By D. A. Jawo

The outcome of the Niamina West bye-elections, held on Saturday, November 7, in which the National People’s Party (NPP) scored a landslide victory over the Gambia Democratic Congress (GDC), has quite a few lessons for everyone who participated in it as well as all those concerned about politics in this country. While no doubt the NPP and its sympathisers are on top of the moon for winning the seat, but I hope they would be honest to themselves that it was obtained at a great financial and moral prize.

It was quite clear that President Adama Barrow sent to Niamina West a large entourage of his most trusted people, including Hamat Bah, leader of the moribund National Reconciliation Party (NRP) as well as virtually all his advisers and other civil servants, including some other cabinet ministers, and of course the Governor of the Central River Region (CRR) and the district chiefs, who are supposed to be politically neutral. They were not only using their incumbency advantage to the maximum, but also using state resources during most of the campaign. It is alleged for instance, that their large fleet of vehicles were being fueled with official fuel coupons instead of from NPP money. All the cabinet ministers who went there, including Hamat Bah, who spent all the time there, were not only using their official vehicles, but they were also accompanied by their government drivers and security/orderlies who were apparently paid per diems for the number of days they spent there. Even the fact that some civil servants, paid from public coffers, abandoned their work to campaign for the NPP was abuse of office.

The NPP and its allies must have no doubt spent several millions of Dalasis during the campaign. However, was it really worth all that cost just to get someone elected for slightly over a year before the next National Assembly elections? Of course, President Barrow and his sympathisers would say that just the symbolism of the victory was worth every butut spent on it. Indeed, they must certainly be congratulating themselves for not only achieving this most symbolic victory, but by implication, also for humiliating their greatest rival, the UDP, who not only declared their support for the GDC, but went all out to campaign for the GDC candidate.

President Barrow had made his intentions for winning the seat known well before the bye-elections and he had been doing everything to achieve that. He was once quoted telling some people from Niamina West that he considered the seat as his “Afo’” (first born in Pulaar) and that winning it would be worth anything to him. Indeed, with the victory, it has become the NPP’s first born, even though in reality, all the NRP NAMs and those renegade members from the UDP and the GDC are technically NPP members as well, in both comportment and action, as was clearly manifested during the debate on the Draft Constitution. There are even allegations that the co-incidence of the National Nutrition Agency (NaNA) paying their last installment of the NAFA money, which was meant to mitigate the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on households barely three days before the elections, was deliberately done to help the NPP as President Barrow was recently heard telling the people that he was the one giving them that money.

However, apart from the obvious use of state resources and incumbency advantage, the NPP also received a lot of financial and moral support from several quarters, including some very powerful business interests. The campaign team was there with several brand new pick-up vehicles, no doubt given to them by those powerful business interests, the usual shadowy ‘anonymous’ donors that the Barrow government has been depending on for a number of things.

Another unclear aspect of the NPP campaign was that while many of those on their campaign trail claim to have been President Barrow’s coalition partners, such as the leadership of the NRP, GPDP, PPP and the new entrant, GAP, but everything seems to have been centred on the NPP, with hardly any mention of the coalition partners. They all were urging the people to vote for NPP but never for the coalition, because the reality is that all those parties now merely exist in name only but in reality, they all seem to have all virtually melted into the NPP. “Our own party leader, Hamat Bah, has mortgaged the NRP to President Barrow for his own position and comfort, leaving us in the cold,” complained a member of the NRP.

As regards the opposition, particularly the GDC and their allies in Niamina West, the UDP, it is certainly time to review what has gone wrong with their campaign strategy. The results both in Niamina West and the bye-elections in Ker Jarga Ward in Jokadu, have shown that both the GDC and the UDP were outperformed by the NPP. Therefore, if this trend continues, should we not brace ourselves for an easy NPP victory in 2021?

Some people however blame the GDC’s loss in Niamina West to their open alliance with the UDP, which does not seem to have been well embraced by the people of Niamina West, for whatever reason. In fact, since its formation in 1996, the UDP has never put up a candidate in the constituency. “GDC should not have allowed the UDP to join their campaign as that most have likely put off some of their supporters,” one GDC sympathizer said.

However, while these results are no doubt a good moral booster for President Barrow and his so-called coalition partners, but it would be quite premature for them to conclude that it is an indication of his popularity and the invincibility of the NPP. They were dealing with a very small area and a less sophisticated voter population who could have been easily manipulated with money and mere promises. However, when it comes to country-wide elections, it is very likely to be a completely different scenario altogether. With President Barrow’s flip-flopping characteristics, it would be foolhardy for them to under-estimate the level of dissatisfaction with his regime, and that could negatively affect the chances of his NPP in 2021 or any other subsequent election.

When Guinea’s Cellou Dalein Diallo rushed to declare victory in Guinea’s presidential election, I told a friend he might have been the one who in fact lost. That very well became the case.

On Saturday, GDC’s Yero Jallow reminded me of Dalein. While he might not have declared victory, his claims of IEC being bias shortly after casting his vote pushed me to conclude he might have lost the contest already.

And then the loss came. Not by a small margin but by a large, outrageous margin. It looked to me Birom lured him to a den and devoured him in a single gulp, while everyone else watched. Even UDP could not save him.

