Senegal of Bakel, Dakar Arena's Senegal - Lequotidien

They launched their government program at the Abdou Diouf International Conference Centre, a prestigious legacy of President Sall’s regime, named after one of the statesmen they once identified for shooting. They organized a party in the beautiful Dakar Arena, a luxurious legacy of President Sall’s regime, whose construction they considered contrary to the country’s priorities. Their militants were transported by Dakar Dem Dikk, a legacy of President Wade’s regime, whom they once called to be shot. The other horde of activists was transported by the Regional Express Train, an imposing infrastructure bequeathed to posterity by President Sall’s regime.

As a reminder, Mimi – according to the facetious discovery of the mayor of Dakar – had sworn to give up his surname if the TER ever ran.

Read the column – The trivialisation of vulgarity

I am returning to this recent past because it allows us to better understand who we are dealing with. A fine bunch of jokers whose ardour for the task has hardly been expressed, except through slander, insult, backbiting and the confirmation of a notorious incompetence. I am also recalling this past because driving a Brt, stamping a TER ticket, having fun in the Dakar Arena would provoke a little humility and less arrogance for a rational mind. On the contrary, the rhetoric of the « State in ruins » due to the lack of falsification of public accounts is still brandished. In short, stupidity always persists, Camus warned us. Thousands of our compatriots are living through an unprecedented humanitarian tragedy for over a century. Bakel has become the materiality of the suffering of Senegalese victims of the flood that followed the overflowing of certain rivers. Worse, it is not only Bakel: Fouta is affected. Our beautiful territory, a burning centre of wisdom, intelligence and fine intuition, is also affected by the overflowing of the Doué River, a river born from the Senegal River, in the heart of the Halpulaar country. Podor, Ndioum and so many other villages are affected in an official silence that speaks volumes… I rely on Charles Péguy: « We must always say what we see; above all, we must always, which is more difficult, see what we see. » In short…

Meanwhile, when energies are expected around a demand to get our compatriots from the North and East out of suffering, the public entertainers’ parade, accuse and, worse, accuse themselves. There is a decency that I have never expected from these people. And, it is still not here.

Read the column – And the petitioning “intellectuals” remain silent…

Rudeness is the trademark of the weak-minded whose only value is to have none of it. To tell the truth, the cruelty of incompetence comes from its companionship with nonchalance, even recklessness. The incompetent, when he also has the bad « good idea » to be talkative, exposes his ignorance and baseness. Many of our compatriots who, in the past, had the weakness to lend them an attentive and benevolent ear, no longer have any illusions. Their former allies, resistant at the time to any cold and objective criticism in the name of « Anything but Macky », wake up groggy, between cyberbullying, arrests and various harassment.

Time is definitely this implacable judge of the vanity of men. When will this chatter, as permanent as it is uncivil, stop and finally get back to work, in order to take care of the widow and the orphan, the precarious student as well as the worker, the retiree as well as the child whose school is invaded by the waters of an overflowing river?

One of them spoke last March of a « Senegal of Almadies facing a Senegal of Parcelles Assainies « . His voice has now been lost in compromise when it comes to pointing out the Senegal of Bakel and that of Dakar Arena.

Bakel has bodies immersed in the waters, among them those of the mothers with faces drowned in tears in front of the dismay of their offspring.

Read the column – A Republican Front !

Children are reduced to wandering in an area cut off from the rest of the world because they cannot go to school. They have seen everything about the indecent show at Dakar Arena and will never forget it. While they suffer, others celebrate. It takes immense nerve to one day dare to tell the story of national unity to the citizens of Bakel and Fouta. And the Left, in all this drama, especially the one that has fallen into moral ruin through opportunism and calculations? The one that swore to defend the oppressed and the outraged in the name of the universalism of the human race. In the name of squatting places, they expelled the people of Bakel, Matam, Podor, Kédougou, from their field of vision of humanity.

History will remember that on October 19, while thousands of Senegalese suffered in their flesh, the privileged strutted at the meeting of shame… You have to violently hate your country to dare to do it.

By Hamidou ANNE / hamidou.anne@lequotidien.sn