Legislative elections in Senegal are deeply rooted in the fibre of the country’s political history.
By Abdourahmane Diallo
The first legislative election in Senegal took place on October 31, 1848 when the territory was under French colonial rule.
The Senegalese will on July 31, 2022 have to choose their representatives in the National Assembly for the next five years.
The campaign for these elections, launched last Sunday, will end on July 29.
In the country of Teranga (hospitality, in Wolof), there is a long tradition of legislative elections.
Since the 19th century and the colonial era, French and then Senegalese citizens have elected members of parliament.
Barthélemy Durand Valentin was the first Senegalese to sit in the Palais Bourbon in France.
Blaise Diagne, Galandou Diouf and Léopold Sédar Senghor followed in the footsteps of the St. Louisan mulatto.
The institution of the National Assembly in Senegal was the culmination of a process marked by several stages: the General Council (1879-1920), the Colonial Council (1920-1946), the General Council (1946-1952), the Territorial Assembly (1952-1958) and the Constituent Assembly created on 25 November 1958.
With the break-up of the Mali federation, the Senegalese National Assembly was established by Law No. 60-44 of 20 August 1960 to become the country’s second institution after the President of the Republic.
From 80 at the beginning, the number of members in the hemicycle rose to 100 in 1978, 120 in 1983 and 140 in 1998.
The number of MPs fell back to 120 in 2001 following the first democratic changeover before reaching 150 in 2007.
Since the constitutional referendum of 2016, there are 165 directly elected representatives of the people.
Until 1967, the term of office for MPs was four years.
Currently, the five-year term of office applies for the different legislatures.
In the 1983 parliamentary elections, 60 MPs were elected by majority vote, while the other half were chosen by proportional representation on a national list presented by each party.
In September 1991 a change took place.
The new Electoral Code stipulated that MPs were to be elected by the first-past-the-post system in the departments up to a maximum of 70 seats.
In February 2001, a presidential decree established a different distribution key.
Sixty-five MPs are now elected by the departmental first-past-the-post system and 55 by the national proportional representation system.
In December 2006, the then president, Abdoulaye Wade, changed the method of appointing MPs again.
His decree N°2006-1350 of 8 December 2006 ratified the election of 90 MPs on the basis of the departmental first-past-the-post system and 60 on the national proportional list.
Thanks to the constitutional review of March 2016, the Senegalese diaspora has 15 MPs in the hemicycle to represent it.
The total number of MPs thus increases from 150 to 165.
This year, the Ministry of the Interior tried unsuccessfully to add seven seats due to the recent creation of the department of Keur Massar, in the suburbs of Dakar.
The 14th legislature (2022-2027) will therefore be composed of 150 MPs representing Senegalese residing in the national territory (97 by majority vote and 53 by proportional representation) and 15 others representing Senegalese abroad.
ARD/id/cgd/lb/as/APA