Senegal’s new leadership has appointed several new judges to replace the previous judges who have been described as loyal to the previous administration of Former president Macky sall who conceded defeat to Opposition candidate Bassirou Diomaye Faye who won more than 54 percent of votes in March 2024 presidential election.
The Alliance for the Republic–Yakaar has described the changes of judges as a “witch hunt”.
This comes after the Alliance for the Republic (APR) held a meeting on Friday of the Supreme Council of the Judiciary, chaired by President Bassirou Diomaye Faye.
Faye’s new government resumed office in April after victory at the polls vowing to make a change to the system while improving living conditions for the Senegalese people and ensuring accountability.
There has been a clampdown on several opposition figures in recent weeks with the APR saying the overhaul marks a step in building a system of vengeance for the winners of the elections to settle political scores.
The new judicial appointments are in the Supreme Court, the Court of Appeal, the public prosecutor’s office in the capital Dakar, and a new judicial body overseeing finance. The changes made came with no explanations by the new government.
The media is said to have portrayed the Previous judges who have been transferred to provincial jurisdictions as having been sympathetic to the former government.
Sall who had served two terms as the country’s president did not run in the March presidential election but rather nominated his prime minister Amadou Ba as the ruling party’s candidate.
The new government also recently published audit reports calling into question the management of the former government, and launched inspections into public structures, without issuing any arrests thus far.