The Senegalese authorities engage in a major reform of local authorities, considering extending the areas of jurisdiction from nine to thirteen while removing the regional development agencies (ARD). This initiative aims to create territories poles that will serve as inter-regional development entities. This was discussed during the consultations organized from May 2 to 3, 2025 in Sédhiou, under the leadership of Moussa Balla Fofana, Minister of Town Planning, Local Authorities and Territorial Planning, reports Sud Quotidien.
The Minister underlined that a territorial transformation is necessary for better decentralization, known as act 4. This reform implies reassessing the skills transferred to the municipalities, departments and future territories centers. Currently, nine skills are transferred and the presidency wishes to add four additional.
Moussa Balla Fofana has recognized that existing skills are already sources of many challenges. He explained that the new objective is to reassess the role of the organs involved, their missions and the allocated means.
Mamadou Oury Baïlo Diallo, mayor of Vélingara and president of the Association of Mayors of Senegal (AMS), supports this participatory approach. However, he insists on the need to allocate the means corresponding to the new skills, in order to guarantee the proper functioning of local communities: “It is crucial to transfer the means with skills,” he said.
The abolition of the ARD, however, arouses a debate. El Hadji Omar Kanté, among others, expressed her disagreement, believing that she could lead to an eternal restart. The work has closed with the promise of a technical commission to synthesize the recommendations and transmit it to the President of the Republic, according to information provided by Sud Quotidien.
