Died at the age of 92, Serigne Saliou Mbacké was Bamba’s last son on earth. During his lifetime, he contributed to the modernization of the city of Touba, to the education of children and to agriculture. Fifteen years after his call to God on December 28, 2007, Senegalese remember this man of God.
A major producer, he carried out a huge agricultural project in Khelcom over an area of 45,000 ha because he was convinced that food self-sufficiency was within reach. This religious guide, 5th Caliph General of the Mourides enjoyed a great aura in the Mouride community and in the Muslim world. Serigne Saliou Mbacké could not see the realization of his project to modernize the city which he entrusted to Wade, not without giving him, as a personal contribution, a sum of 7 billion CFA francs. He implemented a land development plan of approximately 100,000 plots and a city electrification network.
The one who was nicknamed the billionaire who did not dress and the scientist who spoke little was of flawless simplicity. His disinterestedness vis-à-vis the tinsel of this life, let somewhat informed people understand that everything that has an end, a finitude, should not be considered as lasting, really. He had the greatest attention for the family of Serigne Touba. Born in Diourbel in 1915, Serigne Saliou has made education his lifelong occupation. During his lifetime, he had established 29 daaras throughout the country. The 14 daaras were acquired before Khelcom which contains only the other 15. Indeed, its daaras where students work in the fields scattered across the country date back more than half a century. In his schools, the teaching of the Koran and religious education were associated with work to indicate that they were inseparable activities.
Serigne Saliou has made Mouridism a Sufi way known today throughout the world. Learning to work in young people gives them the awareness that allows man to fulfill himself, to be useful to himself and to the community. As for education, it aims in these daaras to make young disciples know the meaning of life, the rules of behavior in society, the spiritual and moral standards whose observation ensures everyone the safeguard of his humanity. .. He took over numerous renovation works, both internal and external, of the mosque and the construction of the Islamic university which his elder brother Abdoul Ahad Mbacké had begun.
Listened to, respected and even feared, he intervened to safeguard the country’s great balance. At the end of January 2007, in a context heavy with uncertainty, he reconciled Abdoulaye Wade and his former Prime Minister Idrissa Seck. Serigne Saliou was the lowest common denominator in a Senegal plagued by divisions of all kinds. Abdoulaye Wade, whose spiritual guide he was and who visited him regularly, bowed to him to ask for his blessings.
The opposition had met him at the end of November to ask him to convince Wade to agree to open the dialogue. The unions sought his mediation before launching the slightest social movement. Serigne Saliou was also an economic actor convinced of the need for his country to achieve food self-sufficiency. Before settling in Touba, capital of Mouridism, on May 13, 1990, to be enthroned Caliph General there, he only came there once a year in order to hand over to his successive predecessors his participation in the maintenance costs of the religious city. Serigne Saliou leaves behind a strong brotherhood of several million followers, but also a city that has experienced exceptional growth.
15 years after his call to God: Senegalese remember Serigne Saliou Mbacke