Author: Gainako

In Loving Memory: I am deeply touched by the outpouring of prayers and messages of condolence from all over the world on the sudden passing of my dearest mom. All your prayers and well wishes filled the void and the sense of loss on this insurmountable loss of a woman that meant the world to me. The messages are a testament of what this incredible woman always called “the love and care you offer to people shall come back to you when you need it the most”… Thank you all so very kindly particularly to my family for being there…

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‘Influx of African Immigrants Shifting National and New York Demographics’ Threatened with arrest in 2009, Lamin F. Bojang fled Gambia after publicly contradicting its president’s claims that he could cure AIDS. Now 31, Mr. Bojang lives in Concourse Village in the Bronx with his wife and 2-year-old son and works as a receptionist at Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center in Brooklyn, while working toward a bachelor’s degree in political science at City College. With educational and professional opportunities in Gambia scarce for his generation, “the rest will have to find ways of leaving,” he said, “and African migrants here, just…

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The special criminal court division of the High Court in Banjul Wednesday acquitted and discharged Alhagie Jobe, deputy editor-in-chief of the Daily Observer newspaper, and one Mbye Bittaye, of all the charges preferred against them by the state. Jobe was arrested on 7 February 2013, and had remain in state custody since then. Alhagie Jobe was arraigned on a five-count charge of making an act with seditious intention, seditious publication, possession of seditious publication, giving false information to a public servant, and recklessness and negligence. Mbye Bittaye was arraigned on a single count of making preparations to do an…

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Clinical safety trials begin in US this week, after approval from the FDA; volunteer testing in UK and Africa from September GlaxoSmithKline’s experimental Ebola vaccine could be tested on humans in the UK, US, the Gambia and Mali in the next few weeks, in a race to contain the deadly virus that has claimed more than 1,500 lives in West Africa. The news came as the World Health Organisation (WHO) warned that the Ebola epidemic could eventually exceed 20,000 cases. Bruce Aylward, WHO’s assistant director-general for emergency operations, said: “This far outstrips any historic Ebola outbreak in numbers.…

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 By Yero Jallow, Gainako’s Staff writer. In exclusive interview with Gainako, Fatou Jaw Manneh talks about the U.S African Summit, Gambia’s struggle and her take on some of the political issues at hand. Find below we reproduce the whole interview as conducted by Gainako’s Staff writer, Yero Jallow. Gainako: I know you and I are inseparable colleagues in the struggle, for many that know you, you are the true heroine of Gambia’s struggle, a dearest sister and mentor I have in you. Would you like me to address you Fatou, Sister Jaw, or just Kabou-Nyancho? Fatou: Oh Dalton.…

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  Fatou Jaw-Manneh Dame of the “Flaming Pen” Source: The Independent (Banjul) — June 25, 2004 October 23, 2005 If the pen were a flaming sword, she would have been its sheath. Fatou Jaw-Manneh is one of the few Gambian women who has made her mark in journalism as a career. As a reporter for the Daily Observer, when that paper was on top of its world in the 90s, Fatou had distinguished herself as being of a class of her own, at a time when a generality of her peers were struggling to find their feet in a stereotypical Gambian environment, riddled with the vagaries of gender discrimination. She had cult a level of her own where many had failed. Now…

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Civil society must hold political leaders and business to account measuring their actions against their promises, Kofi Annan, Chair of the Africa Progress Panel, told a meeting in Addis Ababa on Monday, adding that malnutrition on the continent represents political failure. In June, African Union leaders at a meeting in Malabo renewed their 2003 commitment to allocate at least 10 percent of their national budgets to agriculture. “We are looking at our leaders. They made fresh promises and we will see where we go from here,” he told a mainly civil society meeting. Organised by the Africa Progress Panel…

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IS THE STRUGGLE REALLY READY TO DISLODGE PRESIDENT JAMMEH? One of psychology lecturers addressing a colleague accentuated “people with long names are most often than not very troublesome” and at the time, my classmates and I found it amusing. Testing his deduction on a randomly selected people with long names I was numbed by his startling precision. Yes President Jammeh is troublesome…Yes President Jammeh has a vindictive chip on his shoulder…Yes President Jammeh is not an academic…Yes President Jammeh epitomises evil but despite all his odds, he is wittingly intelligent and has excellently mastered his games to an extend he…

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Dr. Chancellor Williams …Born December 22, 1898, Died December 7, 1992 Author Of ‘The Destruction of Black Civilization’ Chancellor Williams, as the old man was fondly called; was one of the greatest African American scholars of the twentieth century.He was the author of one of the greatest books on African history entitled ‘The Destruction Of Black Civilization’ – a must read, by anyone wishing to understand the African condition, dating back 4500 B.C. Another book he wrote, equally worth reading is ‘The Rebirth African Civilization’ – both books were required reading in history, and Afrocentric and/or World history classes in…

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They are the flagships of a regime perpetually hovering over the edge of complete collapse and certain disintegration, on the one hand, and willing collaborators in a cabal desensitized to the particularly gruesome human rights violations of the last two decades. They project narcissism and self-interest; with material greed at the heart of their irreverent decisions to serve a regime that offers neither the joys of work nor the joys of job security. And to many Gambians, it seems working for the regime is, at its worst, only a benign miscalculation unworthy of drawing conclusions beyond patriotic motivations to serve,…

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