DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — Senegal’s authorities Monday dissolved a significant opposition celebration hours after the celebration’s common president and opposition chief mentioned a decide ordered his arrest.
Ousmane Sonko, a towering opposition determine broadly supported by Senegal’s youth, was in jail Monday as he awaited trial for brand spanking new prison prices, mentioned his celebration’s communications director, El Malick Ndiaye. It’s unclear when the trial will happen. He’s accused of calling for riot, conspiring towards the state, threatening nationwide safety and different prices.
“I’ve simply been unjustly positioned below a committal order,” Sonko wrote on his Fb web page Monday, which communications director Ndiaye confirmed.
Earlier on Monday, Senegal’s inside minister issued an announcement claiming Sonko’s opposition celebration had been dissolved. The Patriots of Senegal for Work, Ethics and Fraternity (PASTEF) celebration has “continuously known as on its supporters to participate in insurrectionary actions,” Antoine Félix Diome, Senegal’s inside minister, alleged in an announcement.
Diome blamed the opposition celebration’s leaders for inflicting lack of life and the looting of properties throughout protests in June towards the prosecution of opposition chief Ousmane Sonko, who’s seen as a key challenger within the election.
The opposition celebration’s dissolution was criticized by former Prime Minister Aminata Touré as an “unprecedented setback” within the West African nation’s democratic historical past. It additional raised issues about subsequent yr’s presidential election in Senegal, lengthy thought-about a bastion of democracy and a regional chief in diplomacy.
“In his despotic dedication to carry on to energy in Senegal, albeit by proxy, Macky Sall has simply opened the floodgates to chaos by imprisoning, on spurious grounds, his fundamental opponent Ousmane Sonko,” mentioned a PASTEF communiqué Monday, after Diome’s claimed to have disbanded the celebration.
“Even when they dissolve PASTEF, they’ll’t dissolve its spirit,” Ndiaye mentioned.
The Senegalese authorities, in the meantime, restricted cell web companies on Monday, a measure taken “as a result of dissemination of hateful and subversive messages on social networks,” in keeping with Moussa Bocar Thiam, the communications minister.
Residents all through the nation reported they weren’t in a position to entry the web.
Sonko mentioned a neighborhood decide within the capital Dakar ordered him held briefly following recent prices towards him Saturday, together with conspiracy towards the state and requires riot. The fees are completely different from an earlier one in every of corrupting youth. That led to Sonko’s conviction in June, which ignited lethal protests throughout the nation with 23 individuals killed.
Sonko is common amongst Senegal’s youth and has been seen as a menace to the ruling celebration forward of the 2024 election. His supporters have mentioned the costs are to forestall him from operating once more for president after he positioned third within the 2019 race.
From his cell in Sebikotane jail, simply exterior the capital Dakar, Sonko can run for president within the 2024 election, communications director Ndiaye mentioned, a declare the AP couldn’t instantly confirm.
“If the Senegalese individuals, for whom I’ve at all times fought, abdicate and determine to depart me within the fingers of (President) Macky Sall’s regime, I’ll, as at all times, undergo God’s will,” Sonko wrote on his Fb web page.
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