Senegal President slams US over graft comment

Senegalese president Abdoulaye Wade has blasted the United States ambassador to the country over corruption comments, after the ambassador warned Senegal that the recent grant to the country will depend on the government’s anti-graft efforts.

AFP

The outburst came a day after its ambassador, Marcia Bernicat warned Senegal that maintaining a recent 540-million-dollar grant depended on its success in fighting corruption.

She hinted that Senegal would be closely monitored over the way it uses the grant.

President Wade felt insulted by the US diplomat’s comments. In a video conference, he snapped at the US diplomat that ‘there is a swindler who stole more than the budget of all the African states combined’, referring to Bernard Madoff, a convicted US Wall Street conman.

President Wade, visibly angry on national television, told the US ambassador to give the grant to another country where the people don’t mind being insulted.

The 540-million-dollar grant is a five-year package Senegal won last year under the US Millennium Challenge Cooperation to build roads, markets, boost agriculture and create economic enterprise zones in the country.

The Wade administration has been under a lot of criticism mainly from the local media and the opposition for not doing enough to tackle corruption. In October, the government was embarrassed by revelation that the president gave 133,000 euros to the outgoing International Monetary Fund representative, Alex Segura, as what he called a "farewell gift".

In 2007, National Assembly president, Macky Sall, now an opposition leader, lost his job after calling for an audit of the president’s son, Karim Wade over financial activities of the National Agency of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference.