Senegal President Aspires Reelection
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
Luanda, Feb 25 (Prensa Latina) The Senegalese president Abdolouye
Wade expects on Sunday to be reelected in the first round of the
general elections where other 14 candidates will also be presented ,
radio transmissions reported.
Wade won easily in 2000, but his image has benn deteriorated
after seven years in power extreme poverty, high level of unemployment
and illegal emigration to Europe .
The former minister Idrissa Seck, ex political prisoner and
possible outh candidate of Senegal -where the 40 percent of its 12
million of people is under 14 years- is one of the candidates with more
possibilities to defeat Wade.
Analysts say that as the survey´s publication are illegal,
they can not anticipate results, although a second round is foreseen.
In his speech on Friday, Wade warned against any kind of violence during and after the elections.
To keep his position, the actual president needs over 50 percent of the voters.
Poverty Looms over Senegal’s Presidential Vote
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
All Things Considered, February 24, 2007 · There’s a presidential election in Senegal Sunday. The West African nation, with a population of 11 million, is one of Africa’s most stable democracies. Yet, for all the political enlightenment, Senegal’s economy is so poor that tens of thousands of young men have been leaving the country at an alarming rate.
Has the president lived up to his 2000 election pledges, which included jobs for the youth? His record comes under scrutiny as the Senegalese prepare to vote for their new leader.
President Abdoulaye Wade, now in his 80s, is a veteran politician, but spent most of his career in the opposition before winning the last election in 2000.
The lyrics of a song composed for his campaign say, in part: "Yes, old man, we want more." The president’s supporters have sung it throughout a three-week campaign. Wade wants a second term in office, he says, to finish the good work his government has started.
"With President Wade, Senegal has done a lot in seven years," says Cheikh Tidiane Gadio, Senegal’s foreign minister and a part of the president’s campaign team.
But opponents of the Senegalese president accuse him of failing to tackle poverty and other national priorities.
He has 14 challengers for the job, among them Abdoulaye Bathily.
"He mismanaged the country," Bathily says. "The level of corruption has never been reached in this country. The economy is in havoc. His chaotic manner of ruling the country has created today a crisis — political crisis, economic crisis, social crisis, identity crisis."
And a critical social problem — one that has drawn international attention — is the drama of thousands of young Senegalese men trying to leave the country.
A Senegalese rapper, Awadi, has a song called Sunuugall, or "Our Boat." It draws attention to the rickety, wooden fishing boats that carry young men off onto the high seas, on perilous voyages heading for the Spanish Canary Islands, in search of a better life.
Awadi says Senegal’s leaders have killed the hopes of the younger generation.
"They made a lot of promises, but it’s a real disappointment," he says. "They promised jobs, but there is only unemployment.
Senegal awaits election outcome
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
Vote counting is under way in Senegal’s presidential election, with partial results giving President Abdoulaye Wade a lead over his 14 challengers.
But it is still too early to say if Mr Wade will reach the 50% needed to win in the first round of voting.
Mr Wade, who is seeking a second term, has come under pressure in recent months over high rural unemployment.
Turnout was high and some polling stations stayed open an extra four hours to cope with the queues.
Mr Wade sounded confident after he cast his vote and as the counting progressed he was quick to claim victory.
But as the results trickle in, President Wade, who came from behind to win in the last election, will be well aware of the danger of a second round, says the BBC’s Will Ross in Dakar.
Since that election, which saw a rare transfer of power in Africa by the ballot from one leader to a rival, President Wade has fallen out with several of his allies, some of whom were on the ballot papers.
Two of them were Moustapha Niasse and the youthful Idrissa Seck, who have both served as prime minister in Mr Wade’s administration.
Ousmane Tanor Dieng, who served under the previous president, Abdou Diouf, was also seen as a strong contender.
Senegal, a predominately Muslim nation, is seen as a rare model of stable democracy in Africa. It is the only West African nation not to have experienced a coup since independence, and polls in 2000 passed off peacefully.
President Abdoulaye Wade at a rally in Dakar on 23 February
President Abdoulaye Wade is seeking a second term in office
This time some five million people are eligible to vote.
Our correspondent says that after voting began at 0800GMT on Sunday, lengthy queues formed at more than 11,000 polling stations across the country.
Some voters said they would again be backing Mr Wade, pointing that he had started a number of large-scale projects to transform the country.
Others say the construction projects are doing nothing to address the real needs of poor Senegalese.
