The Ad Hoc Commission of the Senegalese National Assembly is due to rule, this Monday, February 22, 2021, on the lifting of the parliamentary immunity of the opposition MP, Ousmane Sonko, the subject of a rape complaint. However, the work of the said committee risks being hampered by the resignation of MPs Moustapha Guirassy and Cheikh Bamba Dièye.
It is this Monday February 22 that the Ad Hoc Committee of the National Assembly must rule on the lifting of the parliamentary immunity of Ousmane Sonko. But MEPs Moustapha Guirassy and Cheikh Bamba Dièye, who were to represent the pole of the opposition and that of the unregistered, decided to throw in the towel.
UCAD lecturer and researcher Dr Bara Amar says the exercise will be blocked by article 34 of the National Assembly’s rules of procedure. “The session scheduled for this morning should not be held”, he declared, adding that the commission is composed of 11 members chosen according to the procedure of article 34. However, the said article stipulates that “all the members of the commission are appointed by the National Assembly on a pro rata basis, on the proposal of the administratively constituted groups, in particular the parliamentary groups which propose their representatives ”.
“When you do the math, the eight members of said ad hoc committee come from the presidential sphere. They are complemented by two opposition members and one non-member. This means that, instead of 11 legally binding members, we will have nine. The resignation will certainly bias the work “, advance Bara Amar who specifies:” There will be a blockage which brings the said commission back to square one, that is to say, propose two other deputies who will join the 9 remaining to examine the question. And if these parliamentary groups refuse, the commission will not be legally constituted ”.
An opinion that does not share the first vice-president of the National Assembly, Abdou Mbow. For the latter, the resignation of Cheikh Bamba Dièye and Moustapha Guirassy from the ad hoc committee in no way hinders the continuation of the work already started. As proof, he recalls, during the request for the lifting of the parliamentary immunity of Khalifa Ababacar Sall, former mayor of Dakar, the deputy Madické Niang, then president of the parliamentary opposition group, had resigned and that no did not prevent the Commission from completing its work.
