By Alagi Yorro Jallow
In the Gambia, it used to be fashionable for politicians to campaign on the concept of a “divided nation.” Then, a leader appeared on the scene and suddenly, we are “Kang-killing”, which translates to a unity coalition, something the country had been lacking.
This alliance of political alliance resulted in the election of President Adama Barrow, a surprising and welcome fresh start for this small West African nation bordering Senegal. The coalition gave voice to a rising chorus of rage that ended the brutal rule of Yahya Jammeh.
The people overcame the forces of dictatorship and ushered in a new era of democracy. But, there is much more work to be done.
The victorious election is just the start. Others include the supremacy of Gambia’s constitution. This is the blueprint where all our rights and responsibilities are enshrined. We all have an obligation to that Constitution, more than any president, to defend and embody its ideals in the face of a new leader who has no record of governance
The overall well-being of citizens requires good governance and that implies accountability, transparency, participation, openness and the rule of law. These are the prerequisite for political legitimacy. These are the political changes that we had long yearned for.
Had Yahya Jammeh won, many of Gambians would have moved on as if all was right with the world, but the world is very wrong, and the impact of that wrongness is on display for all to see.
After twenty- two years of dictatorship, Gambians should remember that out of suffering, healing is possible. Out of darkness, light shines brighter, and without sounding too much about it, Gambian people cannot have one without the other. Gambians can reconcile and rebuild our great country with this ethos.
This is an opportunity to dig deeper into our imaginations and collective intelligence for solutions, to make great art, to forge stronger human connections, to plant deeper community roots, to try to listen to each other and reconcile our differences.
We need a new story that starts with who and where we are now and defines where we want to go. A story that includes the farmers, the religious leaders, the journalists, the engineers and civil society at large and members of the public A story that redefines what success means for a nation founded imperfectly on near-perfect ideals. A story that encourages us to see sacrifice for each other as gain for us all.
President Barrow will do some good, perhaps even great things in office. But we cannot forget the abhorrent system inherited in that office, and we have obligation to make his job easier when that job involves representing the values that have the potential to make us great.
If we need any guidance on that, let’s look at the actions of Obama during his presidency. He gave Americans an affordable health care system which seven of his predecessors failed to achieve. Despite the bottlenecks by his political foes, he was triumphant. He achieved a great feat and gave the Americans what they had longed for.
In a similar vein, we are asking for President Barrow to give us what none of his predecessors have ever given us – empathy. We want empathy to heal the injuries and traumas of Jammeh’s twenty-two years of tyranny.
After Jammeh, we know we have a steep and icy road ahead of us. There is palpable fear in the air. We have distrust, tribalism and political hypocrisy. We need to find a way to raise our voices and listen to one another with open minds. We need to win hearts and minds. Healing, unity, hope are our bywords as we forge ahead with empathy.
The definition of empathy is the ability to understand others – to share their feelings. This is different from compassion, which is when one has pity or sorrow. Empathy is a case of commonality. Sympathy is one of separation. Empathy is the key to finding common ground, on working together in communities, caring for our neighbors and helping the marginalized, the powerless and the suffering amongst us.
It is practicing what many consider “the Golden Rule”. But for President Barrow, our collective empathy may be more like kryptonite.
It may turn out to be a form of resistance – for not succumbing to suspicion or even hate. Strong indications suggest our President is very slow in uniting our country. His actions demonstrate that he seeks success by tearing the coalition and other allies down and keeping us all apart.
The river may be long but it can be crossed provided President Barrow did not measure victory by creating opposition. Silence, on constant state of fear mongering and finger pointing, leaves our electorate on edge, shaken by the bad legacy of Jammeh. Thinking of Jammeh’s legacy deprives us of the worthy empathy for our fellow Gambians, regardless of how they voted. This is a fight for the soul of our nation.
The collective problem The Gambia is currently facing is all about empathy. There is an African proverb that says: “when you grab the head of a snake, the rest is mere rope”. And this “one-three headed snake” are corruption, tribalism and hypocrisy”. It’s a tall order to overcome this Achilles heels of our society.
Nevertheless, we should persist. And persist we must. By persist, I mean, we as Gambians must continue to go about our daily lives. We need to be responsible for ourselves, our families, and our broader communities as well as our country.
To advance in our development, the youth should stand against corruption with aggressiveness in defense of our future; and our mothers should address the issue of hypocrisy – to bring truth, peace, reconciliation and love, because they have empathy at that; and our fathers should campaign against tribalism and preach tolerance. This is how to progress if we want to kill this “3-headed snake”.
There are the way forward folks. No public relation campaign, no prayers, no inspirational talks without “killing the snake” can hold us together in the spirit of “Kangkilling” and unite us as one family that eats from the same plate.
