Exiled Senegal opposition figure Karim Wade vies for top job

Exiled Senegalese opposition figure Karim Wade, an ex-minister and the son of former head of state Abdoulaye Wade, Saturday said he had filed papers to contest presidential elections in February.

Wade's Democratic Party had designated him as its candidate but doubts had remained due to his sentencing to a jail term for corruption in 2015, three years after current President Macky Sall took office.

Sall pardoned him in 2016 and Wade has been living in exile in Qatar.

"I am happy to announce that my candidacy for the presidential election on February 25 was submitted" overnight, Wade said on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Wade's criminal record had prevented him from standing in the 2019 election which saw Sall re-elected.

But in August parliament voted to restore the eligibility of Wade and another opposition figure, former Dakar mayor Khalifa Sall, following President Sall's initiation of a political dialogue that was boycotted by various opposition groups.

Khalifa Sall, unrelated to the president, was imprisoned in 2017 and given a five-year jail term for fraud but released in 2019 after receiving a pardon like Wade.

More than 200 candidates have filed papers to contest the presidential election.