The number of voters has almost doubled since the last election and there have been no independent opinion polls.
And with so many candidates, it may be extremely hard for any of them to get the 50% of votes needed to win outright in a first round, our correspondent says.
Senegal’s Wade leading in presidential vote
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
President Abdoulaye Wade on Monday claimed victory in Senegal’s presidential election and his supporters celebrated in the streets long before the vote count was completed.
Some of the 14 challengers to the 80-year-old Wade, who became president in 2000 after three decades in opposition, refused to concede defeat in Sunday’s election.
Prime Minister Macky Sall, the president’s campaign manager, said Wade had 57 percent of the votes, according to unofficial partial results.
"I invite all the other candidates to accept the voters’ verdict," added the prime minister.
No official results were released to indicate whether any contender had the required 50 percent for a first-round victory and none of the other contenders gave in.
The independent electoral commission (CENA) said Monday that official partial results were only expected on Wednesday, with full results published by Friday.
"The first national partial figures will be published Tuesday, or most likely on Wednesday, by the commission," a CENA official said, stressing that only the panel "is entitled to do so.
Prior to the vote, several contenders, including Idriss Seck, who was prime minister until Wade sacked him two years ago, said only electoral fraud would make it possible for the head of state to win in the first round.
Pape Diouf, one of Seck’s campaign officials said it was indecent for Sall, the prime minister, to declare Wade’s victory on unofficial results.
"It’s not his role, and it is really indecent," said Diouf, adding "it is regrettable and deplorable in a country like Senegal."
"It is an unfounded bluff. No candidate can reach the 50 percent mark, a second round is inescapable," said Khalifa Sall, campaign manager for Ousmane Tanor Dieng, candidate of the ex-ruling Socialist party.
"Wade is at 48 percent," he said, after earlier stating that Senegalese would not accept Wade’s victory proclamations.
"We are still planning for a second round," he said.
Said a political observer: "I am rather surprised by these results. It’s truly a plebiscite."
"But I also don’t see how rigging could have been so massive," he said in response to opposition allegations.
Wade’s supporters drove around the capital in the early hours of Monday letting off firecrackers, blaring horns and playing Wade’s campaign song at full blast.
Several hundred people wearing Wade T-shirts and carrying flags in the colours of the ruling Senegalese Democratic Party packed the party headquarters, singing and chanting.
Voters thronged polling stations Sunday in the polls seen as a test case of the country’s long-held reputation as an island of stability in west Africa.
Senegal is the only country in the region not to have experienced a military coup since its independence. French rule ended in 1960.
Voting was extended by several hours due to the late delivery of polling material in some areas and a massive turnout at some of the more than 11,000 polling stations scattered across the predominantly Muslim country.
Sall estimated the turnout at a record 70 percent.
Wade, who had predicted victory before polling, said he needed a second and final term to complete his grand promises to reform the country, which had been under Socialist Party rule for the 40 years.
He swept to power in a second-round vote in 2000, ousting Abdou Diouf and succeeding on his fifth attempt at running for office.
Wade has embarked on huge infrastructure projects such as freeways but his critics say he has fallen short on job creation and tackling poverty.
A wave of young men who have left the country to seek jobs in Europe and America became one of the electoral issues.
The election passed off largely peacefully however.
About 2,000 poll observers, including 500 foreigners, monitored voting.
Senegal President Faces 14 Challengers
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
DAKAR, Senegal, Feb. 25, 2007
By RUKMINI CALLIMACHI Associated Press Writer
(AP)
(AP) President Abdoulaye Wade sought to win a second seven-year term in office Sunday, facing off against 14 challengers as voting began in an election to decide who will lead one of Africa’s most stable democracies.
Wade’s opponents are promising to create jobs in a country where half the working-age citizens are unemployed. Among Wade’s strongest opponents is former prime minister Idrissa Seck, who was jailed and later freed after human rights groups cried foul.
Wade, 80, is a decade older than the oldest of his 14 opponents and has been criticized for pursuing glitzy building projects that some say benefit the capital’s cosmopolitan elite while doing little to ease the problem of unemployed youth.
Commonly referred to as "gorgui" _ a respectable Wolof word for "old man" _ Wade says age is not an issue.
Electoral polls are illegal in Senegal and analysts say it is difficult to predict a winner. Seck, who is in his 40s, is widely seen as the candidate of choice among youth in Senegal, where more than 40 percent of the country’s 12 million citizens are under age 14. The voting age is 18.
