In Senegal, Petite-Côte becomes the “chic and cool district of Dakar”

Villages separated by lagoons and mangroves, where you can watch the ballet of hornbills and pelicans. Myths and pages of history run through the Petite-Côte region of Senegal. In Toubab Dialao, El Hadj Oumar Tall, a jihadist and marabout, is said to have dug up a spring of water. In Popenguine, the apparition of Mary to fishermen continues to unite a Catholic community around an annual pilgrimage.

But Petite-Côte, already bustling with tourism, is changing rapidly. Piles of bricks and bags of cement are piled up along the roads and paths, where carts loaded with reinforcing bars are crowded together. Even in villages like Guéréo, construction sites are visibly increasing.

In recent years, many Dakar residents, accustomed to spending their weekends there, have settled more permanently between the village of Yenne and the town of Saly, 80 kilometres from the capital. Since 2019, the opening of a motorway has allowed the journey to be made in just over an hour.

The Petite-Côte stretches south of the Cape Verde peninsula, on which Dakar is located. The new town of Diamniadio, built in 2015 by presidential order and already home to several ministries, linked by train to Dakar, is only a few dozen kilometres away. As is the Blaise-Diagne international airport. The department of Mbour, which includes Petite-Côte, has become the third most populous in Senegal, increasing in ten years from around 669,000 to 940,000 inhabitants.

“A real boom”

Easing congestion in the dense, polluted and congested capital has been a desire of the State for a decade. “We are witnessing an expansion of the Dakar metropolis. The Petite-Côte is becoming a peri-urban area”explains Papa Sakho, a geographer at the Cheikh-Anta-Diop University in Dakar. “Yenne is becoming a suburban commune where people who work in Dakar or Diamniadio live.” explains an elected official from the fishing village. “The arrival of new inhabitants causes an increase in tax revenues”Underlines Demba Sarr, an employee of the Ngaparou municipality, who also notes the growth of new sectors in the region, such as “construction, services and trade”.

Saly, a seaside resort whose development dates back to the 1970s, is undergoing a transformation. The town already represents a quarter of Senegal’s tourist accommodation capacity with its 10,000 places. But it is becoming a regional capital, according to a long-time player in the hotel sector: “Since the arrival of the motorway, there has been a real boom. Several supermarkets, hairdressers, gyms have opened… Saly is no longer the small town that used to host a few European retirees. It has become the chic and cool suburb of Dakar…”

Cheikh Mbacké, a consultant, moved there five years ago. The hotel industry has been reorienting itself towards the events sector, he explains: “NGOs, private, public… Each one organizes its seminars in Saly. In my sector we are both here and in the capital. Why stop there?” He notes that the range of activities continues to expand: “Saly is also becoming a sports city. Training centres are growing around the famous Paris-Saint-Germain Academy”a sports complex opened by the Parisian football club to support young players.

But the “boom” The Petite-Côte is not exempt from turbulence and worries. A local elected official confesses his feelings on condition of anonymity and with a certain humor: “What is happening makes bricklayers smile and fishermen cry. Some benefit from development. But for others, this situation means the abandonment of their activity, pollution and inflation…”

A region that is becoming concrete

“The price of land has skyrocketed. A plot of land of approximately 200 m2.² which five years ago was worth 2 million CFA francs, today can be sold for 8″, explains Cheikh Fall of the development NGO Enda Tiers-Monde. Agriculture is therefore slowly declining. Khadija Toussi produces Somone millet products with a women’s cooperative. “But here they don’t grow crops anymore. We don’t have any more arable land, it’s too expensive.”He explains. Speculation has made the region a champion of land conflicts. The latter sometimes resemble a revolt, as in 2020, when the inhabitants of the quiet village of Guéréo opposed a hotel project.

That same year, the Ministry of Environment pointed out in a report a “alarming situation” in Petite-Côte. The State then classified 4,000 hectares of the Somone lagoon, a popular spot for tourists and Dakar residents, as a protected marine area. Oyster farming activities have since resumed. A few kilometres away, to combat the phenomenon of coastal erosion, breakwaters have been installed on the beaches of Saly.

But concerns remain in a region that is becoming more concrete. Environmentalists and fishermen from the village of Ndayane opposed the construction of a deepwater port, the flagship project of former President Macky Sall. Unfortunately, the project was launched in 2023 and on September 13, Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko received the CEO of the Dubai manufacturer DP World to discuss the progress of the work. The port, its terminals and its economic zone should extend over some 1,200 hectares. The impact studies of the project valued at more than a billion dollars remain inaccessible and the recriminations are dead letters, for the moment.

Could some plans be revised? Local farmers welcomed the authorities’ announcement in May that they were suspending a project calling for a new dam to be built while it was being studied. “Balancing the growth of the city of Dakar”According to him, the land in the village of Daga-Kholpa was intended to house a new urban centre of 8,500 dwellings in the initial phase only.

Enda Tiers-Monde’s Cheikh Fall concludes: “There is a lack of planning. On the one hand, we protect marine areas and, on the other, we build a giant port that risks affecting them. Megaprojects are announced without considering the impact on the surrounding land.” In short, a call to rationalize the development of the region.