This is a big moment for NPP. This party has not even been inaugurated yet it put across an emphatic statement of intent and deservedly collected its place among the big boys of Gambian politics.

While the way and manner in which NPP achieved it may be frowned at in some quarters, it remains the party has impressed.

The one person who will be especially pleased with NPP’s electoral victories on Saturday is President Adama Barrow. As leader of the party, he described the contests as a litmus test. Now that everything is done, his confidence should definitely be shooting through the roof going into 2021. We’ll now have to wait and see how far this party can really go.

The writer, Lamin Njie, is the editor in chief of The Fatu Network. The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Fatu Network.

My friend and brother, Sadibou Secka, told me today anyone who leads America leads the world. He is right.

Hate her or like her, America’s influence over the world is remarkable. Whether for the good or for the bad, that’s a topic of its own. But never has there been a moment since the beginning of time when one nation sneezes, everyone else catches a cold.

This Tuesday’s presidential election in America may well be a purely American thing but the amount of interest people elsewhere have shown in it is what hasn’t ceased to amaze me.

In The Gambia, people defied every time difference odd to monitor the event. The country is ahead of America by at least five hours. But Gambians cared less. As if there lives depended on it.

That status quo is set to continue with clarity in the contest still not arriving. Some key states are still counting votes. While Joe Biden appears to be knocking on the doors of the White House, a winner is still up in the air.

The writer, Lamin Njie, is the editor in chief of The Fatu Network. He was chosen by the US government this year to cover the US elections.

Are political junkies like me following the latest election crisis in Ivory Coast, manifesting greater concern for the world than what had prevailed in the Gambia in 2016? In their weekend presidential election it was reported that 60% of the registered voters refused to collect their voter cards and only 10% of eligible voters cast their votes in what was a nationwide protest of the illegitimacy of incumbent President Alassane Ouattara to run for a third term. In his infringement of the nation’s two-term constitutional limitation in office of elected presidents, the Ouattara government has killed over 30 peaceful protesters, reviving memories of over 3000 killed in a previous election impasse; and worse still he has today, November 3, 2020, been declared a landslide winner in an election marred by rigging and under the supervision of a corrupt electoral commission.

The major opposition parties that boycotted the whole unconstitutional ballot and enjoy the sympathy of the majority of Ivorians have announced their rejection of the results and their formation of a parallel interim government with their first objective of organizing legal elections for eligible candidates.

The outlaw government of Ouattara is threatening to use his familiar tactics of violently suppressing any attempt to challenge his authority.

The EU, USA and even France are all together in condemning Ouattara for transgressing the constitution of the Ivorians and strictly urged him to respect the laws of his country.

Oddly, we haven’t heard any statement from the UN Security Council on today’s development or the AU and ECOWAS who were the first to synchronize their efforts in 2016 for a hastily-drafted resolution advocating for the APRC government to respect the constitution of the Gambia and step down or else faced a militarily onslaught by subregional forces. They were, indeed, stupidly predisposed to wage war in the Gambia to “prevent the government from infringing the nation’s constitution and to further fend off any political violence that never started in the first instance.

Can anyone therefore believe that after the death of so many Ivorians in the hands of an illegal government with greater prospects of more people being killed in the days ahead, our subregional leaders, namely the invalid Muhammadu Buhari of Nigeria and low-IQ French puppet Mackey Sall of Senegal in particular, are all sitting on their rumps watching Ouattara on his deadly rampage?

I hope legal bounty hunters like US Ambassador-at large Stephen J Rapp is taking note for a possible future “hybrid court”!

But on a serious note, is it true that Mackey Sall doesn’t want to say anything against his Ivorian colleague because he plans to try the same unconstitutional coup of running for a third term in Senegal’s next presidential election or has his unlawful intervention and continued meddling in Gambian politics since 2016 resulted in a restraining lesson on his political adventurism? Time alone would tell.

In a recent interview when asked what ECOWAS was doing about the political crisis in Ivory Coast and Guinea Conakry, our foreign minister Dr. Mamadou Tangara replied that events in those nations were internal matters not for foreign intervention. I didn’t know whether to cry out of sympathy for poor Africa or laugh at our unsophisticated government.

However, the unsustainable political crisis in Guinea Conakry, another constitutional contravention by President Conde with no hope of abating has equally been ignored by our plaster saints and “constitution enforcers”.

In both countries therefore, one is inclined to conclude that our brain-dead and amoral ECOWAS leaders are virtually gearing us up for prospective military coups or civil wars. In the absence of ECOWAS playing their expected role of forcing Ouattara and Conde to do what is right by stepping aside and letting the wishes of their people prevail, I guess a peaceful coup would remain the best and only option for stability.

Because only weapon manufacturers and arms dealers will profit from a civil war that they will fuel the moment they noticed its likelihood to start.

With the COVID-19 pandemic killing enough people in numbers likened to protracted world war casualties, I don’t think we need more deaths from new wars. The fighting fools in Armenia and Azerbaijan killing each other over the disputed enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh since the collapse of the Soviet empire in 1991 typifies the gains of the weapon-manufacturing industries in modern wars and the losses of the combatants and their loved ones. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres had upon his appointment in 2016 repeatedly warned all nations and leaders about how modern wars are un-winnable.

