In Senegal, the electoral campaign for the legislative elections of November 17, 2024 officially began on Sunday October 27, 2024.
In this electoral context, the coalition The nationalists, Jël liñu moom (Wolof term meaning “Take what belongs to us”) led by politician Tahirou Sarr, made a public declaration broadcast on national television RTS1, on November 3, 2024 , as part of the Electoral Campaign Journal dedicated to these legislative elections. On this occasion, Tahirou Sarr, who spoke in Wolof, said: “Foreigners represent almost half of the (Senegalese) population.”
In 2023, the total resident population of Senegal amounts to 18,126,390 people according to the latest statistics from the National Agency for Statistics and Demography (ANSD).
It should be noted that the leader of the Senegalese nationalist movement Tahirou Sarr has already been the subject of calls to order and indignation from the Council for the Observation of the Rules of Ethics and Professional Conduct in the media ( CORED) as well as civil society organizations for his speech deemed xenophobic towards the foreign community living in Senegal.
We attempted to obtain details from Tahirou Sarr regarding the source of his statement. But our phone calls and messages went unanswered. This article will be updated if we receive feedback in this direction.
What does the available data say?
Abou Ba is a demographic statistical engineer, head of the population division at the Ministry of Economy, Planning and Cooperation. He informed us that on this date, in terms of migration, the most reliable and complete data are those coming from the fifth General Population and Housing Census (RGPH-5) carried out by the ANSD. in 2023.
Abou Ba says he participated, as a sworn demographer, in the collection of data on behalf of the RGPH-5. “We surveyed more than 96% of the population. This means that it is an excellent coverage rate at the national level. A census is reliable if the response rate is greater than 90%”
Contacted by Africa Check for clarification, the ANSD indicated that the data regarding foreigners in Senegal is found in “chapter I” of the RGPH-5 provisional report published in July 2024.
Indeed, we can read in this provisional report that foreigners represent 1.1% of the resident population; representing a total of 207,791 individuals.
“Foreigners living in Senegal are mainly nationals of a country in West, Central, North and Southern Africa. However, citizens of West African countries, in particular nationals of countries neighboring Senegal such as Guineans (40.3%), Malians (14.9%), Bissau-Guineans (4.4% ), Gambians (3.0%), and Mauritanians (2.1%), are more numerous. Furthermore, the presence of nationals from countries in Europe (4.0%), Asia, (2.3%) America (1.0%) and Oceania (0.1%) represent ( 7.4%),” it is stated in the document.
As for people who have not declared their nationality, they represent 5.1% of those questioned, underlines the report.
Contacted by Africa Check for additional data on the issue, the Senegalese Ministry of the Interior told us to refer to the Directorate of Foreigners and Travel Documents Police (DPETV). But she did not respond to our requests.
“A big mistake” to say that foreigners represent half of the Senegalese population
According to demographic statistician engineer Abou Ba, the declaration that nearly half of the Senegalese population is made up of foreigners “is purely a falsehood that we should be particularly wary of”.
“If we are not careful, it can burn relations between countries. When other people say subjectively that there is a high number of foreigners in Senegal, it is up to them to demonstrate it,” he recalled.
Demographer Professor Mohamadou Sall, who directs the Institute of Training and Research in Population, Development and Reproductive Health (IPDSR) at Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar. He believes that the information according to which almost half of the population is made up of foreigners is a big error.
The reliability of RGPH-5 data on foreigners
According to the ANSD “RGPH-5 is an operation during which we obtained a national coverage rate of 96%. This rate is a national average.
As for people of foreign nationality not listed or who have not declared their nationality, the Senegalese statistical authority explained to Africa Check that “there was a minimal number of individuals listed but not having declared their nationality and for whom, we cannot certify that they are of foreign nationality.
On this same question, expert Abou Ba explains that to carry out a study, the demographer or statistician sticks to the declaration of the respondent who is supposed to be in good faith. This is why the study data is reliable, since it reflects the responses of those interviewed. This area falls under quantitative survey, he noted.
Abou Ba adds that if there was a need to check the level of reliability of the respondents’ responses, this would involve us in the qualitative dimension of the study. And this is not the work of the demographer or statistician, but of the socio-anthropologist. To carry out this verification, the latter can study behavioral, sociological and migratory issues, he underlined.
Limits on the number of foreigners recorded by the ANSD
Ndatar Sène, statistical and demographic engineer, discussed the reasons why the number of foreigners recorded by the RGPH-5 appears to be underestimated.
For him, in general, there is a feeling of underestimation of the number of residents in Senegal, including foreigners, because many of them say they have not been personally surveyed within the framework of RGPH-5. But, continues Sène, apart from omissions and non-responses which are of the order of only 4%, the census has an excellent coverage rate, which was reinforced, shortly after the publication of RGPH-5, by a post-census survey having remedied most cases of omission.
The other factor explaining a possible underestimation of the number of foreigners is that the RGPH-5 only recorded those living in households. “Foreigners without a fixed address or household are difficult to identify,” said Ndatar Sène.
Note that in its work, the ANSD distinguishes two types of households: the ordinary household and the collective household. The ordinary household is generally defined by the ANSD as being a group of people, related or not, who live together under the same roof and pool all or part of their resources to meet their basic needs, in particular housing and food. As for the collective household, it is a group of people who, for extra-family reasons, in particular professional, health, school, religious, deprivation of liberty, live together in an establishment or a specialized institution. . The administrative or legal status of these institutions or establishments requires any person outside the institution to obtain special authorization from those responsible before carrying out any activity there, including the census, according to the ANSD.
Ndatar Sène also indicated that within the framework of RGPH-5, the ANSD attempted to identify “the floating population” among foreigners. This means the homeless, who often sleep in garages, markets and other temporary homes. Although this census of the floating population, which lasted a single night, was not carried out in all places in Senegal, but in a few targeted areas.
All these factors contribute to the hypothesis of an underestimate of the number of foreigners provided by the RGPH-5. However, it should be noted that the ANSD figure reporting 207,791 foreigners is reliable scientific data which makes it possible to measure a certain migratory reality in Senegal, noted Ndatar Sène.
Conclusion: Tahirou Sarr’s statement is incorrect, given the available data
According to Senegalese politician Tahirou Sarr, foreigners represent almost half of his country’s population.
The most recent and most reliable data on the subject, obtained from the National Agency for Statistics and Demography of Senegal, show 207,791 foreigners, or 1.1% of the population.
According to the experts interviewed, although limitations were noted in the ANSD census on foreigners, they do not constitute half of the population of Senegal.
Consequently, Tahirou Sarr’s statement is incorrect.
Article edited by Valdez Onanina.
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