Abdoulaye Wade
Third president of Senegal (born 1926)
Family : Place of birth : Kébémer ; Date of birth : 29 May 1926 ; Mother : Aïssatou Dabo Wade ; Father : Momar Tolla (Mor Tolla Wade)
Education : He went through the École normale William-Ponty (1947), then obtained in 1959 a doctorate in law and economics at the University of Grenoble.
Action : He founded the Parti démocratique sénégalais (PDS) in 1974 and became the main opponent. On 19 March 2000 he won the second round against Abdou Diouf: the country’s first democratic alternation. He was elected with 58.1% of the vote in the 2000 run-off, then re-elected in 2007 with 55.79%. His major works include the Blaise-Diagne airport, motorways and electrification.
Trials : He ran seven times for the presidency, between 1978 and 2012.
Legacy : Defeated in the 2012 second round by Macky Sall, he made way for the second alternation in Senegal’s history. Grand Officer of the Légion d’honneur; a stadium has borne his name since 2022.
Sources
- Persée — Monika Salzbrunn, « La campagne présidentielle sénégalaise en France » (Hommes & Migrations, 2002)
- Cairn — « De la victoire du « sopi » à la tentation du « nopi » ? » (Politique africaine, 2004)
- Cairn — « Le baobab a été déraciné. L’alternance au Sénégal » (Politique africaine, 2000)
- OpenEdition — S. M. Sy, Les régimes politiques sénégalais de l’indépendance à l’alternance (compte rendu)
- Wikipédia — Abdoulaye Wade