Dozens of people trying to reach the Canary Islands disappeared this Wednesday as night fell at sea after a canoe was shipwrecked off the coast of Senegal. This comes from reports from residents of the town of Gandiol, from where the boat set sail. The same sources added that there were about thirty young girls among them. Over the course of Thursday, the news spread among neighbors, who began sharing photos of the people who were said to have died. The body of a young woman was recovered from the sea. According to the Interior Ministry, the authorities are working on the exact number of missing people, a complex task since people from other regions of the country also traveled on board.
The shipwreck occurred on Wednesday evening in the area whose local name can be translated as “The Gap”, a dangerous exit to the sea from the Senegal River used by the fishermen of Saint Louis, who have been demanding its beacons for years to avoid accidents. According to local sources, the boat with a hundred young emigrants had set sail from Gandiol to reach an even larger canoe that was waiting for them on the high seas and with which they wanted to sail to the Canary Islands.
Senegal is one of the main departure points for the canoes that have been arriving in the Canary Islands almost daily in recent months and was the scene of serious shipping accidents this summer that left dozens of people dead. In recent months the presence of women and young girls on board these canoes has increased.
One of the worst accidents this year occurred in August last year, when about 90 young people from the Senegalese town of Fass Boye died of hypothermia and dehydration at sea after being stranded at sea for days due to an engine problem. A Spanish ship rescued the 38 survivors and took them to the Cape Verde archipelago, where they received medical care before returning to Senegal. A few days earlier, in July, the shipwreck of a canoe en route to the Canary Islands off the coast of Dakar claimed around 17 lives. In 2020, more than 100 young people died on a boat that left Mbour and broke at sea after a gas cylinder the migrants on board were using to cook exploded.
The constant departures of canoes from Senegal are the reason for the strong migration peak that the Canary Archipelago has experienced since the beginning of last summer. In 2023 alone, more than 25,000 people have arrived in the Canary Islands, 9,000 of them in the current month of October, which has led the government to declare a state of emergency and prepare to soon open around 11,000 accommodations in barracks, hotels, etc. hostels on the Peninsula. Adult migrants arriving on the islands are referred to other autonomous communities, a process that has been in place since 2000. Minors are welcome on the Canary Islands.
Political and social crisis
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The political and social crisis that Senegal has been experiencing since 2020, which intensified in the first days of June this year, is one of the reasons that explain this migration surge. A series of violent demonstrations, harshly repressed by the Senegalese state and resulting in at least fifty deaths, ended this summer with the jailing of main opposition leader Ousmane Sonko, accused of the insurgency, and the ostracism of his political party. More than a thousand young people were arrested. Sonko, who has so far dropped out of the presidential campaign for the February 2024 election, had raised high hopes for change among thousands of young Senegalese, many of whom are disappointed.
Likewise, the economic disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine have led to an increase in the prices of essential products, while Senegalese fishermen denounce the lack of fish, which they attribute to the presence of large industrial vessels with licenses issued by their government country. The main departure points for the Cayucos to the Canary Islands are Joal, Mbour, Kayar or Saint Louis, all fishing areas.
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