It is rather mind boggling to hear that the Gambia government contracted “British experts” to identify a suitable military-shooting range in the country in an effort to relocate the Brikama Lance Corporal Lamin Bojang’s range. Folks, if we cannot identify one for ourself then we might as well accede to our uselessness, wastefulness and certainly cluelessness. It is an affront to our intelligence to depend on unscrupulous foreigners to solve our elementary problems such as locating or building our own shooting ranges in this 21st century. As a matter of fact I don’t think we can get a better location anywhere in the country different from that good-old place in Brikama. Evidently, that range was developed by our British colonial masters well before we attained our independence in 1965, maybe in the 1940s or thereabout when the whole area was a thick forest devoid of human habitation. But that shouldn’t translate into permanent dependency for their descendants to be contracted in 2020 to get us another place after being cognizant of scores of modern firing ranges constructed in residential areas all over the world.

What benefit does five decades of our independence, exposure and education bear on us if we can’t construct our own modern shooting range at such a perfect location? I don’t know the exact details but I will assume that the central motive for relocating the range has to do with concerns raised by the neighboring natives over stray bullets accidentally injuring or killing them. Obviously the range built in a dense forest in the 1940s is now sitting in the middle of rapidly developing towns with dwellings hazardously edging closer.

But what I expect of honest foreign experts invited to think for us on where to get a safer place, since we can’t think for ourselves, is a frank recommendation from them to convert the “archaic-facility” of the 40s into a 2020 standard modern shooting range but, of course, by the right contractors.

But hey, why in the world will greedy experts honestly advice us on its judiciousness and feasibility only to forego the cash-cow of several millions easily provided by a bunch of unimaginative Neanderthals ? After all, avoiding population density by moving from one primitive-firing range to another is not only foolish but practically impossible nowadays. No wonder the minister of defense couldn’t answer questions from National Assembly Members (NAMs) asking about how long it will take the British experts to locate a better and safer place in the country. Because no matter where the relocation-proximity and suitability duly considered-sooner or later people will again encroach around it and start building homes, farms, gardens and the like. Meaning that in another decade or even less we will again pay the “Toubabs” to come right back and find us another shooting range. By the way how much are we paying these con artists ostensibly stonewalling the government and probably depending on cheap labor and ideas from Gambians doing the whole survey?

Alternatively, The Gambia only needs modern-range-building contractors whom I believe can even be found from some of our excellent Gambian-construction companies. If not, we can try the generous Turkish to fund it since they have often been willing to support our military needs. Nonetheless, I think with the funds available and the blueprint drawn, a Gambian company will be able to satisfactorily do the job. The area has to be deeply excavated first, to drop the terrain level way below ground elevation and solving 50% of the stray-bullets problem. Secondly, it must be fenced with unscalable walls instead of leaving it open to every wanderer like it used to be. Roofing some parts or all the area may be necessary as well. In time, it can even be transformed into a soundproof underground shooting range reminiscent of some of the 17 sophisticated types constructed in metropolitan New York City, booming with a population of over 8 million people.

Such modern ranges are equipped with “bullet traps” that safely and efficiently allow the recovery and disposal of every fired round and other debris that may cause environmental and human hazards.

And whereas primitive shooting ranges like the one in Brikama only cater for static target practices at prone, kneeling and standing positions, modernized ones come with moving, running and other arrays of customized and realistic training targets.

I have heard defense minister Shiekh Omar Faye talking about his ministry’s intention to transform the old range into a hospital after a new place is located. A Hospital? From which funds and when? Why not utilize those funds to start modernizing the obsolete range if at all the money is available? Although one has to be careful of who is talking again. I don’t want to appear cynical, but I am afraid that abandoning such a perfect place for being unimaginative could open it to the mercy of corrupt land dealers predisposed to sell every square foot of soil in the urban area if the price is right.

So please forget about the so-called British experts or a fantasized hospital and prioritize the reconstructing of a modern shooting range in Brikama by the right experts. It should be a productive project that will eventually make soldiers, the people of Brikama and the entire Gambian population happy for becoming a great legacy proudly narrated to our progenies.

