Is Wade qualified to assume his presidency?

By Frederic Tendeng
It is disheartening and shocking to recently hear Senegal’s President, Maître Abdoulaye Wade expressing his will to seek another seven year presidential term in 2012. He will be 88 and will no doubt hit the Guinness book of records as the first President in the world who campaigned to remain in power up to the age of 95. In Tunisia, Habib Bourguiba was 82 when he was deposed for physical en mental incapacity to handle the position of Head of State. Wade is disqualified because he no longer represents national unity in his country. In fact, nothing from his governance pleads in his favor. By uplifting his family to control the fattest shares in the government set up and entrusting his son with a super ministry, (Ministry of International Cooperation, of Land Management, Air Transport and Infrastructure) , Wade is now acting as a clan leader who installs the state institutions’ in unprecedented contingencies as far as the history of Senegal is concerned. The management of Senegal’s state under Wade’s leadership is too libertarian. With a single phone call or word from the President, his son or any member of his family, hierarchical structures are stamped over, standard funds disbursement procedures are ignored and casual expenses promoted as a governing modus operandi. To the detriment of basic republican principles, Wade openly defended his son who was cited in gross financial malpractices and advocated to turn down the dark pages as regards the opacity surrounding the management of ANOCI, the billion dollars agency he handed over to his son, Karim Wade, with a hope to skyrocket him as his successor. Wade forgot that he jailed dignitaries of the former regime for felony, over-billing and other alleged economic crimes. President Wade hates contradictions and automatically terms “bad faith” any different opinion from his. Not only has he crumpled the Constitution of Senegal to keep up the appearance of a democratic set up, but Wade misses no chance to manipulate the republican institutions with a stunning arrogance. Members of his majority would shout loud and clear that they are not the people but Wade parliamentarians’ only bent to approve any bill coming from Dakar’s state house.. Wade is largely disqualified by his own blunders and blatant contradictions that reflect his actual spirit of an isolated man in search of a political balance. It is amazing to see how Abdoulaye Wade desperately maneuvered to get the international community’s support for the Guinean military junta led by Moussa Dadis Camara. When swearing on in the year 2000, Wade warned that the era of military coups in Africa is over but he no longer recalls his own words. He constantly displays signs of senility and recently told Voice Of America that he didn’t know Babacar Gaye who was his state house cabinet director from the year 2003 to October 2009. He continuously and regularly shuffles his government because all the cabinets he formed have failed to serve the purpose of the afflicted Senegalese people. Wade’s only satisfaction is praise. He enjoys a deep psychological comfort when publicly praised in the media. He loves and cherishes being magnified or honored and he tirelessly works for that. His crazy love for magnificence links his name to headstones and other monuments he builds here and there at the expense of the nation coffers’. His imposed Monument de la Renaissance has divided Senegal’s social, religious, civil and political entities.
As a leader, Wade is too political to respect the rules of moral and ethics that bind heads to their people in a democratic set up and that’s brings shame to Senegal. In a complete disregard to the aspirations of his people, Wade has taken advantage of his status as Head of State of Senegal to discredit the Republic and deceive the people who awarded him the position of manager and guarantor of the rule of law.
The million dollars question is how much credit remains when a state becomes the hostage of uninitiated administrators, corrupt politicians, thugs and convicts, unscrupulous oligarchs and above all a chronic institutional instability that is entertained by the President himself? Senegal is ruled by people who care for nothing but public funds. They only obey to the triptych budget overruns, spontaneous enrichment and arrogance. Nine years in office have not helped President Abdoulaye Wade to fit the cap of a statesman. He likens the state to his party while the only thing he knows is ideological apparatus. With Wade, any adventurer can man top cabinet position. Farba Senghor occupied strategic ministerial job without any qualification or experience and messed up Senegal’s agriculture and air transport. He is now entrusted with the mission of paving the way to Karim Wade’s control of the ruling PDS party that has been changed for that matter. Senegal needs a historical compromise that would be a shake up for the rectification and restoration of state values. The Republic is wounded and needs a great stroke of brush that will prevent pests and impetuous genius of belly politics to continuously harm this great nation. These parasites in office are migratory herds; they are the blackmailers and pirates that Senegalese people should stop now!