Results of the Senegal 2024 legislative elections: What are the main lessons from the November 17 election?

The National Votes Census Commission has just announced the provisional results from the legislative elections of November 17, 2024. They confirm the trends announced by the media since Sunday.

The Pastef list led by Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko comes well ahead of the votes.

Ousmane Sonko and his party, the African Patriots of Senegal for Work, Ethics and Fraternity (PASTEF) won 130 of the 165 seats in parliament.

An “overwhelming” victory and therefore an absolute majority which sounds like a confirmation of the presidential election and the choice of the Senegalese to make a profound break in public governance.

Traditionally, Senegalese voters have always given newly elected presidents a comfortable majority in Parliament, allowing them to implement their reforms and materialize their electoral promises.

A look back at the main lessons of an election which outlines a new reconfiguration of the political spectrum.

Distribution of votes and seats:

Pastef: 1,991,770 votes (54.97%) – 130 seats

Senegal Aid Coalition: 531,466 votes (14.67%) – 16 seats

Peace and Equity Coalition: 330,865 votes (9.15%) – 7 seats

Samm Sa Kaddu Coalition: 222,060 votes (6.13%) – 3 seats

Coalition And Nawlé: 47,636 votes (1.31%) – 2 seats

Senegal Kesse: 25,822 votes (0.71%) – 1 seat

Employment and Transportation Coalition: 26,775 votes (0.74%) – 1 seat

Coalition And Kolute Ngir Senegal: 21,391 votes (0.59%) – 1 seat

Bessal Senegal Coalition: 20,765 votes (0.57%) – 1 seat

Farlu Coalition: 28,303 votes (0.78%) – 1 seat

Sopi Senegal: 22,991 votes (0.63%) – 1 seat

The Nationalists: 26,876 votes (0.74%) – 1 seat

Some 7.3 million voters were called to elect the 165 deputies to sit in the National Assembly for a five-year mandate.

The Senegalese have massively renewed their confidence in the ruling party Pastef and its leader Ousmane Sonko, however the mobilization of voters was not at the level of the last presidential election.

With a participation rate estimated at 49.72%, slightly up compared to the 2022 legislative elections (46.6%) but well below the rate recorded during the presidential election of March 24 (61%), these early legislative elections remain generally in the trend observed for legislative elections in Senegal.

This relative demobilization of voters for the election of deputies is explained by the different nature of the elections, presidential elections crystallizing more issues naturally arouse more interest among citizens which translates into high participation at the polls.

Participation rate in previous legislative elections:

• 2024 : 49,72%
• 2022 : 46,64%
• 2017 : 53,66 %
• 2012 : 36,67 %
• 2007: 34.75% (marked by a significant opposition boycott)
• 2001 : 67,4%

By choosing to lead his party’s list and go alone to these early legislative elections, Ousmane Sonko, charismatic figure and head of government, took and assumed a political risk which ultimately paid off.

This victory is therefore a personal revenge for the president of Pastef, whose candidacy for the presidential election had been invalidated and who had forced him to review his plans by propelling President Bassirou Diomaye Faye, elected from the first round with 54% of the votes.

The provisional official results of the early legislative elections confirm the hegemony of Pastef, which after having conquered the Executive, thus gives itself the means to realize the promises thanks to an overwhelming majority in Parliament.

The stakes were indeed high for the head of government and his party who were aiming for an absolute majority in the national assembly in order to have free rein to implement his “rupture” program and carry out his reforms.

The current Prime Minister will thus have weighed in with all his weight and used his political influence to carry out a veritable electoral raid and win the votes. 130 seats out of 165 of the hemicycle. 40 of the 46 departments fell into the hands of the presidential party, only six escaped the wave of Pastef.

Ousmane Sonko once again demonstrates that he is undoubtedly the most influential politician in Senegal. This electoral success which bears his personal signature will further establish his political legitimacy.

Wednesday during the weekly meeting of the Council of Ministers, President Bassirou Diomaye Faye praised “his personal commitment and his leadership”

“The Head of State sent his sincere congratulations to Ousmane Sonko, Prime Minister and President of Pastef, for his personal commitment and leadership, which allowed his party to obtain an absolute majority in the National Assembly,” indicates the press release from the Council of Ministers.

