share the same opinions. For my part, I remain very comfortable with everything I have said and analysed about Ousmane Sonko. I have a great time deconstructing political facts and populist gestures, and with Sonko, there is material. Time, which remains the best judge, will restore everyone to their truth. What is sweet with the stage director of the dystopia in Senegal is that he takes advantage of all the platforms where the audience is important to lay bare, on his own initiative, all the schemes he implements. When it is from his mouth that he confirms what we have demonstrated, we can only sleep soundly and tell ourselves that we are on the right tracks.

Jean-Paul Krassinsky’s excellent graphic novel, The end of the world with a toast, published in 2019 is in short, about a pig who is an eminent astronomer working under the reign of Empress Catherine II of Russia. Nikita Petrovitch, a brilliant scientist, is an unfriendly pig who discovers that a comet is going to crash in Siberia. He communicates his discovery to the throne, but he is hardly taken seriously and is forced to take Ivan, a crazy and clumsy dog, under his wing to deliver the bad news to the people. Like all monitors, they are heckled and meet villagers who are not very grateful. They idealize 18th century Russia and are astonishingly gullible in the face of the actions of the royal power. This graphic novel is a sarcastic tale focusing on the triumph of gullibility, political stupidity and obscurantism, especially when the strings are pulled by those to whom the populations offer their full trust. When I reread this work, I see many similarities with our country, which turn laughter into worry.

Read the column – In the manhunt kingdom

An old lady allowed herself in the comedy show held at Dakar Arena, to mime a malaise and get up from a stretcher to greet her hero Ousmane Sonko. The staging is so grotesque that it took no more than a day for people to find this sacred comedian and deconstruct the deception that aimed to touch the masses through emotion. This actor’s role will be ridiculed on social networks and revelations will follow about her performance at the big circus. You can’t do better in terms of dystopia.

This Senegal is a tragic case. Late yesterday evening, journalist Ahmed Ndoye was arrested by the police after a press conference he was holding. Everything is being done to silence all opposing voices. I don’t think that those who were shouting for change everywhere voted for such regressions. Hello autocracy, hello again egocracy, Senegal is a paradise of humanity and freedom lost! I forget, the PM told us that he inherited a country in ruins. Let’s toast, it is on ruins that empires are built!

By Serigne Saliou DIAGNE / saliou.diagne@lequotidien.sn 

  • Translation by Ndey T. SOSSEH