Thanks for reading. Till next time.

Samsudeen Sarr

New York City

Am I the only one bothered by the question of how dumb the Gambia defense minister Honorable Shiekh Omar thinks we are to believe that sweet talking will always achieve him his objective no matter how well-informed his audience is? The humiliation he subjected retired Colonel Ndow Njie, former commander of the Gambia National Army (GNA) in the National Assembly’s (NA) ultimate rejection of his appointment to the Gambia Armed Forces Council (GAFC) by a vote of 27 to 22, generated two probabilities in mind:

1. That the honorable minister in a rather tactless venture to expunge the three-decade-old stigma from his record of dismissal for “insubordination” from the Gambia National Army (GNA) in 1990 by the same former army commander Colonel Ndow Njie probably assumed that facilitating his appointment to the special GAFC may actually cut it. Perhaps thinking that in doing so critics will never again bother him about what had gone wrong between him and the retired colonel in 1991 to indeed warrant his undignified termination as a GNA captain. However in addition to records still accessible, many of us familiar with the incident emanating from unflattering reports of then Captain Faye’s conduct in 1990 as a company commander in both Liberia and at home are still around with vivid memories of every detail. In fact barely forty-eight hours after his theatrical appearance at the NA in defense of our former boss, the Gambia Standard Newspaper published the official derogatory letter on the episode. Besides, when in early 1991 Captain Faye’s soldiers in “Charlie Company” returned from Liberia and staged a scary protest against the PPP government over late payments of their meager allowances, the authorities, in order to settle and diffuse the volatile situation decided to reinstate Captain Faye back to the army; but Colonel Ndow Njie and the British Army Training Team (BATT) commander Colonel Jim Shaw ardently rejected the recommendation prompting the army commander’s option to quit rather than to ever work with Captain Faye again. The colonel was as a result relieved of his command duties and appointed ambassador to France while Captain Faye, on the same day, was reinstated back to the army. Hence, when the idea started circulating that Minister Faye was on an atypical crusade for the appointment of Col. Ndow Njie to the new Armed Forces Council, the first thing to come in my mind was the obvious rejection of the offer by the former commander, considering the adverse impression he had once developed against his subordinate. It therefore baffled me when the retired colonel disregarded the consequences and accepted the proposal. He should have known better than to fall for the subterfuge.

2. On the flip side did Hon. Faye purposefully orchestrate the whole gambit in a payback tactic to humiliate the former army commander, an instinctual prediction from the whole unnecessary drama, especially in his attempt to justify the lousy resume submitted by the colonel to the NA? The appallingly-prepared resume at best unveiled the caliber of a senescent rather than a brilliant contender. After Colonel Ndow Njie’s negligence of missing some of the silly blunders noted in his resume such as spending only 3 years instead of 6 years in primary school and passing his GCE ‘O Level exams twice in June and August of the same year with different results and no explanation attached for doubters, I think Minister Faye should have prevented the presentation of such document to the NAMs for scrutiny. Unless the document was sent directly without his perusal which would still be attributed to his carelessness as the principal initiator. But knowing the guy I believe he was all along banking on his wooing skills to get the necessary votes of which I must give him some credit for convincing 22 NAMs to vote for his motion against 27 opposing members. But with no credentials attached to the ridiculous resume, and Minister Faye still adamant on persuading the NAMs into recognizing the colonel’s exceptionalism merely compounded the problem to its failure. While cajoling the NAMs live on TV, fact checkers and those who knew better were probably sending text messages to their colleagues disputing most of his unfounded rhetoric. For instance, the retired colonel and former commander never ever attended any military academy in Pakistan but the minister confidently claimed that he did. Furthermore, I believe the Armed Forces Council responsibilities are not about soldiers with best results in Annual-Personal-Weapon Test (APWT) or about arithmetic wizards; but for suitable talking points, Minister Faye had to exaggerate the commander’s outstanding sharpshooting and accounting skills. Hey minister, the job is about grounded knowledge on military policies at the highest level requiring the best brains and not about the best marksman or ledger keeper. However, if the whole exercise was to payback on what the former commander did to him in 1991, he deserves special commendation for a job well done. I hope I am wrong in this prognoses but exploiting the brouhaha now to literally tell the world that Colonel Ndow Njie as army commander at the time had no constitutional right to terminate his service as a commissioned officer and captain, looks like a low blow to me. He just can’t have it both ways, by acclaiming the former commander for building and administering a perfect army from nothing to something and then turned around to delineate him for not pretty much knowing what the heck he was doing as an administrator. That he was not even empowered to dismiss a sublieutenant much more a captain of his rank but still forgetting that the BATT commander Colonel Jim Shaw was the Colonel Njie’s principal advisor throughout that period who was also mortally against his reinstatement imposed by the political elite. Anyway sorry Colonel Njie, I think it was a big mistake to accept the convoluted offer; and mark you, your withdrawal from the process came rather too late after your humiliating disapproval at the NA for not, among other things, providing your credentials. Minister Faye finally said that you lost them in your regular relocations. Really in 2020? Hmmmm!

