President Macky Sall announced yesterday the vote would be delayed to an unspecified date due to a dispute over the candidate list – a move some opposition and civil society groups have denounced as an “institutional coup”.

In an early sign of pushback against the postponement on the streets, around 200 protesters blocked traffic on a main thoroughfare in Dakar with a makeshift barricade of burning tyres.

The crowds retreated into side streets after riot police fired tear gas and started making arrests. The police did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Further protests are planned outside parliament today.

Senegal has never delayed a presidential vote and uncertainty about what happens next threatens to fuel civil unrest like the deadly protests of recent years that have tarnished its reputation as one of West Africa’s most stable democracies.

After Sall’s televised announcement, the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) expressed concern about the circumstances that led to the postponement and called for a new election date to be set quickly.

The French foreign ministry yesterday also urged the authorities “to remove the uncertainty surrounding the electoral timetable, so that the elections can be held as soon as possible and in compliance with the rules of Senegalese democracy”.