Senegal: Seck plans US visit to undercut President Sall’s potential third term bid

Former Prime Minister Idrissa Seck has hired two US human rights advocates to help raise the alarm in Washington over several potentially ominous developments. These include the widespread expectation that President Macky Sall will run for a controversial third term in next year’s election and mounting legal troubles facing Sall’s main opponent.

To help raise awareness, Seck last month retained the services of James Johnson, a retired civil rights attorney. Johnson, who charges $400 per hour, is a friend from his college days who previously advocated for the Senegalese politician when he served time in prison in 2005-2006 after falling out with President Abdoulaye Wade.

“Now, 18 years later, Idrissa has asked me to help him again,” Johnson tells The Africa Report. “He is deeply concerned about the 2024 elections cycle.”

Johnson in turn helped connect Seck with Jeffrey Smith of Vanguard Africa, which just signed a $35,000 two-month contract with the presidential hopeful to increase his visibility in the US capital.

“We will definitely recommend and plan accordingly for a trip to Washington, DC for Hon. Seck to meet with US government officials,” Smith tells The Africa Report in an email. “This strategic outreach will be crucial for the future of US-Senegal relations.”

Gathering clouds

The lobbying and public relations campaign comes as Sall’s opponents are increasingly concerned that he will run for a third term. Senegal changed its constitution in 2016 – after Sall was first elected in 2012 – to limit presidents to two five-year terms, but Sall argues that his first term doesn’t count against the total.

The president’s refusal to rule out running again is inflaming political tensions in Senegal. Last month, more than 100 political and civil society groups banded together as the Mouvement des Forces Vives du Sénégal F24 to build pressure against a third Sall mandate.

The February 2024 election in Senegal is an inflection point for the country, and arguably for the region writ large

Adding to the tensions are efforts to bar Sall’s main rival, former chief tax inspector Ousmane Sonko, from running for office as he faces charges of rape and making death threats against an employee of a beauty salon in Dakar. Sonko finished third in the 2019 election, behind Sall and Seck.

Seck, a prime minister from 2002 to 2004, had been serving as the head of the country’s Economic and Social Council in Sall’s coalition government, but was released from his duties last month so he could run for president. He believes Sonko should be allowed to run – for now.

“Sonko has the right to be free of the presumption of guilt unless and until he has a fair trial proving the crime and exhausting appeals,” says Johnson, who first met Seck in 1989 when both had fellowships to attend the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs. “And the highest priority is to eliminate the incentive for political leaders to prosecute their rivals for crimes in order to eliminate their opponents’ rights to free political expression.”

Smith for his part says he will engage with human rights and pro-democracy communities, as well as think tank leadership, to advocate for “free, fair and credible elections in Senegal” as part of his work for Seck.

“The February 2024 election in Senegal is an inflection point for the country, and arguably for the region writ large,” says Smith, who advocates for several African pro-democracy opposition leaders, including Uganda’s Bobi Wine, Martin Fayulu in Democratic Republic of Congo and Tanzania’s Tundu Lissu.

“The twin issues of a third term for the president and the pending accusations by prosecutors against one of the president’s main rivals, [Ousmane] Sonko, present a crisis of governance that could result in the same types of repression, but even worse, that plagued Idrissa in 2005.”