The recent crisis that hit Senegal lately is much more than a simple protest after the arrest of Ousmane Sonko. His interpellation was actually the trigger that enabled the Senegalese population to set free all their frustration and dissatisfaction over the last few years, sometimes not even related to Ousmane Sonko.

The main contender of Senegalese president Macky Sall was put under arrest on Wednesday 3^rd of this month, while he was on his way to the court to respond to the judges concerning a rape case. Considering this charge as a plot against him to prevent him from competing in the upcoming presidential election of 2024, Ousmane Sonko was interpellated for public nuisance, and this is what caused all this social trouble.

People have started demonstrating in the streets ever since, blaming the president for this weird arrest and for the long-lasting issues that have been hitting the population so far, the youngsters in particular. Most of the Senegalese youth is currently unemployed and looking for a job that never comes. Perspectives do not exist in a country where the living conditions worsened because of the sanitary crisis.

This legitimate discontent was recently appeased when Ousmane Sonko was finally set free under judiciary control, but the five dead and the plundering, without mentioning the climate of uncertainty and the looking-like-a-war-zone streets of Dakar, will not make the Senegalese forget about what they fought for. Beyond Sonko and his arbitrary arrest, it is all a bunch of problems that need to get taken care of, and Macky Sall must give answers to his young population.

It is not a habit for Senegal to sink into chaos like that, and the country has been known all over Africa for its safety and calm politically speaking. It is now time to heal the wounds and act so that such deeds never happen again.

sources leparisien.fr and rtl.fr