Senegal: Idrissa Seck plans political party to "save the country"

Dakar, 09/25 - Senegal`s former Prime Minister Idrissa Seck has announced plans to shortly form a political party called Rewmi ("the country", in Wolof) with an ambition to improve the political, economic and social situation in Senegal.

Seck made this announcement in a speech broadcast Sunday on private Senegalese radio stations, shortly after he returned from France where he spent several months.

Idrissa Seck, 47, who was deputy secretary general of the Democratic Party of Senegal (PDS), spent 7 months in prison following a judicial inquiry into spending from government coffers on national construction works in Thies, 70 km from Dakar.

Idrissa Seck was dismissed along with four others from the PDS for "divisive activities" before he announced his intention on 4 April 2006 to contest the upcoming presidential polls.