Senegalese President Macky Sall easily secures his reelection

Pres. Macky Sall of Senegal

President Macky Sall has been reelected by a for a second and final term, according to provisional results released by the National Vote Counting Commission on Thursday.

The results show that Pres. Sall had a huge lead over the other presidential candidates. He received 58.27% of the votes. With this percentage, a runoff that would have been necessitated had he received less than 50% has been avoided.

His closest competitor was Idrissa Seck, who was making his third attempt at the presidency. Seck received 20.50% of the votes.

Ousmane Sonko, the youngest candidate of the five who were eligible to contest, was third with 15.67% of the votes. He was followed by Issa all (no relation), who had 4.07%, and Madicke Niang, who had 1.48% of the votes.

Turnout was 66.24% of the 6.6 million plus registered voters.

The opposition candidates have expressed dissatisfaction with the results, but will let them stand.

“We firmly and unreservedly reject this result. We will not appeal to the Constitutional Court,” read a joint statement from all four candidates. The four met at the residence of Idrissa Seck.

Ordinarily, electoral petitions must be filed within 72 hours after the results are announced.

This final term that Pres. Sall will be serving will be considerably shorter than his first. A constitutional amendment reduced the presidential term from 7 years to 5 years midway along his first term.

By Matengo Chwanya

Africa Global News Publication