In February 2017, the government reduced electricity tariffs by 10% and since then the government has not paid the subsidies due to SENELEC on a regular basis. The government of Senegal refused to adjust tariffs because of the presidential elections, despite the increase in the price of a barrel of oil. This misalignment is the main cause of the problem of SENELEC and the budget deficit faced by Senegal. Consequently, the government was obliged to borrow 125 billion FCFA from the banks. The problem is that the government just wanted to give its word against the payment of 25 billion per year for five years. Unfortunately, the banks refused and demanded an official guarantee. It took IMF authorization for the loan of 125 billion FCFA to pay SENELEC in 2019 and this caused a deficit of 3.7% in the same year. This loan will be qualified as exceptional in order to ensure that the deficit does not exceed 3%.

SENELEC, which holds the monopoly of the purchase and distribution of electricity in Senegal remains the most important company to be privatized. Previously privatized, the State bought shares to be the majority. In addition to this, the government had bought out 12.3% of the shares of Total and 11.3% of the shares of Mobil to establish a pluralist control of 33.6% of the oil refining company SAR. President Wade viewed the SAR as a strategic asset, especially with the optimism of finding oil.

After all these efforts, the government ran into two major problems that had triggered the energy crisis. These are the government's inability to pay the butane gas subsidies to SAR and the inability of SENELEC to honor its financial commitments to its two main suppliers, Shell and Total.

On the one hand, because of its financial precariousness, the board of directors of SAR had decided to stop buying crude oil on credit. SENELEC which had accumulated a debt of 10 million dollars with Shell had stopped supplying SENELEC with fuel and had decided not to supply fuel on credit. These two measures have had a ripple effect on our entire energy sector.

With social pressure, the government had disbursed $30 million of its outstanding debt to the SAR to allow the import of crude oil. This payment represented only about 20% of the total debt owed to the SAR. The State has put itself in this situation because of the accumulation of unpaid subsidies. These subsidies impacted SAR's financial situation, as it had to absorb the difference between buying oil at world market prices and selling gas and refined oil products at lower prices in Senegal. This forced the SAR into debt with the banks and its debt amounted to almost $175 million.

On the other hand, Shell, which supplied 60% of SENELEC's oil needs, had stopped supplying it for lack of payment, and had imposed a credit limit of 11 million dollars on SENELEC. Once this threshold was reached, Shell stopped supplying SENELEC. A solution had to be found, because neither SAR nor Total could supply SENELEC.

The price of fuel increased by 3.6% and gasoline rose from 602 FCFA to 624 FCFA and diesel increased by 4.8% from 514 FCFA to 539 FCFA. Oil suppliers won't see it and SAR signed a contract with SENELEC, limiting its supply to 25%, but when Shell and Total refused to supply SENELEC, SAR still supplied 100% of the needs of SENELEC in fuel.

Samuel Sarr, former director general of SENELEC, had sounded the alarm, but he received no reaction from the Minister of Energy and Mines and finally decided to raise the issue with the then Prime Minister, Macky Sall. . He finally had his audience with President Wade and the latter asked his Prime Minister to devise a strategy to deal with the energy situation. The Prime Minister convened an interministerial meeting, but nothing concrete came of it.

The SAR had closed and liquidated its remaining stocks and the imports of petroleum products were stored at the port. However, for lack of sufficient and adequate infrastructure, SENELEC could not transport the imported fuel to its power plants in Cap de Biche, only about twenty kilometers from the port of Dakar. Finally, the SAR allegedly authorized SENELEC to unload and store its imports at the refinery to facilitate transport to Cap de Biche. A misfortune, never coming alone, GTI had also decided to stop supplying SENELEC for non-payment.

Before suspending its activities, the SAR refined 1.2 million tons of crude annually while the country needed 2 million tons. SAR's production technology was outdated and it could only refine Bonny Light which is Nigerian crude oil and is more expensive to process. Total wanted to sell its shares because of its interest in the Ivorian refinery with a capacity of 4 million tonnes of crude per year.

It should also be noted that to date, the most strategic parastatals have been privatized. Advens Group held 66.9% of the shares of SONACOS in 2005, the rail operator Transrail was sold in 2003 to a Canadian company Canac-Getma for 34 million dollars, Air Senegal international was privatized in 2000 with Royal Air Morocco which controlled 51% of the shares. Without forgetting the SDE privatized in 1996 by SAUR, subsidiary of the French group Bouygues and Sonatel in 1997 and a restructuring in 1999. During this period, the privatization programs had generated almost 500 million dollars including 212 million dollars thanks to the sale in 1997 shares of Sonatel.

The major problem is that corruption is a major obstacle to Senegal's economic development and competitiveness. There are laws, control bodies to fight corruption, but it is still in full swing. Transparency International, in its 2019 Corruption Perceptions Index, ranked Senegal 66th out of 180 countries.

When Khadim Ba, boss of Locafrique and former administrator of the SAR, was informed of the impossibility of paying a bill of 61 million euros, while a line of credit of 250 million euros had been disposal of the RAD, he refused to condone this and decided to slam the doors.

The first reason for underinvestment in the energy sector is the subsidy. In West Africa and in Senegal in particular, half of the population is poor and more than half of the population lives in rural areas. SENELEC suffers from structural problems that obstruct its performance and the subsidies are unsustainable and make the public service vulnerable to corruption.

We must privatize the management of SENELEC, because any serious listener will tell you that the problem of SENELEC comes from the rulers who interfere in the management of the box for political purposes.