Thione Seck, one of Senegal’s biggest music stars over the last four decades, died at the age of 66 in Dakar on Sunday, his lawyer said. “He died this morning of an illness at the Fann hospital,” lawyer Ousmane Seye told AFP, confirming reports in the Senegalese media. In the 1970s he sang in the Orchestre Baobab, known for playing a mix of Afro-Cuban salsa and traditional Senegalese music. Tributes poured in after his death was announced, with the former mayor of Dakar Khalifa Sall paying tribute to “a true monument of Senegalese music”. He was arrested in May 2015 after fake banknotes worth 50 million euros ($60 million) were found in his Dakar house.

Source: Punch March 14, 2021 15:22 UTC