In 2000, Wade won a landslide victory toppling the Socialist party that had ruled the former French colony for 40 years by appealing, in part, to its disenfranchised youth. He spent three decades in opposition and ran four times for president before being elected.
His slogan of "Sopi," meaning "Change," has been used against him, with posters throughout this seaside capital showing Seck alongside the words: "Vote for real change."
Seck was appointed premier in November 2002 and sacked 15 months later after being accused of embezzling millions of dollars _ charges he denies. He was jailed for seven months starting in July 2005, but then released and cleared of the charges.
Senegal, a dry, dusty and mostly Muslim nation with few natural resources, is one of a handful of African countries never to have suffered a coup. It is viewed as a model of democracy and one of the continent’s most stable countries, with relatively little crime.
Still, Wade’s tenure has met criticism from international rights groups for the jailing of opponents, including Seck, as well as several journalists.
Sporadic violence has marred the election campaign.
The government banned a march organized by opposition leaders last month and security forces fired tear gas into the crowd when leaders decided to go ahead anyway. Moustapha Niasse, a key opposition leader who is also running in Sunday’s race, was dragged through the street by security forces.
This week, Seck’s cavalcade was attacked by a rock-hurling mob chanting "Sopi," Wade’s slogan. The windows of his car were broken and his assistant injured.
Wade has traveled to Sudan and sent peacekeepers there in an effort to broker peace in the troubled Darfur region, but a low-level conflict in southern Senegal’s Casamance province, where separatist rebels have waged a struggle for independence since 1982, grinds on at home.
Wade has overseen an impressive 5 percent growth rate, compared with 1 percent during the 40 years of Socialist rule before he won office.
He points to job-creating initiatives such as raising crops whose oil can be used for biofuels. He says he has invested heavily in measures intended to help his country’s young _ including devoting 40 percent of his budget to education and by opening skills training centers.
But half of the West African nation’s working population is unemployed, causing waves of illegal migration to Europe to increase markedly this year _ perhaps the greatest stain on Wade’s presidency.
About 4.9 million of Senegal’s roughly 12 million people are registered to vote, said Election Commissioner Issa Sall. More than 12,000 polling stations have been set-up nationwide in what will be Senegal’s first election using an electronic voting identification system based on fingerprint and retina recognition.
Senegalese President Leads Election
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
By RUKMINI CALLIMACHI
The Associated Press
Monday, February 26, 2007; 1:23 AM
DAKAR, Senegal — The president of one of Africa’s most stable democracies sought another five-year term Sunday, jostling with 14 contenders in a race that may hinge on the votes of young people hungry for jobs.
Early results reported by state-run Senegalese Press Agency indicated President Abdoulaye Wade was in the lead but did not say by how much. It was not known how many votes had been counted, but they included polling stations in key cities including the capital Dakar and Thies, the agency said.
Wade, who spent three decades in the country’s opposition and ran four times for president before winning in a landslide in 2000, says that he’s spent a lot of time thinking about what Senegal needs and those that criticize him are failing to see the larger picture.(AP Photo/Schalk van Zuydam)
Senegal President Abdoulaye Wade, waves at his supporters during a rally in Dakar, Senegal, Friday, Feb. 23, 2007. Wade, who spent three decades in the country’s opposition and ran four times for president before winning in a landslide in 2000, says that he’s spent a lot of time thinking about what Senegal needs and those that criticize him are failing to see the larger picture.
The first official results are not expected to be released by the electoral commission until Monday night, Election Commissioner Issa Sall told The Associated Press.
Wade has presided over an era of peace rare in a tumultuous part of the continent, and the economy _ though struggling by Western standards _ is stronger than in many African nations. Still, thousands of desperate youths have already voted with their feet, risking their lives to slip illegally into Europe by sea.
The median age in this country of 12 million is about 19 years, according to U.S. government statistics, compared with 36 in the United States. About half of Senegal’s work force is unemployed.
The 80-year-old Wade sounded confident as he cast his ballot in a dusty polling booth in this seaside capital.
"I will win, there is no question about it," he said. "It’s evident that the youth have voted for me."
Among the top challengers are two of Wade’s former prime ministers: Moustapha Niasse, a former U.N. envoy, and Idrissa Seck, jailed by the government for seven months on embezzlement charges that were never proved.
To avoid a run-off, the top candidate needs to win more than 50 percent of the ballot. Though Wade is considered the favorite, the crowded field of challengers could splinter the vote and force a runoff.
