By Lamin Njie
President Adama Barrow should resign in December and hand power to someone who is not a politician to preside until 2021 and organise elections, Dr Ismaila Ceesay has said.
The Gambia’s political future is a crossroads as President Barrow is facing strong opposition over his plan to stay in power until 2021. Mr Barrow had previously pledged to be in office for only three years but he has now changed his mind, a move that has sparked a bitter political row.
UDP and PDOIS are leading the calls for Mr Barrow to step down in December while pressure group Three Years Jotna has threatened to take to the streets if Mr Barrow fails to keep his promise.
Dr Ismaila Ceesay today told The Fatu Network The Gambia is in a “dilemma which if we don’t really treat carefully will be to the disadvantage of this country and for future generations.”
The top political scientist argued: “For thirty, we’d one government with one president. Subsequently, he was overthrown. Twenty-years one party with one president. So the norm in terms of our politics and democracy was self-perpetuating rule, leaders who overstay in power and they are forced out. 2016 came [and] that was a big opportunity for The Gambia. That for the first time in the history of this country we were able to remove a sitting president through the ballot box. It means that we have an opportunity to reset our democratic culture from self-perpetuating rule to something else.
“The coalition MOU was handy, in the sense that it wants to reset the political norm to a system where we have multi-party competitive democracy where leaders don’t stay too long in power. That is why they came up with certain general principles, key among which was what; a person who is elected as flagbearer will oversee a three-year transition and will resign and conduct elections that he will not contest because he will have the advantage of incumbency, that anybody who wins will start the building of this nation. That has failed.
“If Barrow refuses to resign after three years, it is setting a bad precedent. It will mean we have leaders who make promises and can’t keep promises. It is bad for our democracy, it will undo everything that we fought for. However, if he is forced out through a popular uprising, it is also setting a very bad precedent. It will mean for a very long time it will be difficult for a president to finish his term in this country.
“So now, what do we do as a country? Let us forget about our personal interest and put the interest of the country first. One thing that can be done which will solve all these problems is for President Barrow to resign. But before he resigns, he appoints a reformist technocratic vice president who will oversee the rest of the transition period, implement the rest of the reforms, oversees a successful constitutional review referundum, organises elections, all these political leaders, the Hamat Bahs, let them all be removed from cabinet. This reformist vice president will become the president and can appoint a reformist technocratic cabinet to do the work. The politicians, Barrow can go and form his political party and come back in 2021, let everybody go and do their politics and leave these technocrats to do the rest of the two-year transition.”
