DAKAR —
A special court in Senegal sentenced the son of former president Aboulaye Wade to six years in prison on Monday and ordered him to pay a 138 billion CFA franc ($228 million) fine, dashing his hopes of competing in presidential elections due in 2017.
Karim Wade, who has been in detention since April 2013, was chosen by the main opposition party, the Senegalese Democratic Party (SDP), as its presidential candidate on Saturday, raising the stakes ahead of the verdict.
President Macky Sall, who ended former president Wade's 12-year rule at hotly contested elections in 2012, warned last week that his government will not tolerate any attempt to destabilize the West African country in the wake of the court
ruling.
