"What has the city of Dakar done since 2014?"
"We created a communication that gives the impression that we have lost Dakar"

In this last part of the “Daily Marches”, Abdoulaye Diouf Sarr puts on the political boubou. He has no doubts about the good health of Benno bokk yaakaar who would win Dakar if the Locales were held today. The mayor of Yoff, who considers that “the concept of Dakar boss is outdated”, also wonders what Khalifa Sall has achieved at the head of the city since 2014.

Is Dakar a case for power with this announced suppression of cities that Taxawu senegaal describes as "political maneuvers" to fight Khalifa Sall?
No, that's not my opinion. I am a scientist and when I say things, I always try to explain them with figures. Our Benno bokk yaakaar coalition has only lost Dakar once. In presidential elections, the President has never lost Dakar. At the Legislative, while we had all been installed in the psychosis that Dakar had fallen, we demonstrated that, sociologically, the capital is ours. And if we lost Dakar in 2014, it's because we were split up everywhere in the communes, and the system unfortunately meant that dissident lists lost. I can show you, commune by commune, that if there was unity, we were going to win. So there was a whole political activism in Dakar. We created a communication that gives the impression that Dakar is lost by power, which is not the case. If we went to the elections today, the truth of the polls would confirm that President Macky Sall has a large majority in Dakar. So why are we being led to believe today that this coalition (Taxawu Dakar) is in the majority? Today, even the communes they had won, such as Patte d'Oie, are in our coalition.

Do you mean mayors?
Yes, but mayors are indicators.

But if we remove the cities, you will still not hear one day "Diouf Sarr, mayor of Dakar"...
You have to reason and go back in history. Act 2 of decentralization had created district municipalities in 1996. And there was the region as a local authority. Act 3 solved a problem, it is the whole philosophy of territorial equity which is contained in the program of President Macky Sall since the Yoonou yokkuté. The Pse is a program for the implementation of a government policy. But our program for the conquest of power already contained that. This is why full communalization arrived with Act 3 of decentralization. It abolishes the district municipalities and the mayors of the municipalities of Dakar have the same dignity as all the mayors of the country. Now, we have kept the towns in certain regions. It must be said that the principle is not the city, but the department because the region has been abolished. Very often, the city follows the contours of the department, but it is still called "city", and the authority that embodies it does not call it president of the department, but mayor. Is it not the content in terms of resources and perspectives that is most important? Besides, what has the city of Dakar done since 2014? This is why in this debate, it is the people of Dakar who interest me and who must have a local community that takes charge of their concerns.

The departments have the same powers as the cities in question...
Exactly. I think we want to turn this into a political debate. But it is nevertheless a debate, in many respects, eminently technical.

In 2014, didn't you lose Dakar because you didn't have the right head of the list?
(Laughter) Someone said something important at the beginning of the interview: "Mr. Minister, there are questions that, if you want, you can leave unanswered." (Laughs). So I take him at his word.

But you are still interested in the city of Dakar or the future department…
My question may surprise you: I am a missionary. I am in a coalition with a man who trusts me, who moved the lines of this country in the most revolutionary way and who has a perspective within the framework of the Emerging Senegal Plan. We who are with him have this missionary philosophy in relation to the goal of extraordinary transformation that we have. Once again, I remind you that axis 1 of the Yoonou yokkuté was developing productivity, which corresponds to the structural transformation of the economy.

Mr. Minister, there you are making "neither yes nor no"...
No that's not it. I assume my positions. If you ask me if I want to be mayor of Yoff, I say "yes" because that is the relevant level of my political expression. But everything else is a strategy within the framework of a party and a coalition.

You don't want to be the boss of Dakar?
(Laughs) I think the Dakar boss concept is outdated.

Shouldn't it be left to the populations to express themselves within the framework of a mini-Referendum in the cities concerned by the suppression instead of imposing the will of the Executive on them?
It is true that Senegal is a very democratic country which each time addresses issues within the framework of consultations. This is the case of the national dialogue which was a great opportunity to discuss certain issues. But this culture of partial referendum is not in our practice. Maybe one day, as is happening in some Western countries, we can get there.

You had Dakar Yoff International Airport, now Léopold Sédar Senghor, in your lap. With Aibd, what has Yoff, of which you are the mayor, lost with this move?

Yoff didn't lose anything because Senegal won. Today, we demonstrated to the face of the world that we could complete the work of the Aibd which was in a whirlwind when we arrived in 2012. Thanks to the genius of the Head of State in terms of financial engineering and project management, we managed to unlock this airport and deliver it on time. And this airport is today the pride of Senegal and Africa. The Léopold Sédar Senghor airport was in Yoff, even if it did not report to the municipality, but in terms of notoriety, it was an airport in Yoff. But these issues must be addressed within the framework of national economic development.

Where are you with the Yoff stadium?
I am delighted to see that very soon Yoff will have a very large stadium, the 3rd moreover after that of Diamniadio, Léopold Sédar Senghor and Demba Diop in terms of number of places. Three weeks ago I received the synthetic turf which is already there and I recruited a security agency to monitor it. Topographers are leveling the platform to lay the grass. At the next navetanes, the young people of Yoff will indeed play on this ground which is the pride of our locality.