Back in the Gambia I think we could, next year face a similar volatile political situation where the voters will battle for two options. Those who would want to retain the current status quo and do whatever it takes to espouse its continuity and the opposing forces who will settle for nothing other than regime change.

Mackey Sall was and still is deeply involved in what politically, economically and militarily exist here since 2016 and without doubt he will invest heavily to see the maintenance rather than replacement of the current leadership of President Adama Barrow. I also strongly believe that the Senegalese president has no principles other than to pursue his selfish political and economic interest with an insatiable greed he would feed by any ungodly means. President Adama Barrow seems to depend on him in everything he does, knowing that it will only be through Senegal’s support that he could fulfill his prophesied “15 years in power”.

Our ongoing Security-Sector Reform may according to the architects not end for the next decade or two that will until then need us to keep ECOMIG and the Senegalese presidential guard in the Gambia for many elections ahead.

If Mackey can remain indifferent to the horrors in Ivory Coast and Guinea Conakry and even seems to support his partners in crime, he could next year treat the Gambia worse.

Let us also not forget that, there are judases in the Gambia who would invite and encourage any intimidation he might try against the Gambian people, using his troops illegally occupying the nation and on a dubious arrangement of providing our president with his personal security. Come 2021, will these foreign troops be oriented to support any winner of the general election? If so, should we expect to see some foreign troops provide security for key opposition leaders going into the election months, in the same manner they now do for President Barrow? If not, then the opposition is effed, big time.

We will see.

Thanks for reading.

SAMSUDEEN SARR

BANJUL, THE GAMBIA

By Madi Jobarteh

Let Pres. Adama Barrow be informed that Democracy is the best tool to combat corruption contrary to his unfounded narrative that Democracy is an obstacle to tackle corruption. This is what Pres. Barrow said in an interview with EyeAfrica few days ago,

“You know in a democracy is not easy. If democracy was easy nobody will be encouraged to respect democracy. It is because is difficult. If it’s dictatorship you can go and arrest people, jail them, you do that. But now you cannot do that. What you do is you follow due process”.

This narrative shows the President is either totally ignorant about Democracy or he is trying to encourage corruption in the land or both. If the President of the Republic does not understand how Democracy works but thinks that Dictatorship is the solution to corruption then the country is in a dangerous situation.

Can Pres. Barrow tells us which Dictator and Dictatorship anywhere in history that was not corrupt to the core. For example, in the Gambia, it was clear that the most corrupt person was Despot Yaya Jammeh as evidenced from the Janneh Commission and as the ongoing TRRC continues to reveal. It was obvious that Yaya Jammeh only pretended to fight corruption by targeting certain individuals and companies but he was never anti-corruption. In fact, Yaya Jammeh is the incarnation of Corruption.

Around the world, it is obvious that past dictators like Mobutu of Zaire, Idi Amin of Uganda or Sani Abacha of Nigeria were as corrupt as present-day dictators like Idris Deby of Chad, Denis Sassou Nguesso of Congo or Faure Gnassimbe of Togo just to name a few. So, where on this earth has Pres. Barrow seen a Dictator who is not corrupt to the core?

Secondly who told Pres. Barrow that in a Democracy one cannot arrest and prosecute corrupt public officials? Has Pres. Barrow looked into democratic societies to see how they are fighting corruption? If you go to France, you will find that a few weeks ago the police had raided the homes of the current health minister and other public officials for mismanaging COVID response in France?

Across many European democracies, one could see how public officials and wealthy business people are arrested, prosecuted and jailed for corruption. Yet Pres. Barrow said Democracy is an obstacle to combating corruption. How?

Democracy is designed to serve four major purposes. That is, to promote transparency and accountability. Secondly, to ensure efficient delivery of public services. Third, to promote popular participation, and fourthly to combat corruption and abuse of office and any other violations. This is because Democracy is based on a rule of law that ensures that citizens and public officials always act according to the law.

Hence if anyone violates the law such as embezzling public funds or stealing private property then that person has violated the law and should be arrested and prosecuted. This is what Democracy is all about. This is what the Constitution and the laws of the Gambia say. So, how could Barrow say Democracy cannot be used to fight corruption?

But the fact is that so far Pres. Barrow has refused to enforce the Constitution and laws of the Gambia such that public officials will violate the law without any accountability. That is impunity. Therefore, we should not allow Barrow to ridicule Democracy by hiding his failure to enforce the law to combat corruption.

What Barrow has manifested is that he is protecting corrupt officials and promoting corruption in the Gambia. Otherwise the Constitution and the laws of the Gambia within the framework of Democracy have given him all the powers and tools to tackle corruption. But the President has refused to do that and now wants to blame Democracy. This is why, just like Yaya Jammeh, Pres. Barrow has until now also failed to set up an anti-corruption agency.

Is it that Adama Barrow is telling us that until we have Dictatorship, he cannot fight corruption in his Government? Then why did we remove Yaya Jammeh and voted for him? If Dictatorship is the best tool to fight corruption then why was the regime of Yaya Jammeh so corrupt? Or is Barrow seeking to be a Dictator onto us?

I hereby demand that Pres. Adama Barrow withdraw that irresponsible, misleading, dishonest and horrible statement that Democracy is an obstacle to fighting corruption. I order him to get up and enforce the full force of the laws of the Gambia by arresting all public officials found to be corrupt. He has all the evidence because his Government has set up a lot of commissions so far that have found many public officials to be corrupt.

