No More Humming Along

NEED TO KNOW

SENEGAL

No More Humming Along

Senegal has long been an island of stability on a continent where war, famine and corruption are unfortunately widespread.

The Francophone West African country’s Feb. 24 presidential election, though, has upended business as usual.

President Macky Sall, who has held office since 2012, is likely to win re-election by garnering sufficient votes to avoid a runoff, reported the Financial Mail, a South African business weekly.

Therein lies the problem.

Last year, Sall and his allies in the National Assembly enacted election reforms that critics argue made it harder for the president’s political opponents to mount a challenge.

Some of the reforms, like requiring presidential candidates to secure thousands of signatures to appear on the ballot, were reasonable. But introducing the requirement a few months before the election was suspicious, wrote the Institute for Security Studies, a South Africa-based think tank.

Then, in January, Senegal’s Const...