Notwithstanding, being what I believe is the first time of its kind to submit names of such potential appointees for approval at the NA, I will recommend the possible adoption and adaptation of the American-congress method of conducting such critical evaluations and endorsements. In that even if the candidate provides all necessary credentials with impeccable resume, coupled with broad experience he or she ought to be invited before a vetting committee for questioning and answers. People out of government business for three decades especially in areas requiring expert knowledge and robust thinking should be subjected to thorough interviews to determine whether they still have what it takes or not. Meaning that a person like even Mr. Yusupha Dibba with all his credentials satisfactorily produced should have still been invited and quizzed over his beliefs on national and international defense issues, hot pursuits pacts, ECOMIG or the Senegalese forces in the Gambia and the whole nine yards about the country’s current defense concerns. How would anyone know if a dormant candidate out of the system for over thirty years is not partially senile now or lacks the ability to pass basic aptitude test without subjecting the individual to a live interrogation?

That said, let’s further look at the oxymoronic assertions of the defense minister in his attempt to bamboozle the NAMs into believing everything he uttered. Didn’t he sound inconsistent for saying that the government signed certain defense treaties of which he was a witness to in Senegal, expected to be ratified soon by the NA but cannot answer the simple question of what the terms and conditions of opting out of the bargain were if the assembly eventually found them unfavorable to the Gambia’s national interest? In his response, he of course simply confirmed how he was a signatory to an agreement he was barely familiar with its specifics or don’t understand what he definitively signed. Likewise when questioned about the rationale behind the deployment of Senegalese troops in Foni he as habitual, without a clue on what he was talking about asserted that that Foni detachment was a component of the broader ECOMIG force. Wondered why nobody challenged him for that incorrect statement. After all, was it not publicly announced by the Ghanian ECOMIG spokesman in the wake of the last national outcry about the hostile activities of those Senegalese troops, that they were not a part of the original West African forces but deployed later on an exclusive agreement between Presidents Adama Barrow and Mackey Sall ? Yes, even the European Union representative Mr Lajos did at the time confirm the spokesman’s statement and further added that the EU was nevertheless paying them along with the ECOMIG force; however, it was not until recently that France started financing both contingents. Minister Faye was either ignorant of the Ghanian-ECOMIG-spokesman’s statement or just could’t explain the unratified treaty already implemented illegally by the Senegalese as he again manifested in his weak simplification and inconsistency over the so-called hot pursuit agreement. In fact he talked about the hot pursuit agreement at the NA as being already signed in Dakar in March 2020 awaiting ratification after the end of the COVID-19 pandemic; however, after perhaps realizing later that the Garawol incident where the Senegalese troops unlawfully crossed into the Gambia to shoot and arrest an innocent Gambian, Mr Trawalleh happened well before the Dakar meeting, he since changed the signing time to March 4, 2017 when “I was not yet the minister of defense”. Quintessential shifting of the goalpost in the middle of the game!