It is not only Bamba Banja, but what about the other officials mentioned in the recent audit report of the 7 SOEs that found massive corruption in public enterprises? What about the Janneh Commission Report? What about the D35M in the FABB account? What about the anonymous donors? What about the diplomatic passports? What about the fertilizer scandal? What about the corruption in sand mining? What about the contracts for Semlex, telecoms, EU fishing, Chinese fishmeal companies and Banjul road project among others?

The Government of Pres. Adama Barrow is corrupt to the core and he knows it. The laws are clear as to how to tackle corruption in the most democratic manner. Yet Pres. Barrow has refused to enforce the laws but only seeks to blame Democracy and prefer Dictatorship! Let it be clear to all that Adama Barrow does not want to fight corruption because all around him is CORRUPTION! This is indeed disgraceful.

For The Gambia Our Homeland

By Pa Louis Sambou

General public discuss has for sometime regularly featured the subject of the UDP Secretary General, Lawyer Ousainou Darboe’s eligibility to run for the Presidency under the existing Constitution. The public interest in this particular subject has since been exacerbated following the voting down of the now historical draft Constitution whose section 94(1)(d) was designed to put this very issue to rest. However, as it turned out, the draft Constitution was ironically put to rest instead — rendered ‘dead’ as “reform pessimists” (according to Justice Jallow) would say or, in a ‘coma’ as reform fantasists steadfastly believe.

Never-mind which of the above metaphoric characterisations is a more fashionable description of the status of the much discredited framework, what’s clear is, as per section 22(1) of the Constitutional Review Commission (CRC) Act, the CRC stands dissolved as of 22 October 2020 and by default bringing to an end the legal effectiveness of key aspects of the Act. The “late draft Constitution”, coined by Lawyer Lamin J Darboe is, from now on a more fitting description of the relic.

Now, just before you finish processing that thought, no, I’m not using this as a convenient opportunity to lay into the ‘late’ draft but, informed commentary on the subject matter would be incomplete if the designed remedy of the above-mentioned ‘late’ draft Constitution provision is omitted. Hence this designed remedy would in light of events highly unlikely become law before December 2021, it’s perhaps prudent to hinge my commentary on the eligibility (or not) of Lawyer Darboe on the existing law being the existing 1997 Constitution.

It has been and continues to be stated in many quarters that Lawyer Darboe’s conviction in 2016 and his dismissal in 2018 as Vice President render him constitutionally barred from vying for the Presidency. I’m tempted to at this point draw a very simplistic conclusion but, that’ll perhaps not do justice to such a fundamentally important political question, therefore I won’t. The relevant Constitutional provision is section 62(3) and it states:

“A person who, while holding public office in The Gambia has been-

(a) compulsorily retired, terminated or dismissed from such office, or
(b) has been found guilty of any criminal offence by any court or tribunal established by law; or
(c) has been found liable for misconduct, negligence, corruption or improper behaviour by any commission or committee of inquiry established by law shall not be qualified for election as President.”

Not that the importance of the above provision could be overemphasised but, suffice it to say, the appropriate answer to the question: ‘is Darboe barred from running for the Presidency?’ squarely rests on the interpretation of the above provision and by extension, sections 156 and 230 of the Constitution.

Before proceeding any further, it must be stated that, for one to be barred under section 62(3), they must have been a holder of “public office” at the time the adverse event occurred. For anyone who keenly follows the lively commentary around this very subject, one notices how the definition of what is meant by “public office” in this context is often conveniently interpreted to suit the bias of the punditry. We all have our biases, don’t we? Sadly, as entrenched and interesting these may be, they do not override the respective legal definition at section 230 which states that “public office”:

“includes an office the emoluments attached to which are paid directly from the Consolidated Fund or directly out of monies provided by an Act of the National Assembly, and the office of a member of a local government authority or the staff of a public Enterprise”

Helpful definition? Perhaps not. But, let’s unpack the logic by tracing which “emoluments” (salaries, fees or profits earned from employment) are paid from the “Consolidated Fund”. This takes us to section 156 of the Constitution which at subsection (2) expressly identifies the office of the “Vice President” as one whose holder’s “emolument” are paid from the “Consolidated Fund”. Therefore, under the Constitution, the office of the Vice President is indeed a “public office” and certainly so for the purposes of section 62(3).

To digress slightly away from the focal subject, references at section 156 to “monies provided by an Act of the National Assembly and… office of a member of a local government authority or… staff of a public Enterprise” by extension, widen the definition and scope of those to whom section 62(3) apply to include pretty much anyone whose gainful employment is remunerated by public funds of whatever description.

Having established what a “public office” constitutes for the purposes of section 62(3), it is obvious that the leader of an opposition party not employed by the State in any capacity is not a holder of “public office”. So, factually speaking, any finding of guilt by any “court or tribunal” or adverse finding by any “Commission or committee of inquiry” in respect of any events which predate the appointment of Lawyer Darboe as Minister of Foreign Affairs are not relevant for the purposes of section 62(3). His conviction in 2016 etc. fall within the aforementioned category and do not render him barred.