When Wade’s black-tinted Hummer pulled up at the polling station, it was mobbed by supporters chanting "gorgui" _ a respectful Wolof word meaning "old man."
Each of the candidates appeared as a grainy photograph on 15 separate pieces of paper to ensure Senegal’s largely illiterate population can easily make their choice.
But some voters complained the supposedly indelible pink-colored ink, used to mark voters’ thumbs to ensure they did not cast multiple ballots, appeared to wash off with soap. To allay those concerns, Wade showed reporters that his thumb remained pink even after he rubbed it vigorously with a Kleenex.
For the Socialist Party’s Tanor Dieng, one of the candidates challenging Wade, the president’s reassurances were not good enough.
"All he can do is bluff, because he knows he’s losing," Dieng said.
International election monitors said early evidence suggested the election was orderly and fair.
Wade, who spent three decades in the country’s opposition, won in a landslide in 2000, defeating the long-ruling Socialist party. He pledged to abolish the system of privilege that characterized the final years of the Socialist regime, and promised investments in education and job training.
Wade claims he has made good on his promises, and has presided over 5 percent annual growth.
But with 48 percent unemployment and the capital suffering cuts in electricity service _ a situation unheard of several years ago _ many say it’s not enough.
"It was the youth that brought him to power and for us it’s been a great disappointment," said Moustapha Diagne, 48, a computer parts importer.
At least 31,000 Senegalese last year undertook the dangerous voyage in small boats by sea to try to reach Europe. Others journeyed north through the burning desert _ and perished along the way.
Wade is also criticized by some for focusing on the problems of the capital and neglecting rural areas. He has not been able to end an insurgency in Senegal’s south.
Still, the president is widely credited with keeping Senegal relatively peaceful on a continent where many nations have suffered coups and wars.
__
Associated Press writers Serigne Adama Boye contributed to this report from Matam, Senegal, and Mamadou Alpha Diallo from Ziguinchor, Senegal.
Calm voting day, long lines as Senegal chooses president
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
Scores of people lined up outside more than 11,000 polling stations around the Senegalese capital Dakar and throughout the country on Sunday to vote in presidential elections that pit 14 candidates against President Abdoulaye Wade who narrowly won the vote in 2000.
The polling, which began at 0800 GMT and was to continue for 10 hours, was proceeding smoothly despite late starts at some stations.
"Many people have been lining up to vote. All in all things are going ahead calmly," said Mamadou Koume, head of the Senegalese Press Agency, who had toured the capital in the first few hours of the voting day.
The predominantly Muslim country is seen as a model for African democracy. The only country in West Africa not to have undergone a coup, Senegal’s three leaders since independence from France in 1960 have each come to power in a peaceful way.
Koume said the skirmishes that broke out earlier this week between rival supporters of two candidates had so far not been replayed on Sunday. He said "all conditions were in place" so that the elections would be transparent and free.
Some five million people out of a population of about 11 million registered to vote in these elections.
Wade, 80, comes up against 14 challengers, including his former Prime Minister Idrissa Seck who was sacked in 2004 and thrown in prison for embezzling money. Also seeking the top spot is Ousmane Tanor Dieng, head of the Socialist Party that ruled the country for 40 years before Wade’s Senegal Democratic Party took power.
Wade came to power pushing "Sopi," or change, and embarked on liberalization efforts but has been criticized for failing to address the grievances of disillusioned unemployed youths, many of whom flee to Europe in rickety boats in desperation.
Because of the high number of candidates, the vote could be split, leading to a run-off election that would be held in March. Parliamentary elections are set to take place in June.
Koume said many Senegalese political analysts have pegged Wade as the winner.
The election campaigning was mostly tame except for the clashes that erupted between Wade and Seck’s supporters in Dakar in which five people were seriously injured.
Senegal’s Wade, 80, Faces Former Ally Seck at Polls (Update1)
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
Feb. 25 (Bloomberg) — Senegalese voters began queuing at
polling stations in the west African nation hours before they
opened, with 80-year-old President Abdoulaye Wade pitted against
14 rivals including former Prime Minister Idrissa Seck.
Wade, who heads the Senegalese Democratic Party, is seeking
a second term in office, promising to tackle poverty and
unemployment if re-elected. He first came to power in 2000,
driving out the Socialist Party which had ruled since the country
won independence from France in 1960.
