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'Wade didn't keep promises'
23/02/2007 20:16 - (SA)
Dakar - After he ended four decades of socialist rule in 2000 elections Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade promised huge social and economic reforms.
But his rivals at weekend polls accuse him of falling short on his pledges.
Although the west African country's GNP has improved from $450 in 2000 to $710 in 2005 according to World Bank figures, it is ranked among the world's 20 most impoverished countries in terms of human development.
"The social needs were not satisfied, poverty has increased and with regard to purchasing power, it is a total failure," said Adoulaye Elimane Kane, spokesperson of the former ruling and now opposition Socialist Party (PS).
Wade was seen as a champion of a new youth employment policy, while preaching grand construction projects to modernise the country, which still remains a key hub in West Africa.
But seven years on, the opposition are calling into question his promises.
"He was elected by the youth and he has not given them the basics of what they expected," Kane said, qualifying the situation in the former French colony as at "odds" with the ambitious promises Wade made in 2000.
Good and not so good elements
Last year saw a record number of Senegalese youths risking their lives in barely seaworthy fishing boats to try to illegally migrate to the so-called "European Eldorado".
One economic observer said for the past seven years things have "moved in all directions and there are good and not so good elements" in Wade's economic policy.
The observer added: "There has been obvious evidence, notably the start of the road construction works, and average income has increased. But poverty affects more than 50% of the population."
Economic growth, on an upward trend since Wade came into office, slowed last year to 3% compared to 6% in previous years, he said.
Peasants, the majority of the population of 11.7 million and who predominantly survive on cultivating groundnuts, accuse Wade of having neglected their source of livelihood.
'Neglecting groundnuts'
Mustapha Wague, in Paos Koto, 250km south of Dakar, said: "Wade discouraged us from producing groundnuts, I will not vote for him because he neglected groundnuts."
Yet Wade's poll spokesperson, Aziz Sow, said many promises have been fulfilled.
"We fundamentally transformed Senegal and the lives of Senegalese," he said.
Wade "showed that it is possible to do things and to concretely change things" in Senegal.
Admitting that expectations "were very high in 2000," Sow says there was not "a sector which did not experience an increase in revenue" during Wade's first term.
The 80-year old Wade is seeking re-election in Sunday's presidential polls where he faces 14 other candidates.
- AFP
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