The “Aar Sunu Election” platform has taken up the fight against the postponement of the presidential election. Calling for a strong mobilization of citizens, the platform invited them to go to prayer this Friday by displaying the national flag as a protest. Not without asking imams and priests to devote their sermons and homilies against this postponement.

The “Aar Sunu election” platform has begun the fight against the postponement of the presidential election decided by President Macky Sall and ratified by the National Assembly. This is how the members of this platform are taking advantage of this Friday prayer to invite the Muslim faithful to display the national colours by going to pray at the mosque, as a protest against this decision. In the same way, fellow Christians are invited, during Sunday mass, to do the same when going to church. “We invite all Muslims to attend the Friday, February 9, 2024, prayer dressed in white, displaying the colours of the national flag to demonstrate their anger and indignation at this affront to the Senegalese people. We also invite all Christians to mobilize on Sunday February 11 during their mass. Given their important role in society, we ask religious leaders, particularly imams and priests, to call in their Friday sermons and Sunday homilies for a return to constitutional legality and respect for the electoral calendar,” declared Gaëlle Babacar Mbaye, spokesperson for “Aar Sunu Election”, during a press conference held at the headquarters of the said platform. The members of this entity are launching an appeal to the Supreme Court to “restore the rights” of Senegalese citizens.

“We, citizens and religious movements, socio-professional organizations, personalities from civil society, united around the “Aar sunu election” platform, demand the reestablishment of the republican calendar. We invite the judiciary, in particular the Constitutional Council and the Supreme Court, to take their responsibilities in the face of history, by immediately re-establishing legal and constitutional order,” affirm the facilitators of the “Aar sunu election” platform. The latter invites “all citizens concerned with the preservation of democratic achievements to mobilize massively to provide a popular, firm, response, throughout the country and in the diaspora, to prevent this confiscation of power”. A position that “Aar sunu Election” took after having noted, according to its members, that “Senegal is not experiencing a political or institutional crisis which justifies stopping the electoral process”.

In the same wake, they also noted, “with indignation, the signing by the President of the Republic, of a decree” which, according to them, “violates the Constitution” by “repealing decree 2023 2283 of 29/11 /2023 convening the electorate”. A summons of the electoral body “the implementation of which authorizes the start of the electoral campaign on Sunday February 4, 2024, and the holding of the presidential election on February 25, 2024”, recall the members of the “Aar sunu election” platform. They say they are outraged, at the same time, by the fact that “MPs voted without debate for the bill, which would postpone the date of the presidential election to December 15, 2024, and would risk extending the second term of the president of the Republic whose term is set for April 2, 2024.

In relation to their action plan to push “President Macky Sall to reverse his decision”, the members of “Aar Sunu Election” will hold a rally next Tuesday. Arrangements for organizing this gathering will be communicated to the press.

Bringing together around thirty coalitions, the platform includes the Autonomous Union of Middle-Secondary Education (Saems) which announced the holding of a general strike at the Cem and high school level.

Civil society actors such as Moundiaye Cissé of NGO 3D, Professor Babacar Guèye, Dr Aboulaye Bousso and Cheikh Mbow of Cosydep, among other members, are among those who run the “Aar sunu election” platform.

By Amadou MBODJI / ambodji@lequotidien.sn

  • Translation by Ndey T. SOSSEH