VZCZCXYZ2596
PP RUEHWEB

DE RUEHDK #0268/01 0651159
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 051159Z MAR 08
FM AMEMBASSY DAKAR
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 0145
INFO RUEHZK/ECOWAS COLLECTIVE PRIORITY

UNCLAS DAKAR 000268 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
SENSITIVE 
 
DEPT FOR AF/W, AF/RSA, DRL AND INR/AA 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL PINS KDEM ECON SG
SUBJECT: SENEGAL: A NEW CYCLE OF VIOLENCE IN UNIVERSITIES 
 
¶1.  (SBU) Summary: Senegal's university students have begun using 
violent protests again to put pressure on President Abdoulaye Wade. 
Regular confrontations between the police and university students 
are reminiscent of the late '80s when the country was undergoing a 
profound malaise and desperate youth turned to violence to express 
dissatisfaction with the country's governance. Crowded lecture 
halls, poor living conditions, understaffed and under-funded 
institutions of higher learning, and a shrinking job market are 
causes of anxiety for university students. If the GOS fails to 
respond with innovative solutions, the higher education crisis may 
create more violence and instability.  END SUMMARY. 
 
Failed Institutions 
------------------- 
 
¶2.  (SBU) Senegal's institutions of higher education suffer from 
overcrowding and an obsolete approach to education that values 
theory and scholarship over the practical demands of the job market. 
Senegal's universities suffer from a lack of resources and everyone 
- faculty, administration, and students - is pressing for more, but 
with Senegal's budget already stretched, it is difficult to see from 
where the money will come. 
 
Violent Communication 
--------------------- 
 
¶3.  (SBU) Students, who live eight to a very small dormitory room, 
have refused to accept an increase of fees from the current ten 
dollars per student to fifty dollars for undergraduates and seventy 
for postgraduates.  But some students have come to the conclusion 
that the only way to get academic and political authorities to pay 
attention to their demands is by resorting to the  language of civil 
disobedience and even violence.  On February 8, after a 24-day 
strike, students at the University of Thies stopped all traffic and 
burned tires on the busy road between Thies and Dakar. 
 
¶4.  (SBU) Similarly, on February 18, students of the Regional 
University of Bambey also held up traffic for three hours on the 
road between Dakar and the holy city of Touba. They protested 
against the lack of professors and threw rocks at security forces, 
which led to the arrest of 14 students who were prosecuted three 
days later, of which six received a suspended sentence of three 
months imprisonment. 
 
¶5.  (SBU) Law faculty students of Cheikh Anta Diop University in 
Dakar, after a three-week strike organized an "intifada," their 
leader, Cheikh Samb, told the Embassy, "I launched coordinated 
attacks on security forces in three different locations, knowing 
that they would not be able to respond efficiently. At one point, we 
outflanked them on the main campus and they had to flee, leaving 
behind three anti-riot shields. I negotiated with the police: they 
freed my students they had arrested and we gave them back their 
shields."  This student leader who is completing a master's in law 
declared that he ignores rumors that he will be arrested soon.  In 
any case, he claimed that if he is arrested, the whole university 
will riot.  On February 21, students of the teacher training college 
of Dakar and of the faculty of economics and conducted their own 
riots, blocked traffic, and burned tires. 
 
General Complacency 
------------------- 
 
¶6. (SBU) Students unanimously say that academic authorities do not 
listen when they draw their attention to problems.  Administrators 
pretend to manage but lack authority and funding and often place 
greater priority on their personal agendas, including job security, 
perks, and personal use of expensive government resources.  Students 
told the Embassy the rectors of the country's two main universities 
are both active members of the ruling party and, as a result, have 
little time to devote to their institutions.  Professor Bouba Diop, 
Ombudsman of the University of Dakar that has some sixty thousand 
students, over one thousand faculty and displays the main problems 
in Senegalese higher education, deplored the lack of disciplinary 
power of academic authorities over their peers.  In testimony to the 
impotence of academic officials, the disputes between the students 
and the administration end up in the in-box of President Wade. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶7. (SBU) Senegal's higher education system has deteriorated 
significantly and, as one student put it, "is headed to the 
precipice."  Senegalese authorities have so far chosen to try to add 
more resources while avoiding the implementation of unpopular 
measures - such as competitive entrance exams and tuition - needed 
to make the system sustainable.  This policy that sacrifices 
accountability for the sake of stability has begun to show its 
limits. The current university crisis is a symptom of a larger 
societal malaise.  Young people have no prospects and no trust in 
their rulers. Their fear of the future and their negative perception 
that the ruling political elites and academic decision-makers has 
begun to produce violent reactions. 
 
¶8.  (SBU) In some cases the perception of hopelessness has lead them 
to seek refuge in religion, practiced in an ostentatious way on 
campus to defy the principle of secularism that is at the heart of 
the French university system Senegal inherited.  Signs of 
intolerance have been noted by the ombudsman who deplored that some 
students complain that there are "too many foreigners" in Dakar 
University, while ethnic and religious brotherhood networks as forms 
of solidarity are on the rise. 
SMITH