Senegal offers $100,000 reward after official slain
02 Jan 2007 15:29:15 GMT Source: Reuters
By Diadie Ba DAKAR, Jan 2 (Reuters) - Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade on Tuesday offered 50 million CFA francs ($100,000), a passport and an air ticket to anyone who helped find the killers of a top ruling party official in the restive Casamance region. Suspected separatists attacked Oumar Lamine Badji, a leading member of Wade's Democratic Party (PDS), late on Saturday at his family home near the regional capital Ziguinchor. They slit his throat and set his house on fire, security officials said. "I have decided to give 50 million CFA plus a passport and an air ticket (abroad) to anyone who gives us information which helps identify the assassins," Wade said in a speech at Badji's funeral, broadcast on state radio. "The state will do its utmost to find the killers and bring them to justice." Separatist rebels from the Movement of Democratic Forces of Casamance (MFDC) have waged a low-level, on-off guerrilla campaign in the southern province since 1982, accusing the government in Dakar of neglecting the region. A string of reconciliation moves has failed to rein in rebel hardliners and fighting intensified again in mid-2006 after some rejected peace talks. Senegal's army has nonetheless just begun the process of removing landmines laid by both government troops and rebels over the past two decades. Badji, leader of the Ziguinchor regional council, was killed the night before Senegal's Muslim majority celebrated Eid al-Adha, known locally as Tabaski, when Muslim families kill sheep, generally by slitting their throats. Casamance is Senegal's only mainly Christian province, cut off from the rest of the country by Gambia, but the conflict has generally transcended religious and ethnic divides with rebels hailing from both religions and various tribes. Many Senegalese long for an end to the conflict in Casamance, which they see as undermining their country's reputation for stability and peace. The former French colony is one of few African countries never to have had a coup. Wade, 80, will seek a second and final term of office in elections in February.