Idrissa Seck, 47, is a businessman and the favorite to face
Wade in a second round of voting scheduled for March 11 if no one
wins more than half of the first-round vote. Seck was freed from
jail a year ago after six months on charges of embezzlement,
allegations he denied. He has since reconciled with Wade and
rejoined his party.
About 4.9 million people are registered to vote out of a
population of 12 million. Ninety percent of them had got their
voting cards by Feb. 23, Interior Minister Ousmane Ngom told
reporters in the capital Dakar that day. He expects that number
to reach 95 percent today, with people able to pick up their
cards from voting stations.
The election has progressed “according to procedure,”
Marianne Gueye, an official from the George Soros-funded Open
Society Initiative for West Africa, said in an interview in
Dakar. Election authorities will have to work on accelerating
voting to cut waiting times and reduce the long queues snaking
from polling booths in the capital, she added.
Wade Votes
Wade cast his vote at about 12:15 p.m. at a school in
Dakar’s Point E suburb, near his residence. Dressed in a light
blue boubou, Senegal’s traditional floor-length robe, he was
accompanied by hundreds of supporters chanting “Gourgi,
Gourgi”, a word in the local Wolof language meaning, `the man’.
He held no formal press conference after voting.
Polling stations, which were due to close at 6 p.m. local
time, may remain open until 8 p.m. after a later-than-expected
start, Omar M’baye, an official from the National Electoral
Commission, said in an interview today in Dakar. By 8:30 a.m.,
after morning prayers, queues at polling stations in the poor
Dakar neighborhood of Gueule Tapee were lengthening.
Senegal has had seven consecutive years of economic growth
under Wade, although about half the population remains
unemployed. The country’s economy is largely dependent on
agriculture, with more than three quarters of the workforce
employed in peanut, millet and cotton cultivation. The fishing
industry has suffered from depleted stocks.
Construction Projects
“I am free, my children are free, there’s no war, I work in
peace and at the end of the month I earn my money,” Yacine
Diouf, 40, a chef who voted for Wade, said in an interview in
Dakar. “He built the motorway, the roads are clean and Senegal
is good now, better than before 2000.”
Wade has started several large construction projects in a
bid to create jobs, including a new airport and improving roads
across the country, which is slightly smaller than South Dakota.
Senegal ranks 156 out of 177 in the United Nations Human
Development Index.
“I have realized everything that I set out to do in 2000;
I’m confident that the whole population is with me,” Wade told
reporters Feb. 23 at the presidential palace. A second round of
voting is “impossible,” he added.
Media weren’t allowed to publish opinion polls during
campaigning.
`Somebody Younger’
Wade first ran for president in 1978 and was imprisoned
several times for his political activities during the period of
Socialist Party rule.
Wade’s “age is a problem, the presidency should go to
somebody younger,” Ibrahima Diallo, 34, a musician waiting to
vote at the Gueule Tapee polling station, said in an interview.
“He doesn’t know how to work according to priorities.”
Other contenders include city mayor and agricultural
engineer Robert Sagna, 67, who has pledged to bring peace to the
southern province of Casamance, where a low-level rebellion has
continued since the 1980s.
Election results are due this week.
Senegal votes, Wade chases first-round victory
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
Sun Feb 25, 2007 3:44 PM GMT144
By Diadie Ba
DAKAR (Reuters) - Senegal’s five million voters flocked to the polls on Sunday in an election President Abdoulaye Wade hopes will keep him at the helm of one of Africa’s model democracies.
The octogenarian leader, in power since 2000, has promised his supporters he will be re-elected by winning the first poll outright. But his 14 challengers have vowed to dispute a Wade first-round victory, claiming the 50 percent or more needed would be impossible to achieve without fraud.
This has raised fears of possible unrest in one of the rare West African countries not to have experienced a coup or civil war after it gained independence from France in 1960.
Initial results are expected from Monday. If needed, a second-round run-off will be held in mid-March.
From the dusty towns of north Senegal, on the fringes of the Sahara, to forest-hemmed villages in south Casamance region, where separatists fight a low-intensity war, voters turned out to cast their ballots in schools and public buildings.
In the capital Dakar, long lines of voters, many dressed in colourful robes, waited patiently in the sun or in the shade of the thick-trunked baobab trees that dot Senegal’s landscape.
Wade, surrounded by supporters chanting "This man is strong", voted in a Dakar suburb with his family.
"I’m very optimistic and I think I’m going to win in the first round," said the president.