In light of the above, section 62(3)(b) &(c) do not apply in the case of lawyer Darboe. However, his dismissal as Vice President is indeed applicable and of relevance for the purposes of the same section 62(3) which at subsection (a) bars from contesting the Presidency anyone who whilst holding public office was:

“compulsorily retired, terminated or dismissed from such office”

Does this bar Lawyer Darboe? On the face of it, one can be forgiven for ascribing a solid ‘yes’ to such question. It’ll be foolish to bet the house on it though. From my own point of view, it is a ‘sticky wicked’ but, nevertheless one from which an interesting judicial precedent could emerge if ever the opinion of the Supreme Court Justices is invited. That’s however not to state that one needs to be a signed up member of the latter to have an opinion. Of course not.

Whilst it is not my intention nor desire to engage the harder edges (partisan political aspects) of the subject, any attempts on my part to indulge euphemism or attempt to conceal my conclusion on the subject would render this entire literature completely pointless. I solemnly promise to do no such thing.

In my view, section 62(3)(a) is not as clear cut as it appears and, I say this for good reason: being (1)“compulsorily retired” and, being (2)“terminated or dismissed” whilst both actions are those which could be taken against any employee, they aren’t applicable to all categories of “public office”. More to the point, the constitutional definition of “compulsory retirement” at section 230 attributes such to only “public office in the public service” at sections 171 and 166 respectively. Needless to say, the office of the Vice President whilst a “public office”, it isn’t a “public office in the public service”.

Now why is the above distinction important and, why did I lay emphasis on “compulsorily retired” alone? This is because it is the first terminology and, in the ‘strange’ art of legal interpretation, in circumstances whereby a legal ambiguity prevails with respect to the interpretation of a particular legal text (as is the case here), the legal interpretation of the first relevant terminology once established is used to guide the context in which the subsequent terminologies will be interpreted and by extension the wholesome interpretation of the respective legal provision. Therefore, as “compulsorily retired” is by virtue of sections 230, 171 and 166 legally attributed to only “public office in the public service”, under the doctrine of ‘Noscitur a Sociis‘ (which has it that, ‘a word is known by the company it keeps’), the terminologies which follow being “terminated or dismissed” ought to be interpreted so that they are uniformly attributed to only “public office in the public service” as is the case with the first terminology in whose ‘company’ they are.

Just in case up to this point one remains unclear as to what my reasoned position on the issue is, in light of the above interpretation, it is my view that section 62(3)(a) of the Constitution is intended for only holders of public office in the public service. Lawyer Darboe as Vice President was not a holder of “public office in the public service” in which case no part of section 62(3)(a) applies to him, his dismissal is wholly irrelevant and his dismissal does not render him barred. This is certainly my understanding and reasoned conclusion but, I am humble enough and quite comfortable to countenance the possibility that I may be wrong. By the same measure, I will be equally thrilled with a contrary interpretation and argument and I strongly encourage such.

Even if one believes, as some do, that lawyer Darboe is a controversial political figure deserving of being barred, it does not logically follow that the Constitution shares that view nor does it mean, however many upsides there may be, that there aren’t any downsides to such and for which it must be possible to state regardless of one’s personal subjective opinion on lawyer Darboe and his UDP. Given the contentious and combative nature of elections, opponents of lawyer Darboe may obviously be countenancing the use of the Constitution to attempt to annihilate him before the start of the race, something which would be foolish in my view especially given the limited prospects of success. In any case though, whilst an undesirable, divisive and disruptive tactic, it’s completely understandable — it’s the ways of democratic politics. The Independent Electoral Commission would, in my view be better advised to be proactive and factor such a possibility into its election planning so as to minimise or mitigate against any associated disruptions as the case may be. This is a hazard for which the Commission has or, ought to have reasonable foresight and, for which it must adequately plan for. Not doing so will be a huge mistake.

By Basidia M Drammeh

The well-anticipated Niamina West by-election is being closely tracked by both political pundits and politicians for it serves as a barometer to gauge the viability, popularity and palpability of the newly established National People’s Party (NPP) under the leadership of President Adama Barrow as opposed to other well-entrenched parties that have always questioned or underestimated the electability of the nascent party.

The parliamentary seat has become vacant following the unceremonious death of its Gambia Democratic Congress (GDC) occupant Demba Sowe in Morocco last January.
The contest for the seat is a two-horse race between GDC and NPP with both parties forming alliances not only to win the seat but also to prove its strength to the other. In this context, the United Democratic Party, which is believed to be the largest political party in the country, has thrown its weight behind GDC and went as far as sending some of its heavyweights to Niamina West to join the campaign trail.

On the other hand, the NPP is being backed by the People’s Progressive Party (PPP, the National Convention Party (NCP), the National Reconciliation Party (NRP), and The Gambia Party for Democracy and Progress (GPDP) whose representatives equally graced a ceremony at the IEC regional bureau in Georgetown to submit the nomination application of the NPP candidate.

If next polls are held under a new Constitution, which undoes a simple majority win, it will be second-to-impossible for a single party to have forthright win the next presidential elections in the first round. Consequently, alliances are inevitable. In this context, the Niamina byelection has offered a clue about the form and genre of such alliances.

As a matter of fact, the election, even though is taking place in a relatively small constituency, will be a useful tool to forecast the upcoming elections in 2021. Victory will be a tremendous morale boost for the winner while defeat will be a psychological blow for the loser. In other words, It’s do or die situation for the country’s political rivals.

