For over six decades, Senegal has been the paragon of democracy in West Africa, a region that's remained beset by civil wars, coups and autocratic rulers. That doesn’t mean everything has gone smoothly in Senegal either, especially in recent years. There have been several allegations that outgoing PresidentMacky Sall has gone after dissenting figures, to the point of jailing a few of them.

Earlier this year, Sall pushed elections slated for February all the way to December. Protests ensued, the constitutional council ruled against the scheduled postponement and Sall acceded to the ruling and will step down on his due date, April 2. Senegalese will now be going to the polls a month later than planned, on March 24.

On the ballots are 19 candidates representing various political parties and coalitions. A candidate must win at least 50 percent of the votes, if not, the two leading vote-getters will head to a runoff election. While there are no official predictive polls, several candidates are clearly more popular than their counterparts, evidenced by the following accrued during their short campaign trails. Below, we run through five of them and why they’re leading the pack ahead of Sunday’s election.

AMADOU BA

One of the most experienced candidates on the ballot, Amadou Ba was Senegal’s prime minister for about 18 months before stepping down to focus on his campaign a few weeks ago. Before his stint as prime minister, he was minister of finance and economy between 2013 and 2019, then foreign minister from April 2019 to November 2020.

Handpicked by Sall as the candidate for the coalition Benno Bokk Yaakaar (Wolof for “United in Hope"), Ba was expected to be the winner of this year’s elections, with early predictions from last year tipping him as the next president, possibly through a runoff. With the events of the last few months, the ruling party’s credibility has taken a hit. However, Ba believes his experience should appeal to many, urging citizens in a rally to vote for “competence instead of entrusting the reins of the country to adventurers.”

ALY NGOUILLE NDIAYE

Just as experienced as Ba, Aly Ngouille Ndiaye had been involved in the highest levels of government prior to his resignation last September. Running under an eponymous coalition, Ndiaye had been positioning himself as the candidate to Yaakaar, but after Ba was announced as the ruling coalition’s candidate, he resigned his post as minister of agriculture.

Prior to leaving the government, Ndiaye had been a long-serving minister since 2012, when he headed the Energy, Mines and Industry Ministry for a little over five years. He was then minister of the interior from 2017 to 2020, and then took a short 2-year break before his 11-month stint at the helm of the Agriculture Ministry. A former bank executive and civil engineer, Ndiaye is also banking on the appeal of experience to voters who might be enamored by his portfolio working with the ruling party.

KHALIFA ABABACAR SALL

“I'm a worthy socialist heir. I've never compromised on my DNA,” Khalifa Babacar Salltold Le Monde earlier this year of his ambition. While they share the same surname, Sall is no relative to the outgoing president. In fact, both are greatly at odds with each other. In 2017, Khalifa Babacar Sall was arrested and charged with embezzling about $3 million. He was sentenced to a five-year prison term, which meant he couldn’t contest for the presidential elections in 2019.

A two-time elected mayor of the capital city, Dakar, Sall was seen as the most prominent opposition candidate to President Sall’s re-election bid, and there are allegations that the corruption charges were trumped up to disqualify him from contesting. President Sall pardoned him a few months after the 2019 elections. Contesting on the Taxawu Sénégal platform, Sall has hinged his campaign on being a socialist reformer, with the motto, “Feel the Pulse of Senegal.”

BASSIROU DIOMAYE FAYE

Last year, deadly protests erupted in Senegal after opposition firebrand Ousmane Sonko was convicted of “corrupting youth” and sentenced to two years in prison. At the last presidential election, Sonko placed third but his popularity has soared amongst Senegalese youth, especially as the demography faces high unemployment rates. Now ineligible to contest due to his conviction, as well as the ban placed on his PASTEF party by the government because of the post-imprisonment protests, Sonko has thrown his weight behind Bassirou Diomaye Faye.

Previously in detention for defamation and contempt of court charges, Faye was released alongside Sonko last weekend to a rally of vociferous supporters who were already campaigning for him before his exit from jail. Despite his detention and being fairly new to the political arena compared to those he’s going up against, Faye is a strong contender, and his rallies over the last few days have attracted thousands of young Senegalese, with the physical, charismatic support of Sonko boosting his appeal.

IDRISSA SECK

Idrissa Seck has been a fixture in Senegalese politics for about three decades. He was a leading member of the then-ruling party, the Senegalese Democratic Party (PDS), and he served as the prime minister between 2002 and 2004 under former president Abdoulaye Wade. Before that, he had served as minister of trade, minister of state, and director of the cabinet. Shortly after being dismissed as the prime minister, Seck was detained and charged for alleged corruption, but the charges were dismissed and he never faced trial.

Expelled from the PDS, Seck formed a new party, Rewmi (Wolof for “The Country”), under which he contested the presidency in the 2007 elections, but he came a distant second. He’s contested in every presidential election since and, last year, he exited the Senegal Economic Council to run for president again. Withdrawing Rewmi from the ruling coalition, he cited the government’s alleged treatment of Sonko, perhaps in solidarity with his own past travails.