Delivery date ?
I won't tell you the date. In any case at the next navetanes, we will find a way to make an inauguration worthy of the name.

Is this an opportunity to relaunch Yoff's Renaissance?
Ah yes, this is the opportunity to relaunch this great team. In 70, there was not the Renaissance of Yoff, but the Almadies who played the final against the Jaraaf. And afterwards, there was a break-up: the island of Ngor left, Us Ouakam too. I am one of those who dream of this great Almadies team, maybe one day we will get there. But in the meantime, we are going to work so that Yoff's Renaissance is truly a strong link in this Ngor-Ouakam triangle.

Where are you at with fisherman's skin disease?
We are still on this research process for Fisherman's Dermatosis. The study was sent by the anti-poison center in Nantes as part of a collaboration that we have with the institute which is in the research of sea activities. So we are awaiting this response. Do not rush to advance certain tracks. This is an entirely new phenomenon. We ruled out certain leads, such as the chemical one. We went to the algae, we checked and there are confirmations to look for. Let's wait for the response from this scientific partnership with Senegal before moving forward!

Have there been contagions?
No there never was. The disease only affected fishermen who went to sea. And all are cured.

You are the 3rd mayor of Yoff. Your detractors say that one of Diouf Sarr's rare creations is Place Mamadou Diop.

What are your accomplishments that would make you proud?
(Laughs) I am the 3rd mayor of Yoff after Seydina Issa Ndiaye, Oumy Khaïry Guèye Seck and Mamadou Diop. In 96, I was already on the municipal council. I was the youngest municipal councilor and I headed the Economic Commission in charge of promoting employment. So I know my commune well and I have never left it politically. You give me the opportunity to say what I have done for the commune. When I arrived in 2014, there was not a single infrastructure apart from the schools that were not in good condition. In Yoff, today all the schools are completely renovated to the delight of parents and students. Yoff is a traditional village, but open to the modern world. On the beach, from Tonghor to Layène, in front of each district, there are buildings called mbaarou guethie. I didn't tile them anyway in brown-beige, but simply in beige (laughs). And you will see that all the mbaarou guethie de Yoff are community development spaces where there are consultations throughout the day. At Nord-Foire, the basketball court that I am taking over completely at the request of young people will be the most modern of the 19 municipalities, after Santi Agne. And it is equipped with wi-fi area. In Biagui, tunndu wiya was an area where there were only houses. Even when there were baptisms, people didn't even know where to settle. I built a public square there with a sports field and spaces for residents to meet. At Cité Bceao, we have built a very pretty garden. Today, there is an incubator in Yoff with a computer training room, a hairdressing training room, etc. In Daagou Daan, I took over Place Ndieuw which was a dump and I put a very large stand there. And besides, when there is the turu Mame Ndiaré, that's where our parents do their cultural activities. But the great satisfaction I have is above all the employment of young people. Yoff is the commune that has employed the most young people in Dakar. All the young people you see doing maintenance in my town are hired by the town hall. It is important because it is more than 400 jobs in the village and in the new housing estates to effectively bring added economic value to the municipality. If you see the structuring of the local economy in Yoff, each house is managing to have a small store or sell something. This is because at the end of each month, the municipality of Yoff injects into the payroll among young people, 60 million FCfa. Regarding the paving, I specify that I was in the city of Dakar and the paving was shared. Why Yoff doesn't have a single square meter of pavement while Medina and others do. So I had to take care of it myself because I couldn't wait for cobblestones to be brought to me. Same thing for public lighting. Yoff is a very well-lit municipality and it is the only one that pays for its public lighting because it was shared by the city of Dakar. You go to Yoff, you give your number, the minute you have your birth certificate. This is to tell you that I have computerized my marital status. Go to other municipalities, we will tell you: "We are bringing the signatures to the mayor tonight or the next day." The Yoff market, and so on. Diamalaye had demanded the paving. The whole belt has been paved up to the pharmacy and that's important. The main question that remained for me was the resumption of the roads of the city Djily Mbaye where there are many potholes. Today I finished my Dao (Request for Tenders). I'm just waiting for the Dcmp to answer me on some observations to resume the road. I assure you that I can go on until tomorrow to tell you that we have done a great deal.

There is still an image that continues to shock the inhabitants of Yoff: the carts...
Yes, there are the carts and the storefront of Ouest-Foire, the Senegalese Football Federation to the Elton gas station. Really, it's my fight and it's what keeps me up at night.

And the waste water from the Cité Adama Diop?
It's obvious that it's been a long time since you've been there because it's a problem that I solved. I assure you, it dates back more than 20 years because it was a problem with the diameter of the pipe that was to evacuate the water. So that's behind us.

Is the third term also behind us?
(Laughs) (He doesn't answer).

It's a question, is the 3rd term behind us?
(He pretends) We are in a perspective (laughs).