A Senegalese court has sentenced on Monday two opposition members of Senegal’s National Assembly, Massata Samb and Mamadou Niang, to 6 months in prison for physically assaulting their female colleague, Amy Ndiaye, a deputy of the ruling Benno Bokk Yakaar (BBY) coalition.
The court also ordered Niang and Samb, both members of the Unity and Rally Party (PUR), to pay 5 million CFA francs ($8,200) in compensation to Ndiaye.
The two lawmakers were arrested in mid-December, two weeks after they disappeared in the wake of their assault against MP Ndiaye, which took place during a heated December 1 parliamentary session.
On December 1, during the Senegalese National Assembly’s debate on the budget of the Ministry of Justice, Massata Samb, a member of the Unity and Rally Party, slapped Benno Bokk Yakaar deputy Amy Ndiaye, who was accused of making disrespectful remarks against a religious figure, PUR leader Serigne Moustapha Sy.
Moments later, Ndiaye was kicked in her stomach by another opposition lawmaker as she tried to throw a chair at the first assaulter. The woman was rushed to a hospital, where it was revealed that she was pregnant at the time when the two MPs had assaulted her.
Two days after a video of the fight circulated on the Internet, triggering outrage among Senegalese people, the President of the National Assembly demanded the arrest of the PUR MPs, with the majority calling for their immunity lifted in order to take responsibility for the assault.