Sheikh lifts his second wife, hoists her onto his shoulder, and then manfully throws her onto a bed strewn with rose petals. The giggling couple embrace, and the door closes on a final image of white slippers swaying in unison.
Aired since January on the Senegalese private channel 2STV during prime time, the series "Maîtresse d'un homme marié" (Mistress of a Married Man) features five young, independent, urban women, some of whom have affairs with married men… and sometimes end up marrying them, like Marème. Although relationships are suggested, kisses are rarely seen on screen, it has provoked the ire of Muslim organizations, whose complaints have earned it warnings from the National Audiovisual Regulation Council (CNRA).
In the Sicap Liberté 3 neighborhood of Dakar, the Sène family gathers religiously in front of their television every Monday and Friday evening to watch their favorite soap opera. Between two dance-filled commercials extolling the virtues of local rice, Rose, a vivacious single mother, condemns the censorship hanging over the series, which she sees as a faithful reflection of a hypocritical society.
"The men who criticize the series are the same ones who have mistresses and do far worse to them than what is shown on screen!" Rose asserts. "Women are judged because they live alone, because they are independent… In Senegal, if you're not married by the age of 30, you're no longer considered a good girl. Here, you can be successful in everything, but if you don't have a man, you're nothing," she sighs.
Each member of the family identifies with a character. "Mine is Djalika," smiles Rose's daughter, who, like her favorite character, is raising her children alone. Her neighbor on the couch, a young man draped in a black tracksuit, prefers the shady Birame. "He hurts women, you could have chosen better!" laughs one of her cousins.
The fact that the series shows, sometimes in a harsh light, the pain of wives abandoned for younger women, the hypocrisy of men, and women's desires for emancipation is precisely the reason for its success in Senegal and throughout West Africa. On YouTube, each episode is viewed between one and two million times and generates a flood of glowing comments.
The craze, and sometimes scandal, is such that one of the actors was slapped by a woman who could have been his mother while he was exercising on the Dakar coast road. "She said to him, 'Stop drinking and take care of your family!'" recounts executive producer Kalista Sy, laughing.
But not everyone finds the series' excesses funny, notably the Islamic NGO Jamra, which referred the matter to the CNRA in January. On March 29, the audiovisual regulator finally authorized the series to continue airing, on condition that "corrective measures" be made to the script, under penalty of a delay in the broadcast schedule or even an outright ban.
Everything was back to normal, from the point of view of religious associations, until the 34th episode, in which Cheikh and Marème are seen frolicking on the marital bed, which prompted a "formal notice" from the CNRA on May 31.
"A line has been crossed. They have offended a large part of the Senegalese population by broadcasting quasi-pornographic content during the holy month of Ramadan," said Mactar Guèye, representative of Jamra.
"It must be acknowledged that this series very accurately depicts Senegalese society and the problem of infidelity among men," concedes Mr. Guèye, interviewed by AFP in his home, where a giant screen broadcasts a telenovela channel. "But it is unthinkable that this glorification of fornication and adultery should continue as it is," he rages. "Maîtresse d'un homme marié" is nevertheless characterized by a sometimes moralizing tone. Home wreckers are always duly reprimanded by those around them.
But for Senegalese feminist activist Fatou Kéné Diouf, "this moralizing will never prevent female viewers from living their lives." "The series shows women who are comfortable with their sexuality. It will never be shown on screen, but it is talked about: in this respect, the series is really powerful," she explains.
On the set, where the offices are deserted on weekends, there is a cheerful hubbub. Chairs are strewn with large multicolored dresses, and makeup is applied hastily on a table. "We shoot twelve hours a day, six days a week. So we don't hear about the controversy, and that's a good thing," says the actress who plays Djalika before having her eyebrows redrawn. In a weary voice, the producer lists the difficulties encountered: machismo, religious pressures, technical problems during filming. "But when young women watch the series and finally identify with characters who look like them, they are very moved," says Kalista Sy. "And no one can take that away from us."