Senegal’s President Bassirou Diomaye Faye fires prime minister after years of tensions

AP
(FILES) Senegalese Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko (L) and Senegalese President Bassirou Diomaye Faye (R) attend the opening of the official ceremony of the presentation of the economic and social recovery plan by the head of government at the Grand Theatre in Dakar on August 1, 2025. Senegal President Bassirou Diomaye Faye on Friday sacked Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko and dissolved the government after months of tensions, deepening a crisis in the debt-laden west African nation. The shock announcement was made on state television in a decree read out by presidential aide Oumar Samba Ba, who said Faye "has ended the duties of Ousmane Sonko... and consequently those of the ministers and secretaries of state who are members of the government". (Photo by SEYLLOU / AFP)
  • Move that risks reigniting political unrest as the West African country grapples with a debt crisis
  • Sonko had warned he could ​take his party into opposition

DAKAR: Senegal’s President Bassirou Diomaye Faye has fired Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko after years of simmering tension.
The decision was announced by the secretary general of the government, Oumar Samba Ba, during a late-night broadcast on Friday.
The firing caps a period of open confrontation between the two former allies from the Patriotes Africains du Sénégal pour le Travail, l’Éthique et la Fraternité (Pastef) party who had defeated the former ruling party.
Ba said the sacking of the prime minister led to the resignation of all the members of the government and its dissolution.
The Pastef party had ridden into office after a fierce campaign mounted against the then-ruling party Alliance pour la République following widespread speculation that former President Macky Sall used a 2016 constitutional change to revise his term in office. Sall, who led the country between 2012 and 2024, eventually did not contest the election and his party lost.
Sonko, who heads the Pastef party, was barred for running after a defamation conviction was upheld by Senegal’s supreme court and the Constitutional Court dismissed his candidacy. Faye ran instead of Sonko.
“Praise be to Allah. Tonight I will sleep with a light heart in the Keur Gorgui neighborhood,” Sonko wrote in a short post on X after his dismissal.
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DAKAR, May 22 : Senegal President Bassirou Diomaye Faye

The sackinga risks reigniting political unrest as the West African country grapples with a debt crisis. Faye’s decision dissolves the government, dismissing all ministers, according to the statement read by Oumar Samba ‌Ba, secretary general of ‌Faye’s office. “The members of the outgoing government ​are ‌responsible ⁠for ​handling current ⁠affairs,” Ba added. The move follows months of mounting strains between the two allies-turned-rivals.
Sonko, a charismatic figure with a large youth following, had backed Faye in the 2024 election after being barred from running himself due to a defamation conviction.
In a social media post after the news was announced on Friday night, Sonko said, “Tonight I will ⁠sleep with a light heart in the Keur Gorgui ‌neighborhood,” a reference to his private ‌residence. In March, he had signalled a ​possible break, saying he would ‌be willing to take his Pastef party out of the government ‌and return to opposition if Faye departed from the party’s agenda, fueling speculation of an irresolvable power struggle between the two men.
Among the anti-establishment, pan-Africanist prime mindxr’s signature initiatives was an audit of Senegal’s resource deals, including those ‌governing its emerging oil and gas sector. In March, Sonko declared a BP gas contract for the ⁠Greater Tortue Ahmeyim ⁠project unfair and revoked some 71 mining licenses.
He promised that renegotiating oil and gas contracts would lower domestic energy prices and boost the economy, helping rebuild Senegal’s battered finances. The political split comes as Senegal faces mounting economic pressure. The International Monetary Fund froze its $1.8 billion lending program with Senegal following the discovery of misreported debt, which led it to peg the country’s end-2024 debt level at 132 percent of its economic output.
Last November, Sonko came out strongly against restructuring Senegal’s debt, estimated at $13 billion, saying the ​IMF was pushing for such a ​move.
Faye has not been as vocal about the debt issue.