“This plebiscite, after that of the presidential election of March 24, reflects the positive appreciation given to the achievements recorded during these first seven months in power, a guarantee of the holding of the promised ruptures,” underlined Ousmane Sonko during the Council of Ministers held on Wednesday, November 20.

For the former head of state Macky Sall, head of the list of the Takku Wallu coalition, composed mainly of the APR and the PDS of Me Abdoulaye Wade, the return to the forefront of the political scene is a failure. The political coalition led by the former president suffered another electoral defeat in the space of eight months.

Absent from the country since his departure from the presidency and exiled in Morocco, the former president failed to counter the victorious wave of Ousmane Sonko and the presidential camp.

The ex-president saw several of his strongholds fall to the side of power, this is particularly the case of his historic stronghold, the region of Fatick (Central West).

He will still have managed to retain some electoral strongholds, mainly in Fouta (North East) where he comes first in 3 departments (Matam, Kanel Ranérou Ferlo), in addition to the department of Goudiry (Tambacounda region in the east). ) and the department of Central Africa, one of the districts of the Diaspora.

Macky Sall, who did not campaign for these early elections, therefore fails in his quest for cohabitation.

Coming second at the end of the presidential election and credited with 35.79% of the votes, Amadou Ba is the other big loser in these early legislative elections.

Considered by many observers as the leader of the opposition the day after the presidential election, the former prime minister who led the “Jamm Ak Njarin” coalition risks losing credibility with a view to a reconfiguration of the political space in the weeks and months to come.

In his battle for positioning vis-à-vis his former allies of the APR, Amadou Ba is losing ground compared to the presidential election but can consider himself lucky to have won a symbolic department, that of Podor, in the northeast , until now an electoral stronghold of the APR, the party of its former leader Macky Sall.

The Battle of Dakar was eagerly awaited. It was finally won by Pastef ahead of the Samm Sa Kaddu coalition led by Barthelemy Dias, the mayor of Dakar.

The opposition coalition which suffered from its lack of political project was beaten in all departments including that of Dakar.

The defeat of the mayor of Dakar against Ousmane Sonko’s Pastef sounds like a disavowal for Barthélémy Dias who had made supremacy in the capital a personal affair, particularly in his political rivalry against Pastef and its leader Ousmane Sonko.

This new setback in Dakar, eight months after that of its leader Khalifa Sall in the presidential election, constitutes a decisive turn in the quest for the coveted leadership of the Senegalese capital.

This was one of the reasons given to justify the dissolution of the national assembly by President Diomaye Faye.

The absolute majority in the legislative elections should allow the Senegalese head of state to carry out his reforms contained in the Senegal 2050 economic transformation program, even if his first challenge will be to develop a budget in a context of budgetary crisis.

A draft 2025 budget will be presented to the National Assembly as soon as the new legislature is installed, the installation of which is planned within two weeks.

“We need to have the legislative means, to be able to pass our laws, to control government action, to carry out accountability. All those who are involved in unclear things will be held accountable. However, only a High Court of Justice can judge personalities like ministers or the President of the Republic, and only the National Assembly has the power to set up this High Court of Justice. This is why we need the Senegalese to give us an overwhelming majority.

Ousmane Sonko had sworn, in the event of victory and an absolute majority, the High Court of Justice would be set up to judge the dignitaries of the old regime guilty of corruption and acts comparable to “high treason”.

This special jurisdiction is responsible for judging the President of the Republic in cases of high treason and members of the government guilty of crimes or offenses in the exercise of their functions. It is chaired by the highest magistrate of the judicial order of Senegal, notably the first president of the Supreme Court.

According to the Senegalese Constitution, a former president can be indicted by the Assembly by a three-fifths majority, and tried by the High Court.

Repeal of the amnesty law

It was one of the commitments of candidate Bassirou Diomaye Faye and his prime minister Ousmane Sonko, the repeal in the event of an absolute majority in parliament, of the amnesty law concerning crimes and offenses committed during political crises between 2021 and 2024 This law was passed by the parliamentarians of the presidential majority under Macky Sall.

Despite the fact that it was the main beneficiary of the amnesty law, with the release of hundreds of its supporters and especially its leaders Ousmane Sonko and Bassirou Diomaye Faye, the Pastef party rejected the law.