Senegal's President Bassirou Diomaye Faye has fired Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko and dissolved the government after months of tension over key policies. The split raises the possibility of a power struggle ahead of presidential elections in 2029.
All ministers have been dismissed but will remain in charge of the day-to-day running of the country, according to a statement broadcast on state media late on Friday.
In a post on social media after the announcement, Sonko said: "Tonight I will sleep with a light heart."
Recent months have seen rivalry mount between the two men, who teamed up to defeat the former ruling party's candidate in presidential elections in March 2024.
Sonko, then a leading opposition figure, was barred from running due to a conviction for defamation. Faye stood for Sonko's Pastef party instead and subsequently appointed his mentor prime minister.
But since then, the allies had publicly disagreed on key policies, including the negotiation of a new lending programme from the International Monetary Fund.
Power struggle
In October 2024 the IMF froze its credit line to Senegal, worth $1.8 billion, following the discovery that the previous administration under president Macky Sall had underreported the country's debt.
The IMF has called for major reforms of Senegal's public finances before it agrees to a new loan. Sonko had opposed any restructuring of the country's debt, which he said the IMF was advocating, while Faye has been less vocal on the issue.
Sonko had also pushed for legislation giving parliament greater oversight of funds allocated to the presidency and the prime minister's office, criticising Faye for failing to deliver on promises of accountability.
Two months ago, Sonko said he would be willing to take Pastef out of the government and return to opposition if Faye departed from the party's agenda, prompting the president to warn that he could fire the prime minister if he no longer had confidence in him.
Addressing parliament hours before his dismissal, Sonko told MPs: "I am not a prime minister who blindly obeys and agrees to everything."
His firing raises the possibility of a power struggle between the president and Sonko, whose party dominates in parliament, warned Maurice Soudieck Dione, a professor of political science at Senegal's Gaston-Berger University.
"With elections on the horizon – local elections in 2027 and the presidential election in 2029 – the danger is therefore that we may witness a conflict between the presidential majority and the parliamentary majority, which could be detrimental for the smooth running of public affairs," Dione told RFI.
Last month, MPs overwhelmingly passed changes to Senegal's electoral code that would remove legal obstacles that ruled Sonko out of the last election and could pave the way for him to run for president in 2029. Faye signed the reform into law last week.
(with newswires and RFI reporting in French)
