Items

• Senegalese President

  M. Leopold Senghor, poet and statesman, was today elected unanimously as first President of the Senegalese Republic. The election which follows Senegal's breakaway last month from the Mali Federation with Sudan, was by an electoral college consisting of National Assembly deputies, and representatives of regional and municipal authorities.
• President Poet

  This week's visiting Head of State, M. Leopold Senghor of Senegal, is one of the most cultivated politicians in Africa - as befits the President of one of its most civilised republics. M. Senghor, 55 this month, is an able scholar, a former brilliant teacher in Paris and a considerable poet. Another distinction, by Senegal standards, is that he is Catholic. The country's population is predominantely Muslim, and Senghor's election seems to testify to the tolerance of both President and electorate...
• Local election test for Nigerian regime

  Nigerians go to the polls tomorrow in the first test of the military government's declared intention to return the country to civilian rule by October next year. The local multi-party elections take place against a background of renewed focus on the administration's human rights record, following the charging with treason this week of 15 opposition activitists, including Mr Wole Soyinka, the Nobel prize winner...
• Letter from... Touba

  This article discusses the unique political environment of the holy town of Touba, an Islamic city whose political and religious leader are the Islamic Brotherhood, the Muriddiya. The article suggests that Senghor, as a "smart tactician," "was quick to realise the political capital to be made from an organization which such sophisticated control of its members" and he appealed to this population in order to secure their vote. The article continues with modern concerns regarding this population and its voting power in Senegal.
• Charges of Forming Illegal W. Nigeria Government: Police Seek Poet

  Following a clash between police and undergraduates at Ibadan University, all students there have been restricted to the campus. They were demonstrating against the outcome of the regional elections. In Lagos market women were dispersed by police with tear gas while on a protest march to the Prime Minister's residence from Mushin, which is the Western Nigerian suburb of the Federal capital. Police in Ibadan toda declared Mr. Wole Soyinka, a Nigerian playwright and poet who featured in the recent Commonwealth arts festival in Britain, to be a wanted person. They have asked for public cooperation in finding Mr. Soyinka, in connexion with an incident which prevented a message from Mr. Akintola, the regional Premier, being broadcast. It was stated that the recorded message was seized in the studio by an armed man, who took it away. The regional Governor has reappointed Chief Babatunji Oloweku Justice Minister and Attorney General. This is the first portfolio to be allocated so far. Chief Remifani Kayode, Chief Claude Akran, and Chief Adebiyi Adeyi have been reappointed ministers.
• Congo Head Of State

  "The two Houses of Parliament in the Congo today elected Mr. Jeseph Kasavubu, leader of the Abako party, as Head of State.
• Mali Clash Starts New Crisis

  "The break-up was provoked by a squabble over the first presidential election, due on August 27/ Senegal's candidate is M/ Leopold Senghor head of the Senegalese progressive union."
• Vorster on victory ride—back to the laager

  "This it's leader Colin Eglin due to return today from a tour which he has been described by the President Senghor of Senegal as "South Africa's Saving Grace..."
• Scenes of disorder

  In preparation for the federal elections of December 1983, Nigeria's leading novelist Chinua Achebe addressed his countrymen in a pamphle, presumably in the aid of the People's Democratic Party of which he was the deputy national president.