I also distinctly remembered journalist Omar Wally of the Fatu Network once asking him about the Garawol incident soon after it happened and the minister exhibited a pamphlet from which he said the Senegalese justifiably relied on such agreement, signed between the two countries in Dakar in his presence. So telling the NA that the hot pursuit protocol is yet to be ratified for implementation is just a reflection of the minister’s lame attempt to deny and invalidated the argument that the Senegalese are totally in charge of our security orbit while President Barrow hired him as their mouthpiece or second fiddler to defend their indefensible behaviors. Amazingly in his last interview with journalist Mr. Njie of the Fatu Network the minister for the first time seemed to acknowledge that the Senegalese security forces made a mistake in that illegal incursion to Garawol adding that it is currently being addressed by the two governments. However, after seeing and hearing all, one never knows what to believe anymore about statements coming out of the mouth of our defense minister. Only God knows what is true or false on them.

In the end, I am tempted into believing that the defense minister doesn’t necessarily pay much attention to what he says or is somehow inflicted with a poor memory incapable of even remembering what he had had for breakfast in the morning. But don’t get me wrong, he can effectively woo the naive into submission if provided the slightest chance.

Thanks reading. Till next time.

Samsudeen Sarr New York City.

The Gambia, our homeland’s revolution, and liberation from 22 years of Yahya Jammeh dictatorship is farcical and nothing less than a major pseudo-event. In communication and media philosophy, a pseudo-event is a deliberate and elaborate creation of perception of reality where reality is indeed nonexistent. In a nutshell, it is faking it to look legitimate which is what our government under Adama Barrow is doing to mask its legitimacy, change and development.

Dear readers, take a mental detour with me to a time and place in The Gambia 2017 when Barrow was ushered in by hopeful and now hopeless Gambians to a global celebration of a so-called revolution. Solo Sandeng, many Gambians voted and died for a change that is still quite never a change. A year is too far away and 4 years too deep into a five-year presidential term for Gambians to wait for real change in the 2021 elections. Saul Alinsky in his book entitled Rules for Radicals captured the state of dysfunction in our land. He observed that there can be “no darker or more devastating tragedy than the death of man’s faith in himself and in his power to direct his future”. We need a revolution for real change NOW. Here are five WHY’s we need a revolution now. Not yesterday, today, or tomorrow but NOW!

POOR HEALTHCARE AND TOO MANY AVOIDABLE DEATHS

I was moved to tears this evening as Pa Modou Bojang narrated the death of a young Gambian girl, Kaddyjatou Trawally who was suffering from kidney disease and unfortunately her promising life was tragically cut short thanks to poor health care and the indifference of our leaders to the life of an average sick Gambian. When Barrow came to power, our healthcare was a mess after years of neglect under both Jawara and Jammeh. He has gone on to appoint two ministers of health and yet our health care system continues to be a death mill as we pay lip service to it. People are dying cheaply and avoidably. The Gambia’s current minister of health who interestingly drew praise for his competence is a failure as a minister and a guardian of our health care system. If The Gambia still had to send most of her seriously sick citizens to Senegal, India and Turkey, then Minister Samateh is a major failure and needs to make way for a minister who will institute and see an end to too many young, avoidable deaths in our country.

INCOMPETENT LEADERSHIP

President Adama Barrow and his government are the very personification of incompetent leadership on the African continent. As Gambia slides into executive anarchy and kakistocracy our government moves from one disaster to another without ever taking a minute to sit down and reflect on better ways to really serve the very Gambians they pretend to work for.Sierraleonean president Julius Mada Bio since coming to office has set his eyes on developing and enhancing the human capital of Sierra Leone by inviting educated Sierra Leone Diaspora to come and serve their nation. Sierra Leone’s super minister of basic and secondary education David Moinina Sengeh is a PhD graduate from MIT and has made major strides in making Sierra Leone a hub for technological development and education. What did Barrow do in The Gambia since coming to power? Please don’t take my words for it, check his incompetent ministers and advisers, and then like a tweeting bird, tell me about the confusion, incompetence, and pandemonium you see.