The French little boy, Emmanuel Macron, should withdraw his rude comments against prophet Muhammed S.W.A and Islam and apologise for making such an unprofessional and unmoral comments.

Muslims and Christians have been living harmoniously together for centuries in hundreds of nations around the World and they are still living in the same harmonious state of life.

Honestly, Macron lacks home training. He lacks moral responsibility and respect for human rights. You don’t fight fire with fire! Because if you do, then you must stupid in moving towards addressing problems.

Go against the perpetrator but never attack people’s prophet! Condemn the act but never attack people’s religion!

But this half-matured little boy turned politician doesn’t know this, because he has no moral training. Respect is reciprocal, you don’t earn it but you work for it.

Islam is a peaceful religion. Islam doesn’t teach us to attack others, Islam doesn’t teach us to kill one another, Islam doesn’t teach to utter ill against one another. But this French boy failed to understand this. He should seek through education about Islam, therein, he would come to know Islam is a peaceful religion.

Islam teaches us love one another, to have respect for one another, to support one another: Islam teaches us give charity, even a smile can be a charity. Islam doesn’t teach us to hold grudge for each other. These are a few reminders. But there is plethora of teachings that Islam teaches us.

Emanuel Macron needs to look back at himself in a mirror and contemplate over his uncouth comments against others’ religion. It doesn’t tell good of him. Right to free speech is welcome but it should go with a high level of responsibility. You don’t just utter words because you can utter them. As a human being with five-common senses, you should think concretely before letting out any word.

That’s why Islam reminds us: to sit down if we are angry, to lie down if we are angry etc. All these help us not to be controlled by our emotions. Emotion shouldn’t be widely express.

Macron needs to go for a brain test! Respect prophet Muhammed P.U.H.

Adama Makasuba, Gambian journalist.

The last time President Barrow faced the press was in August 2018. His reason? He didn’t like the way and manner I posed a question to him.

I find the president’s behaviour towards the media hugely ridiculous. A man who shortly after coming to power promised to engage journalists every six months, two years is now how much have gone since he took part in a serious media event.

Yet on Tuesday, the president had the audacity to preach ethics to journalists. In fact, if he has any clue, he will realise what he’s preaching doesn’t exist in journalism.

The issue of neutrality in journalism has been a subject of great controversy among journalism scholars. Neutrality is hugely problematic if looked at within the lens of staying aloof of issues and politicians and their behaviour. Should a journalist stay detached when clearly a politician is misbehaving, as dictated by neutrality? Should a journalist stay removed when a fight breaks out betweeen the powerful and the powerless? Or should a journalist be on the side of the masses or not when they’re up against the almighty state? These are all questions that continue to prove tricky and relevant.

In my 10 years as a journalist, what I have come to learn is that a journalist should be impartial. This is not exactly the same as neutral. Impartial means fair. It very much doesn’t mean a reporter cannot point out the wrong behaviour of politicians. It also doesn’t in any way interpret to a journalist not allowed to state his opinion on the wrong conduct of politicians.

When politicians commit wrongs, it’s the journalist who should on behalf of the people point them out. They can even criticise such politicians. Just that that’s exactly what is often regarded as being bias in The Gambia.

It’s also interesting to hear the president say it’s professional journalists who are winning awards. He very much confused himself there. His government has turned a blind eye to the massive corruption and all the wrongs award-winning journalists such as Mustapha K Darboe have exposed in the past two years. He very much trusts and works with people who have been indicted in various investigations conducted by Mustapha – and as in the words of the journalist himself, ‘nobody cares’.

And again if you ask me, President Barrow doesn’t have any moral authority to tell Gambian journalists how they should be going about their trade. A leader who runs from journalists? In America, Trump every day fights with reporters but that hasn’t stopped him from engaging them in the Rose Garden every other day.

British journalist Piers Morgan has been quite brutal towards Trump in recent months over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic. But just at the weekend, Piers said Trump called him and said they had a decent conversation.

The president should know there is no such thing as neutrality in journalism.

By Alieu SK Manjang

The Gambia has different ethnic groups, and this has become an unquestionable reality of our social order. However, the question remains in which way one particular ethnic group is distinctive from other ethnic groups? We would ran into trouble, as a very common one in contemporary social anthropology, if want to decide boundaries of the exiting ethnic groups in the Gambia.

Generally, number of criteria are used by anthropologists to demarcate cultural groups. These include language, culture, political organisations and territorial contiguity. Thus, when one asks an individual Mandinka, Fula, Jola, Sarahulleh, Manjako or Serrer about their typical characteristics, he or she would might refer to the cultural traits of his or her tribe, which they in fact share with other neighbouring groups. Obviously, each ethnic group in The Gambia live in a close interaction with other ethnic groups. Hardly do any of them have exclusive livelihood or exclusive language, exclusive custom or exclusive religion. With this in mind, is it appropriate to describe ourselves ethnic groups?

Given the inheritant difficulties of defining ourselves with reference to objective cultural features or clear-cut boundaries, we can conclude that someone is a Jola, a Fula or a Mandinka by virtue of believing and calling himself or herself a Jola, or a Fula or a Mandinka, and acting in ways that validate his Jolaness, Fullaness or Mandinkaness.