Having said that, we must allow ourselves to feel the agony, the exhaustion and the despondency of this transition. To paraphrase a past president from another low point in our history, we need to do these things not because they are easy but because they are hard. Like that high road, it’s the difficulty that makes them worth taking
We study history for a reason. Those of who glamorize the great old days without acknowledging on whose backs that greatness was achieved do a disservice to the present and the future. And for those fighting for justice, there are several play books and source code repositories left behind by Yahya Jammeh.We need empathy to heal the legacy of dictatorship. History is not a circle, but more probably a spiral, in which we revisit similar but not exact coordinates from the past. We should revisit that past and prepare for the troubling times ahead.
The Reality of Gambia’s Democracy: A Dominant Political Force Demands an Effective Opposition
Written by Solomon Demba
The outcome of the recent parliamentary election is ringing endorsement of the UDP as a dominant political force. The key challenge for our new democracy now is how to create an effective opposition force that has the capacity to face up to a dominant political force. As oppositions remain fragmented and divided, this raises the question whether the UDP’s absolute majority is likely to lead to the insulation of one dominant-party system.
Obviously, there is an intrinsic relationship between the attainment of a dominant status and the effective opposition’s concept. In this sense, the ineffective opposition is likely to enhance the dominant political force’s ability to consolidate its support base, and ultimately engender the decline of the oppositions. This may well be prevented if the oppositions act together on common grounds, to advance the aggregated interest of the society. Failing to do so, the ruling elite will remains unaccountable, and many more self-serving missions seem inevitable consequence. In my view, such pitfall poses the greater threat to equal political representation than the overstated tribal divisions.
Our unity to advance the collective good of the society seems an attractive choice, rather than pontificating about tribal divisions that are overly exaggerated to benefit the proponents. We are Gambians; we transcend tribes to build a fairer and pluralistic society. The former USA President Barrack Obama eloquently said this, ‘’the future of humanity and the future of the world is going to be defined by what we have in common, as opposed to those things that separate us and ultimately lead us into conflict’. ’The President’s assertion captures two main features of multicultural society, namely, conflicts and unity.
The former can be avoided if we accept our differences as distinctive tribes and work for the collective good. The latter is necessary for the stability of our country as we come together to build a prosperous Gambia. The same proposition is espoused by Philosopher Will Kymlicka, in his theory of Liberal Multiculturalism, he postulates that a greater integration of the communities is better achieved if different groups respect and preserve each other distinctiveness. We are bound together through marriages and friendships for centuries. Recognising each other distinctiveness has allowed us to live in an inclusive society. So let us remain committed such values to imbue unity among all tribes.
While the UDP appears to have gained the support of the major tribes, it is representative of Gambians’ society as its MPs hail from different ethnic backgrounds. It may be controversial, but coherent for individuals to align themselves with a political party through a tribal line. Tribal politics is distinct identity political practice deploys by many political parties in order assume political power. Of course, political parties are likely to exemplify values such as cultural practice, language that are essential to tribes so as to influence the political thinking of the voters.
This may fan the flames of political discontent, but it seems necessary so to attain political power. In any case, if political parties are to be successful in bringing out meaningful changes in ordinary Gambians’ life they must attain power by any reasonable means. After all, political power tends to grow out a barrel of a gun. So it is a realistic expectation for political parties to deploy tribal politics in furtherance of their political ambitions. What seems abhorrent is the differential treatment of one tribe at the expenses of others without any legal justification. Such principle cannot sit comfortably with the notion of equality.
Nonetheless, the opposition must succinctly scrutinise the legislative process of the government to protect the interests of those they represented. A scattered gun approach may not be so effective in holding the government to account given the absolute majority of the UDP. What seems necessary is a united opposition force with common objectives to balance the power of the incumbent. Indeed, the less effective oppositions are, the more their ability to oust an incumbent diminishes. This was self-evident in the way in which the Coalition attained political power.
It is a given fact when there is no realistic prospect for a political party to form a future government,’ the party’s protagonists will desert the party as the promise of a change disappears into a distant future. Consequently, series of political capitulation (in Gambian’s political term cross carpeting) to the ruling party may follow to splinter the parties’ support base. In this regard, the party in question will find it inherently difficult to build a formidable political force capable of winning the political power. Take, for instance, the NCP was in similar position for many years without increasing its electoral success. In fact, its support was in serious decline. Similarly, the re-invention of the PPP seems to have spectacularly failed to reinvigorate its former support base. The APRC’s heavy loss provides another explanation why voters are likely to desert a political party which is deemed to have no chance of assuming power.
The fact is that it was unconvincing to the voters that these parties had a realistic of winning political power. Therefore, there was no need to vote for impotent political parties that may not bring out change. It is safe to say, an effective and united opposition can only provide political parties with a realistic path to government. It can also be seen as an effective way of ousting entrenched ruling elite.
In conclusion, while the UDP represents a dominant political power in the Gambia, an effective opposition seems necessary to balance the power in the legislature, so as the other organs of the state in order to protect all Gambians’ interests. Failure to do so, our democracy runs the risk of being reduced to one dominant- party system. That may transform itself into a light dictatorship with the ability to control all narratives through media, at the expense of our well-fought democracy.
Forward with the Gambia!