Opposition Gambia Democratic Congress (GDC) party leader says ‘no’ to results from many constituencies where he said irregularities happened during the recent parliamentary elections, adding they will challenge the results accordingly.
Mama Kandeh also discredited the reports of the various international observers to the elections saying they never reported that President Barrow embarked on a nationwide tour to campaign for a particular party which is a violation of the law.
Kandeh convened a press conference on Monday at the Baobab Hotel to reveal his party’s position on the recently concluded parliamentary elections.
The GDC party which contested its first parliamentary elections on April 6th, won five seats in the National Assembly.
“The GDC position in this election is very clear that until we apply what we need as a party and off course respect the rule of law, the GDC party says no to many of the constituencies where irregularities happened during the election process. It is our position to continue the ground work we doing and to make sure whatever we put on the table is a concert evidence because we don’t want to violate the rule of law. GDC is known for peace and respect for every human being. That being the case, we want to continue the trend but it is not stopping us from scrutinizing the results. Already we have gathered lots of information about what happened during the electoral process which we are not satisfied with but we will make it available to every Gambian and to the whole world so that everybody can see what has happened during this past parliamentary elections” Kandeh said.
According to him, the irregularities are found throughout the nation and the international election observers have seen it themselves.
Kandeh said the GDC is accused of violating the electoral laws but people are not talking about President Adama Barrow who went on a nationwide tour and is not a member of any political party and was campaigning on behalf of political parties and calling them coalition candidates.
“We put a petition to the IEC, condemning anybody calling himself a coalition candidate because nobody was nominated under the coalition ticket. So, the cheating and the irregularities where openly done. We have copies of the letter and that of the IEC that there is no coalition candidate. But the trend continued and there was no one there to stop it. President Barrow was campaigning” he said.
According to Kandeh, when President Barrow wanted to embark on a nationwide tour, the GDC wrote to him, the IGP and IEC and copied to other diplomatic missions in the country that he was going to interfere in the political campaign. He said though they cannot stop him as president from going round the country but they believed that it was the wrong time for him to do that.
“We have records of audios and videos of him calling on people to vote for coalition candidates. After being notified that there is no coalition candidate, he insisted and went ahead and campaign for them openly. I haven’t seen such in the reports provided by the international observers. We haven’t seen any report or action taken against those using or saying they are coalition candidates, putting on the coalition symbols and putting on the president photos that they are coalition candidates. Those are misleading information and cheating on Gambians and we believe this is just not fair” Kandeh said.
He made it clear that the GDC will take its position after the executive meeting and gathering of all the information needed. He said they have lot of information already and they will make it public and known to everyone. “We cannot let this go like the way it is. We are not saying we can make a change but Gambians will know what happened” he concluded.
