VZCZCXRO0355
PP RUEHPA
DE RUEHDK #0316/01 0391839
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 081839Z FEB 06
FM AMEMBASSY DAKAR
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 4179
INFO RUEHZK/ECOWAS COLLECTIVE

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 DAKAR 000316 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR AF/W, AF/RSA, DRL/PHD AND INR/AA 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/08/2016 
TAGS: PHUM PGOV KJUS SG
SUBJECT: EX-PM SECK RELEASED FROM PRISON: WHY AND WHY NOW? 
 
REF: A. DAKAR 0181 
 
     ¶B. 05 DAKAR 2509 
 
Classified By: POLITICAL COUNSELOR ROY L. WHITAKER FOR REASONS 1.4 (B) 
AND (D). 
 
SUMMARY 
------- 
¶1.  (C) The Government released former Prime Minister Idrissa 
Seck from Reubeuss prison on February 7 after charges against 
him were "partially" dropped.  It remains unclear which 
charges might be held open; one fallback is an accusation of 
undue accumulation of wealth.  Seck was released precisely at 
the time that Senegal was playing a key Africa Cup soccer 
match, presumably to reduce media coverage.  President 
Abdoulaye Wade, meanwhile, was in Equatorial Guinea.  There 
were numerous legal and political reasons for Seck's release. 
 Most important is that Wade needs to quell tensions in his 
ruling Senegalese Democratic Party (PDS) before his most 
important speech of the year, the April 4 Independence Day 
address.  END SUMMARY. 
 
&NON LIEU PARTIEL8 
------------------ 
¶2.  (SBU) A judicial finding of "non lieu," as we understand 
it, signifies that a charge has been dropped for lack of 
evidence.  The judges investigating Seck decided on the 
apparently highly unusual finding of partial non-lieu. 
Whatever its precise legal import, this means the judges hold 
open the possibility of reopening the investigation of Seck 
at a later date.  We are trying to determine exactly what 
charges may be left open.  One default possibility is a 
catch-all charge of undue accumulation of wealth.  In any 
case, the judges also ordered Seck's release. 
 
¶3.  (SBU) Seck gave a statement on arriving home, but he was 
released from prison almost precisely at the time Senegal was 
playing a key Africa Cup soccer match; so relatively few 
people heard it.  Newspapers the next morning divided between 
those who headlined Seck's liberation and those that lamented 
Senegal's football loss.  President Wade, meanwhile, was in 
Equatorial Guinea and made no comment on the Seck release. 
 
WHY AND WHY NOW? 
---------------- 
¶4.  (C) Jurists have been arguing for weeks that the 
government's allegedly faulty application of the law and 
non-constitutional manipulation of national institutions 
would soon force Seck's release (Ref A).  Timing also played 
a part.  Perhaps no one in Government noticed, but the time 
Seck spent in prison (July 15 - February 7, or 6 3/4 months) 
virtually equaled the seven months then-opposition leader 
Wade spent in prison in 1993.  More pressing is Wade's need 
to have his ruling PDS apparatus fully unified when he gives 
his important Independence Day address April 4.  On that day, 
he will both present his vision of the future to the nation 
and issue marching orders to his party for the February 2007 
elections, and he needs to have neutralized public resentment 
at Seck's arrest. 
 
¶5.  (C) While we cannot quantify Seck's popularity either in 
the PDS or beyond, it is clear that Wade's loyalists fear his 
capacity to spoil their election chances.  Furthermore, Seck 
has threatened to mobilize or energize non-partisan 
opposition to Wade and the PDS.  To take just one example, 
the Tidjane Brotherhood, Senegal,s largest religious 
brotherhood, is increasingly restless with what it sees as 
Wade's neglect, and its youth movement will hold its annual 
gathering in the Tidjane capital of Tivaouane on February 9. 
Last year, youth chairman Moustapha Sy faced down a cabinet 
minister and demanded Seck's reintegration into the PDS. 
This year he might have called for his immediate release, and 
that could have further catalyzed Tidjane political 
discontent. 
 
¶6.  (C) We spoke February 7 to law professor and former Wade 
counselor Mamadou Camara (Ref B), who predicted to us five 
months ago that Wade would not allow the charges against Seck 
to stand.  Camara says Seck's release was necessary to 
satisfy Seck loyalists, to mollify those in the PDS who think 
Wade had victimized Seck and to abort any potential 
cooperation between Seck and the opposition.  According to 
Camara, Wade will now be free to undertake a strategy of 
"sausage slicing" against the opposition, cutting off and 
co-opting influential segments or individual leaders one at a 
time ) as he has done so successfully over the last six 
years. 
 
¶7.  (C) Senegal Radio and Television (RTS) Director and Wade 
communications honcho Moustapha Dieng predicted to us 
February 6 that internal PDS opposition to Seck's release 
 
DAKAR 00000316  002 OF 002 
 
 
will be intense.  Ministers whose ambitions were stymied by 
Seck when he was Prime Minister will seek to block his 
reintegration into the party leadership.  Newly appointed 
Agriculture Minister and Wade diehard Farba Senghor, Dieng 
singled out, has identified himself almost totally as a Seck 
enemy over the last six months, and would find it extremely 
hard to work with Seck in preparing the PDS election campaign. 
 
¶8.  (C) Over lunch February 8, Samba Bathily and two other 
Seck activists told us they consider that Seck remains 
outside the PDS.  They believe Wade needs Seck more than Seck 
needs Wade, that he will never dare reinstitute legal charges 
against him; time is on their side; Wade is running scared; 
and it will be in Seck's interest to put off any deal until 
just before the election, if indeed at all.  What they wish 
for is to see Seck run for Parliament as de facto head of the 
opposition's parliamentary list.  Then, they believe he would 
become National Assembly President and the next in line to 
the presidency. 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
¶9.  (C) Seck's release from prison is only the first step in 
his possible political rehabilitation.  Many Senegalese are 
certain Wade and Seck have struck a deal, possibly involving 
Seck's active support for Wade in the election campaign, 
though no one yet knows the details.  Some suspect charges 
have been left open in case Seck reneges on any commitments 
he has made, and that if he causes trouble for Wade, he will 
find himself again before the courts.  We have always 
underscored our support for a fair and transparent process, 
and Senegal's judges to their credit have done the right 
thing to date.  The Secretary's July 20 press conference, 
Congressmen Wolf's November letter and Codel Kolbe's January 
4 intervention with President Wade almost certainly played a 
key role in bringing Seck's incarceration to an end.  END 
COMMENT. 
JACKSON