Mobhare Matinyi
    WITH AN EAGLE’S EYE
Senegal and Tanzania share some astonishing similarities that can generate an interesting discourse for the benefit of both African countries that do not even boast low-level diplomatic relations.

Apart from sharing the same month for their national days -- Senegal’s on April 4 as Independence Day and Tanzania’s on April 26 as Union Day -- both countries had the rare opportunity of having as their first president someone who was charismatic, intelligent and highly philosophical, that is, Léopold Senghor and Julius Nyerere, respectively.

Senghor and Nyerere, who also happened to be teachers before joining politics, both believed in African socialism and became the first African presidents to relinquish power voluntarily, in 1980 and 1985 respectively. Africa had to wait for another ten years before Tanzania produced another truly retired president, Ali Hassan Mwinyi in 1995, before Nelson Mandela in 1999.

Senegal started in 1960 as federal republic composed of Senegal itself and the French Sudan, the present day Mali, but lasted only for a few months. Tanzania did not succeed in convincing Uganda and Kenya to form the East African Federation immediately after independence in the early 1960s.

Senegal later attempted a shaky union with Gambia in 1982, forming Senegambia, but within seven years everything fell apart. Luckily, Tanzania is an outcome of the 1964 union between Tanganyika and Zanzibar and is still surviving; although some politicians are doing everything they can to weaken the union.

Because of his compromising attitude, the second president of Senegal, Abdou Diouf, allowed political reforms in his country after civil unrest, imprisonment of his opponents, and a possibly rigged election in 1988. The second president of Tanzania, Mwinyi, in 1990 peacefully opened the door to every kind of reform, good and bad.

In principle, the Diouf reforms are the ones that brought in Abdoulaye Wade as the third president of Senegal in 2000, and that is where the issues start. President Wade, who is 85 years old or possibly even older than that, is an interesting character with two doctorates, in law and economics. Wade spent 22 years chasing the presidency before ousting Diouf in 2000.

Wade, whose daughter Sindjely works as his special assistant, is married to a French woman, Viviane, 78, and their son, Karim, 42, has been a “super minister” since 2009. The unpopular and perhaps incapable young man runs four strategic ministries, namely international cooperation, energy, air transport, and infrastructure, after handing over one, urban and regional planning, to another minister in 2010.

Now, faced with the reality of politics and life, President Wade wants to get a third term and then install a new position of vice president who will be required by constitution to assume power if the president dies. Any guesses? One does not need to be a genius to guess who will become the first vice president of Senegal should that deal succeed.

Performance wise, Wade has failed to provide the Senegalese people with electricity, and his last serious effort was to replace the energy minister, Samuel Sarr, with his own son, the super minister Karim, in 2010. Now Sarr serves as a minister of state and special presidential advisor.

The Senegalese National Electric Company, Senelec, is struggling a lot, just like Tanzania’s government and Tanesco, with little hope, if any, of resolving the power problem any time soon. While Tanzanians are competing over who can buy a bigger generator or tolerate darkness, Senegalese are rioting and burning Senelec offices and cars.  

The month of June was tough in Senegal, and things got spiced up when people heard that their overage president was trying to amend theconstitution to get another third term. The country is now swimming in the waves of demonstrations.

As one would expect, police at some point just watched looters doing whatever they wanted, and that prompted the government to bring in the military to protect its buildings and the residences of senior officials. Things may actually get to the point of the masses confronting the family of the president and his buddies, and that will be unfortunate because the referees will have to be the armed soldiers.

Wade is also facing an under-the-table rebellion within his political party, Parti Démocratique Sénégalais (PDS), because they are tired of him and do not think his son should be the next leader. Luckily for him, the opposition is very weak.

Coincidentally, Wade also faces opposition from local Muslim imams who opposed his project for a 160-foot bronze statue, and so are Christian bishops who complained that he insulted Jesus.

In general, apart from grooming his successor and failing to provide power to his people, Wade is accused of excessive spending, corruption, nepotism, constraint on the freedom of the press, and restraint of civil liberties. Undoubtedly, Tanzania’s leaders have a big lesson to learn, for better or for worse.

Mr Matinyi is a consultant based in Washington, DC
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