{"id":35459,"date":"2026-05-26T15:29:30","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T13:29:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=35459"},"modified":"2026-05-26T15:29:30","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T13:29:30","slug":"senegal-parliament-elects-ousted-prime-minister-sonko-as-speaker","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/senegal-parliament-elects-ousted-prime-minister-sonko-as-speaker\/","title":{"rendered":"Senegal parliament elects ousted Prime Minister Sonko as Speaker"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Senegal&#8217;s parliament elected ousted Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko as speaker this Tuesday, a \u200cmove that could give him a powerful platform to challenge President Bassirou Diomaye Faye.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Faye dismissed Sonko on Friday and dissolved the cabinet, \u2060ending months of speculation about a growing rift between the two over how to handle the country&#8217;s debt crisis.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The move has intensified uncertainty over how the government would repay its loans after it discovered billions in \u200cunreported \u2060debt.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Lawmakers rebelled by reinstating Sonko as a member and voting to elect him as speaker with 132 votes in favour.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The \u2060opposition described the manoeuvre as a scandal and questioned the legitimacy of the \u2060appointment.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;What is happening is a black day at the National Assembly,&#8221; \u2060said opposition lawmaker Abdou Mbow.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":35191,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[26],"class_list":["post-35459","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Senegal's parliament elected ousted Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko as speaker this Tuesday","published_date":"2026-05-26 15:29:04","news_description":"Senegal's parliament elected ousted Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko as speaker this Tuesday","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/35459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/35459\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35460,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/35459\/revisions\/35460"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=35459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}