By: Ousainou Allen (Interim President, NAFAA)
Throughout human history, human beings have lived in communities and equally coexisted with nature. This has warranted the need for humans to adopt “culture” as a means of realising their true being.
According to the Oxford Dictionary, “culture” refers to the customs, beliefs, art, way of life, and social organization of a particular country or group, essentially encompassing the learned behaviors and values of a society, including their attitudes, arts, and modes of perception.
Judging by the above definition, and putting it in the context of Gambian society, culture simply encompasses everything to do with our daily life; our sense of justice, our perception of everyday realities including political affiliation, our system of education, our religious affiliation, our patriotic values, those transversal skills (critical thinking, problem solving, entrepreneurial mindset, emotional intelligence) etc.
It is not an unknown fact that this land today we call The Gambia was once inhabited by communities that had a vibrant, yet well organised social set up that not only promoted justice, good governance, creative arts, religion and spirituality, a sense of identity that included the way they comported themselves, the building and infrastructure architecture, their diet as well as their inextricable relationship with nature and the environment.
Throughout history, for many nations, there occurred a period of prolonged subjugation and colonisation by foreign powers or empires which in many cases results in the imposition of the occupiers culture on the occupied. In our Gambian context, the British empire occupied and colonised us from 1821 until 1970, when we were finally allowed to become a republic. In perspective, this means 149 years of cultural disruption, economic exploitation, social inequality, forced labour, political disenfranchisement, linguistic imperialism, environmental degradation, imposing cash crop economies whilst they looted our natural resources, artefacts and stripped us of our sovereignty. As a consequence, The Gambia, like most colonies of the British empire was forced to abdicate her sovereignty in the areas of culture, agriculture and uniqueness in the way our society was governed in exchange for a colonial architecture that is extractive and paternalistic in nature.
Unfortunately, this colonial architecture has over the years bred native collaborators i.e. our current government and elected officials, hellbent on perpetuating the status quo. This colonial architecture and their local collaborators have reduced our beloved country to become dependents of food aid, although we are endowed with a rich agricultural history, about 500,000 hectares of arable land, abundance of irrigable water sources (ground and surface water) and an average of 10 hours of sunlight daily.
Today, The Gambian is faced with the two starkly contrasting choices:
Firstly, embracing the status quo by aligning themselves with the collaborators whose raison d’être unfortunately perpetuates institutionalized ills namely; corruption, nepotism, mediocrity, inefficiency, lack of vision and purpose, lack of patriotism and national identity, indignity suffered by Gambians especially the most vulnerable, lack of adherence to the rule of law, violations of fundamental Human rights, rapid degradation of our once amiable social setup, disregard for our flora and fauna and the depletion of our natural resources.
Secondly, educate themselves on the importance of realising a cultural renaissance as well as economic sovereignty as have been achieved by many nations today including some of the most advanced e.g. Japan, China, South Korea, India and in the case of Africa, Rwanda and Burkina Faso are taking great strides towards achieving this feat.
The NAFAA project will provide Gambians the opportunity to experience a renaissance and transformation in our existence as a nation by:
- Modelling our development agenda in conformity with our cultural heritage, intrinsic norms and values, identity and learnt history.
- Adopting a citizen-centered approach to governance that meets the needs and aspirations of Gambians.
- Institute cross-cutting reforms that will set The Gambia on a pedestal of structural transformation.
- Harness the overwhelming potential of our greatest resource i.e. the Human Resource, by prioritizing Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) and Technical, Vocational, Education and Skills (TVET) to build the Human Capital required to engineer Gambia’s ascension to the status of an Economic powerhouse.
- Adopt a more inclusive long-term sub-regional development agenda that promotes regional integration, expedite development and promote regional peace and stability.
NB: While it is prerogative to boot out the current NPP government in the 2026 presidential elections, electing NAFAA in power shall serve as the only option to break the colonial chains that have historically bound us thereby settling us on the path of Cultural renaissance and Economic sovereignty.