In this contemporary age, where disctiviness is eclipsed to a great extent, this emic category of ascription should be way of delineating ethnic groups.

My attention was yesterday drawn to the Sunday October 25 2020 interview of American ambassador-at large Lawyer Stephen J. Rapp by the US-based “For The People By The People” online talk show, hosted weekly by Messrs Banka Manneh, Musa Jeng and Pa Samba Jaw (Coach) on one of their series of topics featuring on my recent publication where I denounced Ambassador Rapp’s misplaced priority of hawkishly and hypocritically campaigning for the arrest, trial and conviction of former President Jammeh in a “hybrid court” reminiscent of the one he had successfully orchestrated against warlord Charles Taylor. The retiree ostensibly in search of a job cannot still differentiate the horrible legacy of Charles Taylor in the eight-year Liberian civil war and that of Yahya Jammeh’s relatively inconsequential crimes in the Gambia usually blown out of their contexts.

Anyhow, as much as I would acknowledge how Jaw and Jeng superficially raised some of my criticisms of the American highlighted in my article-although they never mentioned me by name-it was nonetheless obvious that Mr. Rapp knew exactly whom they were referring to and the content of my story; because at some point of emphasizing his resilience to always pursue heads of state suspected of committing war crimes or crimes against humanity he vowed to return to the Gambia to get Jammeh adding “even if Ambassador Sarr continues to criticize me”.

To be fair with them, I will first commend the hosts for “gently” reminding Mr. Rapp of America’s undesirable state-sanctioned excesses generally attributed to its combat forces deployed abroad to fight dubious wars and by extension to its government especially what had happened in Iraq and Afghanistan and for asking Ambassador Rapp why he is not equally vigilant about investigating or trying to hold any of those suspects accountable in his “so-called hybrid Courts” considering the inflexible antagonistic position of the US government towards any international courts instituted on such, including the ICC.

Additionally, no superpower nation including the five permanent members of the UN Security Council-America, Russia, China, Great Britain and France-has ever cooperated with human-rights-violation investigators pursuing suspects in their various security forces. But they would enthusiastically sponsor or support the investigation, arrest and conviction of other nations’ troops and leaders under the guise of maintaining a fair world order.

Amazingly, Mr. Rapp had no nation of major influence to quote as examples of targeted places by “his hybrid courts” other than Kosovo and another Balkan state ravaged by wars of genocide and crimes against humanity similar to what he said happened in Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Liberia that ultimately validated the prosecution of ex-warlord Charles Taylor.

But did any of those serious crimes in those countries ever happen in the Gambia? Of Course not.

It was therefore intellectually very dishonest of Mr. Rapp for insinuating that my criticism of his selective approach to global justice when accused of targeting weak leaders over stronger ones as an attempt to discourage him from helping victims of human-rights abuses or other abuses committed by governments likened to the APRC under Jammeh.

I have never for once said anything like that but instead wanted him to understand that even the TRRC he is banking on for evidence to “capture” Jammeh was not necessarily commissioned for that, but to reconcile the political and ethnic difference of a polarized nation, blamed rightly or wrongly to some regrettable incidents associated with the 22 years rule of the APRC government still under investigation.

I have always argued that the APRC government was in form and substance derivative to the AFPRC military junta that came into power in 1994 through a popular and peaceful military takeover, and had maintained the same system of governance even in its democratically elected-civilian image.

But it’s also worth mentioning that most post-colonial military governments in Africa operated like that and were globally endorsed until in the past two decades or thereabout. Indeed military rule in West Africa was a normal and welcomed alternative to corrupt and tribally-constituted civilian governments that for decades served the interest of a few and the Neo-colonial masters. The first wave of coups in Africa were subsequently confirmed to have been instigated, financed or supported by foreign/Western powers for their own political and economic interests.

From the Congo’s Patrice Lumumba to Ghana’s Kwame NKrumah, most of our progressive post-colonial leaders were either assassinated or their governments overthrown on the instigation or sponsorship of certain treacherous Western nations to maintain control of our minds and resources. Eventually the military puppets they had taught the art and science of overthrowing governments graduated and started working for themselves rather than the greedy bastards.

But as typical of foreign or Western wheeler-dealers they soon started to campaign against the legality of military coups when it was no longer profitable to them, in the same manner they had to abolish the three-century old cataclysmic Atlantic Slave Trade when its economic losses started to outweigh its huge profits.

The balkanization of Africa at the Berlin Conference of 1884 without the consultation of the African people remains one of the most irreparable damages permanently inflicted in the evolution and salvation of our damned continent. In what has been considered as systematic racism and brazen genocide, Westerners have wiped out millions of people in Africa, Asia, the Americas, Australia and on every foothold of land they find profitable to impose their atrocious dominance for centuries. As long as their financial ledger books were profitably balanced, human lives other than that of Caucasians, meant little or nothing to humanity. They divided us against each other and never hesitated to annihilate dissenting voices or forces. Unless he failed his history classes, Mr. Rapp wouldn’t dispute this theory.

In South Africa Rapp’s ancestors participated, aided or pretended not to know that for close to a century Caucasians violently and fraudulently seized and occupied the land of the indigenous black majority and denied them their most fundamental human rights coupled with persistently killing and dehumanizing them.

