DAKAR: A 16-year-old died following clashes in Senegal’s Ziguinchor, the third fatality in unrest after President Macky Sall postponed this month’s election, a hospital source and a local politician said on Sunday.

Sall’s decision to push back the Feb 25 presidential vote has plunged Senegal into one of its worst crises since independence from France in 1960. Protests pitting youths against the security forces have turned increasingly violent in a country seen as a haven of stability and democracy in West Africa, a region roiled by coups and unrest.

Landing Camara, who was known as Diedhiou, died in hospital after being wounded in Ziguinchor. His identity papers showed he was 16, after the hospital source said he was 19.

The southern city is a stronghold of jailed opposition figurehead Ousmane Sonko, where youths and security forces clashed throughout the day. The teenager “took a projectile to the head and died of his injuries in intensive care”, the hospital source in Ziguinchor said.

“There were several seriously wounded people during the protests and one died. He was hit in the head by a bullet,” said Abdou Sane, coordinator of the opposition party Pastef in Ziguinchor.

Published in Dawn, February 12th, 2024