By Enyichukwu Enemanna
Prime Minister of Senegal, Ousmane Sonko can run in the country’s upcoming parliamentary elections, the constitutional body has ruled, rejecting an appeal by opposition coalition challenging his candidacy.
The Takku Wallu Senegal coalition led by the immediate past President, Macky Sall had claimed that Sonko was not eligible to run in the snap polls.
The coalition cited the sentencing of Sonko in absentia to two years in prison in June 2023 for “corrupting youth” as point for his disqualification.
In a decision published late Thursday however, the Constitutional Council declared the appeal “inadmissible”.
Only the interior minister can refer a case regarding a candidate’s eligibility, it ruled.
The West African country will vote for a new parliament on November 17, after President Bassirou Diomaye Faye dissolved the opposition-dominated national assembly in September.
Longtime rivals Sonko and Sall were at the centre of a three-year political face-off between 2021 and 2023 which resulted in dozens of deaths.
Sonko was imprisoned for more than seven months under the Sall administration, and following a string of legal battles was blocked from standing in the March presidential election.
Sonko’s former deputy Faye won the presidency with more than 54 percent of the vote, on a promise of a radical break with the past.
In its decision, the Constitutional Council also authorised the candidacy of opposition figure Barthelemy Dias, mayor of the capital Dakar, who was convicted of homicide in 2011.