FINANCIAL GLUTTONY AND ECONOMIC MISMANAGEMENT

Some time back in March 2019, the Janneh Commission after two years of sittings, over 50 million Dalasis in expenses of taxpayers’ money submitted the report to Barrow. The commission’s report indicted the current minister of Finance Mamburay Njie, Alagie Ceesay, Chief protocol of the president among many notables in Adama Barrow’s government. Instead of implementing the recommendations of the commission, he disagreed with some of its findings and went on to implement it selectively while surrounding himself with the very people who were indicted for helping Jammeh pilfer our resources. What a very tragic and wasteful way to spend our taxpayers’ money. Interesting Jammeh’s seized properties were secretly sold between cronies and Banjul mafia for far less than the fraction of what they are really worth. And guess what, a court ruling has rendered the sale of Jammeh’s properties and Janneh commission recommendations unenforceable for now. Fire on the mountain but this is a topic for another day.

OLD WINE IN A NEW BOTTLE

Change is good they say but transformation is even better. And what did our clueless and mild intellectually retarded president do with our change? He changed or revolution into a regret. We have regretted and he used our change to put over us lords we voted to change. no system change, he killed our coalition and the principles of our coalition. He will go on to recycle former Jammeh enablers to help him master the ways of his predecessor. Jammeh’s men are running the state one more time. George Orwell’s timeless Animal Farm classic captured it thus: “nearly the whole of the produce of our labour is stolen from us by human beings. There, comrades, is the answer to all our problems. It is summed up in a single word–Man. Man is the only real enemy we have. Remove Man from the scene, and the root cause of hunger and overwork is abolished forever”.

INCOMPETENT ADVISERS

Barrow upon arrival at the seat of power committed a great wrong. Instead of hiring advisers from Gambia’s pool of highly educated and respected experts, he went on to hire as presidential and government advisers the brainless and clueless quartet of Siaka Jatta, Dou Sanno, Henry Gomez and Saihou Mballow as a political compensation for whatever they did for him. These quartet do not even know the terms of references of their employment. They have nothing to offer and that’s one reason they keep verbally assaulting anyone critical of Barrow and our government. In their cluelessness they didn’t know it is not their job to defend Barrow against political opponents but to advise him on policies. They are failing unquantifiably because they have no education or governance experience to offer.

DISAPPERING OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE YOUTH

Youths make about sixty percent of Gambian population, yet our country has nothing to offer them than a failing country with no decent jobs. The few that can manage decent government jobs earn less than 300 Dollars a month which is never enough to sustain them and their many poor dependent families. No wonder many Gambians are still dying in 2020 in fruitless efforts to make it to Europe for better life and opportunities while our president spend millions building mansions and NDP offices all over the country. For The Gambia it is Jammeh 2.0 and the only difference is that that the head quarters in now in Mankamang Kunda instead of Kanilai.

WE NEED TO TAKE TO THE STREETS NOW

Henry David Thoreau, the American transcendentalist philosopher posited: “All men recognize the right of revolution; that is, the right to refuse allegiance to, and to resist, the government, when its tyranny or its inefficiency are great and unendurable”. Gambia needs a new, proactive Gambian. A Gambian who will use radical means of fighting for his rights and effecting change. Gambian youths need to pour onto our streets now to call for real reforms now. We want:

• End to endless avoidable deaths and neglect of our healthcare facilities.
• An end to systemic corruption and total system change we voted for.
• An economy that works for the masses, young Gambians and not the few and the privileged.
• Firing of all clueless and incompetent advisers our president pays with our taxes.
  Transparency and end to financial gluttony in our government.
• Massive investment in education, education infrastructure, science, and technology.
  End to the exploitation, destruction of our beaches and resources by Chinese fish meal factories and sand mining companies.

