DAKAR (TrustLaw) – Senegal’s President-elect Macky Sall plans to reform governance and fight corruption in the country, but he’ll struggle to deliver on this unless he keeps his electorate on side by cutting food prices first and foremost, analysts warn.
Parliamentary elections are slated for June, and Sall, who takes office next week, will need a majority in parliament to form a strong government that would allow him to implement his planned governance reforms. This makes it imperative for him to keep voters on his side, analysts say.
Sall, who campaigned in part on strengthening institutions that provide oversight on government and ensure a transparent management of public affairs, is expected to order a public finance audit among his first moves in office when he officially succeeds Abdoulaye Wade.
Wade's administration has been tainted by allegations of corruption and nepotism.
“People expect him (Sall) to end growing impunity that allowed those close to the outgoing regime to feed fat from state coffers without any action taken against them,” said Libasse Hane, an expert on governance in Senegal.
But experts say the new president must also move quickly on another major campaign promise – to cut the prices of basic foods including rice (the local staple), sugar and cooking oil.
“All I want from him is a reduction in the price of the sack of rice and the packet of sugar or else we will send him away as we did to the old man (Wade),” said Babacar Ngom, a taxi-driver in Dakar.
“Remember that there are elections again soon, so he had better come good on his promises.”
Sall has promised to reduce taxes particularly on imported rice and intends to cut expenditure on heavy bureaucracy to fund the move, in a high-profile show of his resolve to help the poor.
His administration will also have to respond urgently to the needs of more than 800,000 people facing food insecurity this year, after drought in 2011 caused a shortfall in food production in parts of the country.
“The average Senegalese expect good governance and a reduction in corruption but what matters most to them is how they are going to feed their families,” said Abdou Lo, the head of Primum Africa Consulting, a Dakar-based consultancy on political communication.
ROOTING OUT CORRUPTION
Senegal's intellectual elite has urged the incoming administration to prioritise reforms in the area of good governance and the strengthening of state institutions, which they view as key to tackling most of the country’s other problems.
They use opinion columns in newspapers and debate shows on TV to argue that corruption and bad governance take away resources that could be used to fund development projects to improve healthcare, food security and to provide basic amenities such as power and potable water.
Many want Sall to act swiftly on promises of limiting the powers of the presidency and ensure that there is a clear separation of powers between the executive, the parliament and the judiciary, as a starting point to improve governance in the country.
“Corruption will not go away from Senegal if we continue to have a judiciary that takes orders from the executive and a parliament that cannot take action on its own for the good of the people,” Hane told TrustLaw in Dakar.
“How do you expect corruption to end if ministers can force courts not to investigate corruption scandals involving people connected to the regime?” he added.
In principle, there is separation of powers in Senegal, but in practice the executive, especially the presidency, is more powerful, he explained.
“We had a president who was stronger than the institutions of the state – that has to change if we must talk of good governance,” Hane said.
(Editing by Rebekah Curtis)
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