Knowing just how much people are craving news from Senegal, but understanding just how busy you avid readers are, I thought that now and again I'd do a quick round up of the week's news in all its glory.
Due to popular demand this will hopefully usually include stories about nobs or something else that seems (according to my google stats) to make people read certain articles on this blog, rather than analysis of food security in Niger or the plight of refugees in Liberia. (PS. Scroll to the end if you just want the lower-brow stuff).
Apologies in advance also that the links are in french. Why include french links for an anglophone audience you ask? Basically I want to look more intelligent and attractive.
Two big political stories this week, both of them recurring ones. First of all the Constitutional Court has been musing over the eligibility of President Wade’s candidature for the elections in February 2012. Wade himself introduced a constitutional limit of two terms in power, but now says that since he did that in the middle of his first term, that doesn’t count - some smart (but dubious) thinking that sets the scene for a few months of legal wrangling and a fair bit of politicking.
Apologies in advance also that the links are in french. Why include french links for an anglophone audience you ask? Basically I want to look more intelligent and attractive.
Two big political stories this week, both of them recurring ones. First of all the Constitutional Court has been musing over the eligibility of President Wade’s candidature for the elections in February 2012. Wade himself introduced a constitutional limit of two terms in power, but now says that since he did that in the middle of his first term, that doesn’t count - some smart (but dubious) thinking that sets the scene for a few months of legal wrangling and a fair bit of politicking.
Secondly there are the increasingly chaotic efforts of the opposition to find a single candidate to put up against the current President – something almost every opposition party signed up to after their defeat in 2007, but which is looking next to impossible due to competing interests and egos… This week it got a little more farcical as the opposition splintered further, with a new group (Bennoo Alternative 2012) breaking away in frustration from the main coalition (Bennoo Siggil Senegaal) to set up a separate process. Remember The Judea's People's Front anyone?
Turning to the back pages, it's been all about Senegal's footballing victory over DRC last week, attended by yours truly, that saw Les Lions qualify for the African Nation's Cup in Gabon and Equitorial Guinea in January. So now the plan to join Senegal’s equivalent of the Tartan Army in the New Year, although all flights there seem to ridiculously to go via Morocco and require the laying of a golden egg.
The Senegal women’s basketball team (Les Lionnes) also today won the African Games, beating Angola in the final. But like the BBC, I only mention this out of political correctness.
But the news you've all been waiting for, the stuff involving nobs… While only one of these stories actually occurred in Senegal, they all caught my eye by being either prominently featured in national newspapers or in the top read sections of news websites.
But the news you've all been waiting for, the stuff involving nobs… While only one of these stories actually occurred in Senegal, they all caught my eye by being either prominently featured in national newspapers or in the top read sections of news websites.
First there was the Brazilian teenager who killed himself by (reportedly) masturbating too much. 42 times in one day according the press, causing some type of seriously embarrassing heart attack and found by his mum in an extreme version of that urban myth so you may have heard about someone’s cousin’s friend. How anyone knows that the overall tally for the fatal act times remains unclear.
Next in Senegal itself there was the story of the Dakar taxi driver, as reported in L’Observateur (the national newspaper owned by Youssou Ndor), who claims to have been ‘almost raped’ by four female customers. Having helped carry one of them, who had faked an illness, to her room the others reportedly grabbed him, ripped his clothes off and demanded an orgy. According to the victim, he managed to escape in his underwear by saying he needed to lock his taxi door ‘but would be back’, before driving off to safety. Unfortunately (and very questionably for a Dakar cabbie) he was unable to tell the police where this apartment was. Since the incident, applications to become a taxi driver have rocketed.
Finally there was coverage of the French woman who sued her husband for not having enough sex with her, winning €10,000 in the process. If only she'd known a certain Brazilian teenager...
So a touch of the Daily Star here too. Next week Debbie from Southend will be reporting live from the Constitutional Court, and I’m sure we all look forward to her views.
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