Sunday 30 July, it is voting day for the legislative elections in Senegal. 6 million Senegalese are called to the polls to renew their legislature.
47 lists are presented to the voters against 12 in 2012, a number that had revived the political debate for months on the national level and in the Senegalese diaspora.
Three days before the election, President Macky Sall ordered all those who had received their ECOWAS biometric card to vote with their passport, old ID card or receipt. A decision that surprised and disconcerted the members of the opposition but also civil society as a whole. The latter had deplored the 50 billion dollars spent by the State without being able to manufacture all the voter cards in time and hours to allow citizens to go to the polls calmly.
Thus, at this day of crucial vote for the march of the country for the years to follow, on the national level as well as in the diaspora, the polling stations were supposed to open from 8 am and close at 6 pm. Unfortunately everything did not happen as the organizers hoped, many centers opened their doors and started the vote well after 9am. As a result, in some localities, a possibility of extending the voting could be considered in the event that not all voters had time to plunge their envelopes into the ballot box.
In Pikine, a conscious suburb, where all the popular revolts start, especially if they do not agree with the politicians, the offices were only opened at 11 am. Only 16 of the 47 files were available. Some did not even have the photo of their candidate affixed to them.
Here in this video, a voter among the first voters.
In Touba, the holy city of Muridism, at the Baye Lahat University voting center, polling stations were ransacked. Urns were destroyed, almost 20 policemen were on site to secure the site. At issue is the slow opening of the polling station that would not have pleased voters. It was not until 12 o’clock that the voting process started for those who had gone to the polls early in the morning.
In Ziguinchor, heavy rain disrupted and interrupted the vote. Fleeing the showers, the voters all took refuge in the polling station, others preferred to go home.
In the diaspora, irregularities would have been noted. In Marseille, for example, voters arrived at their supposed polling station but were unable to vote. The office officials advised them to go to the other offices, but after going through the other 4 offices, they did not find their names on the list, they had to go home, Expressed their dissatisfaction at the polling stations. . “Here in Marseille more than 1400 people have not voted. 3 out of 4 voters went home because they were told that he could not vote, “said Cheikh Moctar, a voter who went to the polls. More unusual, some candidates for the deputation themselves were not able to vote.
At the Palais des congrès de Montreuil in Paris, a polling station of more than 30,000 voters, after a few couacs, voted them back. Most have denounced the lack of organization, some even talk about sabotage of the vote. “Unsurprisingly, the ballot can be described as anything but organized. A room too small to accommodate the tide of Senegalese citizens who made the trip to vote. Polling stations without bulletins. It takes a very long tail to get at least 5 ballots, it is amazing, but mandatory according to them, then to go to queue again to vote. An organization of amateurs, under conditions unworthy for the voters, “replied Madi voted very early in the morning.
It should be noted that the first results of these legislative elections to a single round are expected in the night from Sunday to Monday.