A Truth and Reconciliation Commission was established for South Africans to forget those crimes against humanity, forgive each other and forge ahead which otherwise could have culminated into nasty retaliations of unimaginable savagery. Mr. Botha, the last president of Apartheid South Africa refused to appear when summoned before that TRC but eventually walked away with impunity. However in Mr. Rapp’s shallow reasoning one would hope that President Botha should have been tried in a hybrid court to avoid the recurrence of Apartheid in South Africa again.

That was his farcical reasoning when asked why he was so obsessed with pursuing Jammeh. That it would prevent what had happened in the Gambia for 22 years from ever happening again. I expected a smarter train of thought from the lawyer who should have simply been honest enough to disclose his interest in securing a job in the Gambia during these hard times of the COVID-19 pandemic in the world. No one has time for these expired lawyers anymore.

Besides, the world has never worked that way. For instance, the world has done everything imaginable to stop African governments from adopting military-style of governments but we still can’t get rid of rogue governments sustained by institutionalized corruption and tribalism and resorting to the same tactics we thought had vanished for good. After years of diligently working to rectify all their shortcomings in past administrations into perfectly civilized nations, the Nigerian, Ivorian and Guinean security forces under orders of their governments are today behaving like how they used to behave under totalitarian rulers. They are in the streets using live rounds to shoot and kill peaceful demonstrators protesting for their basic human and civil entitlements. How many more hybrid courts would Ambassador Rapp have to commission against all these criminals to prevent the recurrence of these incidents the zillionth time?

Mr. Rapp would have sounded a bit more reasonable if his efforts were geared towards stopping coups which will also require stopping corruption and tribal politics still cardinal sticking points that shockingly led to the Malian military takeover, lately. We all thought coups were things of the past, didn’t we?

From my personal perspective, if not confronted with honesty and total commitment, corruption and tribalism from our politicians will certainly continue to justify more coups regardless of the rhetoric or a million convictions in hybrid courts by all ambassadors-at large of the world.

Anyway I would advice Mr. Rapp to better redirect his compulsive and obsessive crusade of capturing and prosecuting Jammeh to the affirmed perpetrators of war crimes or unforgivable heavyweight criminals like George Bush, Tony Blaire (in Iraq and Afghanistan) Nicholas Sarkosy ( in Libya) and a bunch of them protected by the mere color of their skins or national origins.

Mr. Rapp has pointed out his possible reliance on the case-report of the infamous killing of some Ghanians from the TRRC to prosecute Jammeh in a “hybrid court of which I am afraid he would again dismiss my comparison of the similarity of what happened in the debacle of the 2003 invasion Iraq to the killing of those unidentified strangers, as untenable. In that both tragedies occurred from wrong intelligence given to the state but forgivable with the superpower leaders and not with the weaker third-world ones.

Yes, the “Ghanian”-murder issue that Mr Rapp thinks could be his best evidence is still shrouded by a controversial mystery with the key government witnesses behind the tragedy all dead, except perhaps for Jammeh alone who the bias TRRC is not making any efforts invite him to testify. They seem to be only interested in proving the occurrence of the crimes and not the circumstance leading to them which would have probably unveiled results totally different from the stories they want the world to know or believe. In other words, factoring the fact that the former Director General of the NIA, the late Daba Marena and the former Chief of Defense Staff the late Colonel Ndure Cham actually presented the wrong intelligence to President Jammeh that the suspicious strangers from Senegal arrested without ID cards were hired mercenaries to overthrow the APRC government and adding what former president Jammeh may have to explain could ultimately reveal a different conclusion far from the maddening story Essa Faal and group are determined to portray out there.

Marena and Cham had given Jammeh a frightening information that would have been a third incident of mercenaries-1996, 1997 and 2005-or murderous dissidents from Senegal planning and invading the Gambia to violently overthrow the APRC government. Stories had even later emerged that the men composed of different nationalities were “back-way immigrants” swindled by Senegalese racketeers and sent to the Gambia to wait for a nonexistent vessel that was to safely transport them to Europe . But upon arrival the evil Dakar agents tipped off the Gambia security forces including the Director General of the NIA about the “subversive mercenaries”.

That said one would wonder where Mr. Rapp’s ethical and moral standard would recline for accepting evidence from the only witnesses who happened to be the suspects or the Junglers who allegedly carried out the killings but who for three years were arbitrarily arrested and incarcerated in prison without being charged or being provided with any legal counsels until the con-artists from the TRRC appeared before them with the assurance of their freedom hinged on their confession to murdering the “Ghanians” on the orders of President Jammeh?

Most folks subjected to such coercion will agree to any confession just to be free. But there are always the true believers. Hence, the majority of them who agreed and said exactly what the TRRC had ordered them to say were released to go home while the few principled ones who refused to comply still languish in jail. How could ambassador Stephen J. Rapp among all high-profile lawyers rely on evidence provided from these victims in a proper legal setting, hybrid or otherwise and expect to win? Of course, he would collect a desperately needed paycheck from the gullible Gambia government even if he got nothing out of the case.

This country with its fragile democracy will never be reconciled by the bad gringos in charge but may instead be irreconcilably divided into feuding tribal and political groups.

Thanks for reading!

SAMSUDEEN SARR

BANJUL THE GAMBIA.