Alhassan Darboe is a Gambian Communication scholar, consultant, and Real Estate businessman. He writes in from his base in U.S.A. He is currently a graduate student at Arizona State University’s Hugh Down School of Human Communication.

Calling for the dissolution of the National Human Rights Commission is an outrageous idea, but I am calling on the commissioners to withdraw their report and write a new one. Gay and lesbian rights are not an issue in The Gambia and I cannot fathom why the human rights commission would put it in their report in the first place. Issues that are of paramount importance are the rights of Gambians and that is what they should have focused on not gay and lesbian rights. Therefore, they should blame themselves for the public backlash.

The National Human rights Commission probably needs an experienced media team that will be vetting their messages for them before making them public. Information in a democracy must be vetted by reading it aloud before publication. The Gambia is a conservative nation when it comes to universal human rights, so they should take issues in piecemeal and the focus must be on the protection of rights of Gambian citizens as they are established to protect and promote human rights issues in The Gambia.

I am very sorry for Imam Baba Leigh, who happens to be the sacrificial lamb in all this debacle. My advice for Imam Baba Leigh is to ignore the politicians calling on him to resign and continue serving in the commission. Imam Leigh stood against injustices when the going was tough; I am very proud to call him my favorite Imam. He should advocate for his commission to consider withdrawing the recommendation they sent to the National Assembly on this subject so that this matter can be settled, and the National Assembly and the government must disregard the report in its totality, and focus on issues that are relevant to Gambians. We did not have Gays or Lesbians in the Gambia, therefore we have nothing to protect.

The Mandinka proverb rhetorically asks: “Word, why did you speak about me when it is not the right time to speak about me?” This is the dilemma the human rights commission finds itself in. The commission should be there to protect Gambian cultures, values, norms, and so forth, as the human rights for Gambians. The commission is established primarily to protect and promote the rights of Gambians, not the world, although one may argue that the Gambia is not an island, so we must adhere to universal human rights issues in the world, but certainly, in my opinion, that is not the role of the national human rights commission, their role and focus should be to protect the rights of Gambians, that is to do with anything that the Gambia is known for as people.

They should be protecting the Gambians values by advising government as to which laws are customary to The Gambia and which laws they should consider when it comes to universal human rights, but in this case, they appeared to be undermining the culture, and values of Gambian people by stating something in their report that is very irrelevant in the present Gambia.

My advice to fellow Gambians is to distance themselves from this topic because the more we talk about it, we will essentially be empowering and promoting LGBTQ issues in The Gambia without knowing. Even in the West, it is not universally accepted, but we should always remember democracy is a complex issue and should understand in a democracy where your rights stop is where someone else’s rights begin.

President Barrow was once asked this question in 2018/2019. He gave the best answer and was very precise. He said: “LGBTQ rights are not an issue in The Gambia, hence there are no Gambians one can pinpoint as gay or lesbian, and therefore, it is not an important issue”. We must desist from playing political expediency into this. We are making our society very vulnerable to having such a discussion in front of our children which could have a serious impact on their lives. The persistent debate and discussions on this topic are a win for LGBTQ advocates.

I understand there is a lot of intellectual dishonesty in this debate, which is driven by so many factors. The NHRC report never mentioned the legalization of Gay or Lesbian Marriage or decriminalizing the anti-LGBTQ law. I didn’t understand why the National Human Rights Commission is been accused of promoting same-sex marriage or promoting their rights. It is illegal in the Gambia; if anyone found doing the act of homosexuality in the Gambia he/she could face life imprisonment. Essentially, what the human right commission was saying they must not be subjected to mob-injustices or torture, but they must be accorded right to innocent until found guilty by a competent court.

As a country, our focus should be on how to fight poverty and pray for a bumper harvest in the coming raining season. May God protect The Gambia and its people from all kinds of evil deeds and give us the wisdom and the unity to protect our culture, values, and norms.

Kebba Nanko wrote from United States