For two decades Yahya Jammeh has relied on Gambian civil servants and security forces to clinch on to power by all means possible. He has banked on the timidity and lack of loyalty of Gambian civil servants and security forces to their country and oath of office. They instead worship the President in fear of losing their jobs and livelihoods thereby negating their duties and carrying out illegal orders from the government.
It is fundamental that every citizen appointed to a position of responsibility has the moral duty to serve with honesty, integrity and without fear or favor. But what we have seen in the Gambia is every sector of government capitulates to the dictates of the state whether legal or illegal. In a decent and independent society, citizens understand fully their cardinal duties to the nation and resist corruption and illegal looting of government resources at the expense of the citizenry. In fact, there are evidence that when Yahya Jammeh appoints his ministers, permanent secretaries, Directors and host of other government officials he asks them to serve without fear or favor. He then turns around and order people to carryout illegal orders only for him to turn around again and not only fire them but send them to the notorious mile II prisons. This practice sets precedence of fear and infighting within departments which creates unhealthy competition for positions.
Well, to all civil servants, security personnel and other government officials, you have endured enough pain and suffering. You have faced too many unreasonable dismissals; humiliations, persecution, jailing and in many instances arrests, detention and torture. You are all Gambian citizens with rights and dignities equally guaranteed to Yahya Jammeh by our constitution. For the most part, majority of you are honest, decent and hardworking Gambians who are simply out to contribute their best for their country. You have a say in how your country should be run and by who. You are no slaves to anybody especially to a fellow citizen who you continue to give your loyalty to but who has used every opportunity to treat you with disrespect and indignity. You go to work everyday wondering if you will come back to your love ones or not. You have seen scores of citizens arrested in your office or your next door neighbor and you have heard your classmates, colleagues get picked up and some disappear for good without trace.
The security forces in the Gambia are the brain and soul of the nation, but you have been the single largest group of citizens who have suffered the most in the hands of Yahya Jammeh. Of course, he see you as the biggest treat because he was there and he knows what you can do against an oppressive regime. But the larger question to you all is, why should you endure so much pain and suffering in the hands of a man you helped propelled and keep in power?. How many of your colleagues that you personally know who have become victims of a brutal regime which has less than one percent of the security as a support cast. Are these so called “junglers” more brave, better trained and more importantly deserving of life and liberty than you? Is your oath of office and loyalty worth a salt to Yahya Jammeh and his disingenuous regime? The answer is a resounding no! Yahya Jammeh has no more birth rights than you, he doesn’t deserve any better life than you. But the responsibility for citizens to resist a brutal government that spares no one lies in the hands of each and every one of us as citizens.
So fellow citizens of the security apparatus, civil servants and other government officials, what is on the line this December elections is not your jobs, but your lives, your future and the future of your children and our country. You must exercise your right to vote against the very regime that oppresses you, a regime that has no respect for your services and most importantly your humanity. It is false and blatant propaganda that if you vote against Yahya Jammeh he will know about it. And so what? if he knows you voted against him! It is in fact an insult to your intelligence for the president who has insulted you so much but relies on you hundred percent to stay in power. You have a moral duty to vote and to vote against a government that has clearly demonstrated its incompetence and neglect to the well-being of our country for two decades. It is by now abundantly clear that Yahya Jammeh has no business in running a household much less leading a nation. So Gambian civil servants and security personnel, your vote is your ticket to political freedom or to Mile II. You can either exercise it to safe your future and that of your children or will you succumb to cynicism, fear and false narrative that your jobs will be safe and secure.
The writings are on the wall, this December elections is the single most deciding moment in the history of the Gambia. Your decisions will determine where our country goes from here. Will we join the league of growing democratic nations in West Africa where citizens deserve to live in liberty, dignity and economic opportunities, or yield our sovereign rights to a scumbag leader who hates everything about the basic fundamentals of our society. History is in the making and change for good or worse entirely rest in your vote for forward or backwards. You take a pick and live with the consequences. Victory is assured to those you are steadfast and assertive of their basic rights and values!