Wade's path to Centralisation and Decadence

Amy Niang writes about the decline of leadership under the Senegalese president:

The implications for state-building in Senegal and similar regimes are clear: democratic change may be a prerequisite but the absence of an institutionalised effort to stabilise the system beyond the regime remains an obstacle. The Wade administration may have few days of glory left. But the damage done by his ruling style to the state-building project is immense. The nominal state has become a carcass institution with a flag and an anthem. Its leading structure is a coalition of an amorphous body made of new political aristocrats whose main characteristics are wealth and relative economic prosperity.