On Friday 22 May, President Bassirou Diomaye Faye dismissed Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko and dissolved the government. Two days later, parliament speaker El Malick Ndiaye resigned, saying his decision was taken in the “higher interest of the nation.”
The move clears the way for Sonko to seek the speaker’s post in an assembly where his Pastef party holds a strong majority. The campaign slogan that carried both men to power in 2024 was “Diomaye mooy Sonko,” meaning “Diomaye IS Sonko.” That unity lasted less than 18 months.
The political rupture is inseparable from Senegal’s economic bind. The IMF froze a $1.8 billion lending programme after the discovery that the previous government had concealed public liabilities, pushing end-2024 debt to 132 per cent of GDP on revised calculations. IMF talks are due to resume in the week of 8 June, with Finance Minister Cheikh Diba hoping to reach agreement on key points by 30 June. The question of who accepts the next round of painful measures now sits at the centre of the power struggle.
Sonko and Faye Part Ways
The break is remarkable because of where it started.
Both men are former tax officials who were jailed ahead of the 2024 election and released just ten days before the rescheduled vote. Faye won with 54 per cent. He appointed Sonko prime minister. Their alliance embodied a promise of rupture with the old order under Macky Sall. Now it has become a fight over authority, policy, and political survival.
The split broke openly over fiscal policy. Diba warned parliament that Senegal’s fuel subsidy bill could overshoot the 2026 budget allocation by as much as CFA 1.15 trillion, roughly $2 billion, if oil prices rise to $115 a barrel. He told lawmakers that Sonko had refused to raise domestic fuel prices. Sonko publicly opposed IMF-backed debt restructuring on a total debt of $13 billion, arguing that adjustment measures would worsen living costs for ordinary Senegalese. The government broke apart at exactly the point where anti-system politics met fiscal arithmetic.
Parliament Becomes the New Arena
Ndiaye’s resignation shows where the struggle is moving. If Sonko takes the speaker’s post, he will remain central to power rather than retreating into defeat. That position would make him the country’s second most powerful official, able to shape the next phase of the crisis from inside the legislature, where Pastef’s majority can obstruct, redirect, or complicate any IMF-linked reforms Faye tries to push through a new government.
That is what makes the situation so unstable. Faye holds the presidency, but Sonko still commands a popular base and party machinery that cannot be brushed aside. Senegal is not just replacing one government with another. It is entering a contest over who gets to define sacrifice, reform, and legitimacy in a debt-strained state. The IMF reckoning did not create Senegal’s political ambitions. It has forced them into collision, and the argument now is about who governs and who pays.
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