From Prison To Senegal’s President: Why Bassirou Diomaye Faye Must Rise To The Occasion

By Martins Agbonlahor Photos: Facebook\Wikimedia Commons\YouTube Screenshots The build up to the Senegalese presidential election of March 24 and its monumental outcome can aptly be comparable to a scene taken straight from a fictional novel, as it was manifestly beyond the ordinary. Bassirou Faye, the opposition candidate and eventual winner of that election, had been released from prison only a few weeks before. But in one unique somersault, he organized, strategized, and polled far ahead of other candidates, defeating them decisively in the tightly-contested election, adjudged free and fair by regional and international observers. What a feat indeed! The elected president was one who didn’t give a damn about being railroaded to prison, knowing such sacrifice would embolden his innate ideals. In fact, his metamorphosis from prisoner-to-president reminds me of the travails of the late Cuban leader, Fidel Castro Ruz, who himself, was incarcerated after his guerilla attack on Moncada barracks in 1953 only to eventually overthrow the country’s die-hard dictator a few years later, and cleanse the Augean stable, instituting a socialist rule. The bearded revolutionary had actually said in his widely publicized trial available in the public domain, that “Prison is an honorable place when one’s motive is...