Senegal opposition leader released after latest arrest

Senegalese police released an opposition leader hours after his arrest on Wednesday, his lawyer said, a week after he was previously detained following clashes between his supporters and security forces.

Political tensions in Senegal have flared up between President Macky Sall’s government and the opposition this year, with riots erupting in March after a leading opposition figure was arrested.

Barthelemy Dias, a mayoral candidate for Senegal’s capital Dakar, was arrested by police earlier Wednesday as he left home to “distribute flyers” with a small group of supporters, one of his lawyers, Cheikh Khouraissy Ba, told AFP via telephone.

Ba later confirmed that Dias had been released, although the police did not comment when approached by AFP.

Police previously detained Dias, a staunch rival of President Sall, presidential hopeful Ousmane Sonko and former minister Elhadji Malick Gakou on November 10 amid clashes between their followers and security forces in Dakar.

Dias was due to appear in court in connection with an incident where a man was shot dead in 2011 as political violence wracked the West African country.

Dias, mayor of Dakar’s Mermoz-Sacre-Coeur district, heads a coalition of opposition parties for the city’s mayoralty in local elections scheduled for January 2022.