Between March 2010 and April 2012, the Senegalese government granted fishing licenses to European and Russian fishing vessels, without adherence to limits and legal requirements. According to the countrys fisheries law, foreign trawlers are forbidden from trawling in the central Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). However, foreign trawlers were discovered trawling for pelagic fish in Casamance and within the EEZ, with permission granted by the Ministry of Maritime Economy of Senegal, under the government of Adboulaye Wade. Local fisher groups staged mass demonstrations and opposition to the granting of licenses. The minister tried to revise the national Fisheries Code to legitimize the granting of new licenses. By December 2011, the number of pelagic supertrawlers had risen from 21 to 44. Senegalese fishers and civil society groups campaigned to cancel the granting of licenses, to stop overfishing and to develop alternative sustainable fishing practices. Macky Sall, the Senegalese President who came to power in March 2012, canceled 29 fishing authorizations granted to foreign pelagic trawlers. In their 2 years of activity, they had caught 125,000 tonnes, half the overall annual catch of pelagic fish by the entire Senegalese fleet. Some trawlers are reportedly still illegally fishing in Senegalese waters.