But even as voting progressed, his opponents said they feared Wade’s camp, through its control of the security forces and state institutions, would try to rig the polls to give the incumbent a first-round win.
In a statement, the campaign of Socialist Party candidate Ousmane Tanor Dieng, a leading challenger of Wade, said it had "credible information … of a planned strategy of fraud".
The controversy clearly worried voters too in this predominantly Muslim country of nearly 12 million people, who live mostly from farming and fishing.
"There might be some problems later in the morning. Because those who are in power have done everything possible to stay there, even if an important majority want them to go," said Amadou Ndiaye, 57, a goods handler, as he cast his ballot.
Some people complained of delays in the balloting, which consisted of voters selecting from different coloured slips denoting the 15 candidates.
MIGRATION DRAMA
Wade’s election in 2000 ended four decades of socialist rule. An economic liberal, he argues he has boosted Senegal’s reputation as a stable democracy in a troubled region.
His campaign has included ambitious job-creation projects to build highways, five-star hotels, railways and airports in the country in a bid to try to stop an exodus of desperate young migrants who have tried to leave for Europe in recent years.
Campaigning has largely been peaceful although followers of a religious leader allied to Wade attacked supporters of a rival candidate on Wednesday, injuring at least three people.
Wade’s opponents criticise him for failing to tackle rural poverty, weak infrastructure, rising prices and a lack of jobs in a country where more than half the population is under 18.
Few of the urban young who helped carry Wade to victory in 2000 are expected to swing back to the socialists but the picture could be different in the less-developed interior.
One key challenger, popular former prime minister and one-time Wade protege Idrissa Seck, could emerge as a kingmaker if the incumbent fails to win in the first round.
Seck has ruled out a second-round alliance with his former political godfather.
Senegal’s Wade hopes grand designs will win votes
February 26, 2007 | Leave a Comment
24 Feb 2007 18:41:43 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Nick Tattersall
DAKAR, Feb 24 (Reuters) - A stone’s throw from earthmovers laying a prestigious new coastal highway, the residents of a crumbling neighbourhood in Senegal’s capital Dakar could be forgiven for thinking progress was leaving them behind.
Hoping to win a second mandate in presidential elections on Sunday, incumbent Abdoulaye Wade has made grand infrastructure projects such as the corniche road and a planned new airport one of the cornerstones of his campaign.
"Tireless builder Abdoulaye Wade … launches Dakar on the road to modernity" declares one of his flyers, a picture of the dapper octogenarian leader set alongside architectural designs for new museums, theatres, monuments and schools.
But for residents of Gueule Tapee — one of the city’s many sprawling suburbs where women queue around communal wells to wash pots and pans and wandering goats eat litter off the ground where children play — such grand plans are mere pipe dreams.
"What does that do for people, improving the coastal highway at a cost of billions of francs when 20 km from here there are villages without electricity," said businessman Ousseynou Diouf, 40, reclining under the shade of an acacia tree.
"There’s the lovely new corniche, but 500 metres away look at the state of these houses, look at these streets," he said, clad in a traditional long brown robe and fake Ray-Ban sunglasses, jabbing his finger angrily at the rock-strewn, potholed road.
When Wade won elections in 2000 he brought an end to four decades of socialist rule in the former French colony, a country often viewed as an African success story: one of the continent’s most stable democracies, religiously tolerant and a major recipient of foreign aid as a result.
His critics say he has since failed to create the jobs he promised, concentrating instead on cultivating an image as an African elder statesman and mediator in foreign crises.
He is nonetheless expected to win Sunday’s vote, thanks partly to support from influential Islamic Mouride brotherhood, but also because his optimistic vision of Senegal’s future is enticing even some of those who may not immediately benefit.
"He has a broad vision of development. He is doing everything at once. It is not just the corniche. He has brought water to villages, built roads so produce can be transported out of the bush," said Modou Ndaw, a 45-year-old teacher.
"I personally am in debt, I am suffering, I cannot always help my family. But the development of the country is not just about me. People have to have a wider vision," he said.
Some floating voters not particularly drawn to any of the other 14 candidates — from former prime minister and Wade ally Idrissa Seck to technocrat socialist Ousmane Tanor Dieng — say Wade should be allowed to finish what he has begun.
"He’s the one who started all these works so he has to be the one to finish them. If someone else comes in it will all go to waste," said Amadou Fall, a 26-year-old driver.
"Who else can we vote for?"
