By Mathew K Jallow
The old adage ‘power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely’, is not an abstract idea; it has foundation in reality. In a world of changing political paradigms, the antediluvian mindset Yahya Jammeh exhibits is a rapidly dying force, as the spread of people’s power changes the very definition of politics and governance in this 21st. century. The divination of politicians and sickening submission to corrupt political leaders, as means of control and exploitation in Africa, often punctuated by state violence, has no place in the emerging political dispensation of our time. The existential threat posed by absolute political power in the Gambia has had a deleterious effect on Gambian society; ranging from mass killings to irreparable traumatic mental illnesses. Consequently, there is no upside in Yahya Jammeh’s intransigence and futile effort of remaining in power; on the contrary, during his twenty-two years of Stalinist rule, Yahya Jammeh has graduated from single, isolated killings, designed solely to send a message to the population, to the mass murders intended as human sacrifices, to prolong his reign of terror. The fact that after twenty-one years, Yahya Jammeh, even with some of the most gruesome state crimes, doesn’t believe Gambians have the fortitude to vote him out, is not an unfamiliar pattern for tyrants losing touch with reality, which compels them to act irrationally, despite the writing on the wall. The trapping of power Yahya Jammeh has enjoyed, at the expense of the Gambian people, has irrevocably run out of steam, and GambiaHasDecided is not a campaign slogan; it is the unmistakable embodiment of citizens’ determination to revolt against Yahya Jammeh’s misanthrope and unchallenged ravaging of the Gambia’s wealth and national resources. Gambians have made an irrevocable judgement to never again return to the era of mass killings, forced disappearances, mass incarcerations and the tortures of the past, but evidently Yahya Jammeh’s inexplicable arrogance and insanity precludes his coming to grips with the sentiments of the Gambian people; that they have voted him out, and he must relinquish power, as stipulated by Gambia’s sacred document; the constitution. Read more