Wisdom opined that what goes around comes around. Sadly, experience has equally shown when things come around, certainperpetrators are not usually around to witness their handy works. The handful who outlived their own makings shamelessly attempt to disown their own shadows. Such persons, while in the height of their prime,venomously eschew anything that empowers the people.Instead they opt to be masters who heartlessly ride on the feeble backs of the very people they swore to protect and enhance. For such leaders to continually suppress their people, they plant seeds of fear and in the hearts of their people. Once these seeds germinate, they are watered and fertilized with stern punishment and unfair rewards to maturity. It, therefore, becomes absolutely hard to remove such callous leaders after the maturity of their toxic plants. One of the reasons for this difficulty is the very people who are victims of their leaders’ oppression; see one another as the cause of each other’s misery instead of the leaders. Such is the person of President Yahya AJJ Jammeh of the Republic of the Gambia.
President Jammeh, like many Gambians, has a humble beginning. He knows first-hand what poverty and injustice mean. He was born and bred in poverty. According to his own narrative at the GRTS, he experienced a lot of injustice and unfair treatment as a junior officer in the Gendarmerie. Personally, I am of the opinion that a person with humble beginning can empathize more with those of similar backgrounds. In other words, such a person should be just, fair and responsible. On the contrary, Jammeh is devoid of virtues; he is shallow, callous, an obnoxious liar, a thief, self-centred hypocrite and a serial killer. Funnily, Jammeh is convinced beyond any reasonable doubt that the Gambia and Gambians are indebted to him. This is precisely why he often reminds us that he sacrificed his life to save the Gambia from the Jawara regime. As a result, he is licensed to sit on the Gambian constitution. He orders the arrest and detention of anyone he wants at will for as long as it pleases him. He kills and/or gets disappear anyone without question. To make matters worse, no one dares challenge him. Imam Ba Kawsu Fofana, Imam Baba Leigh, Mam Buray Njie, Njogu Bah and of late Fatou Camara are classical examples of Jammeh’s arrogant disregard of the Gambian constitution and international law.
Albeit Jammeh is guilty as charged with all the atrocities he committed, it is prudent to note that he is always aided and abetted by some Gambians. While working for or with Jammeh, they close their eyes to all his wrong doings. Some will even abet him in executing his shady deals. Others torture and kill for him but the moment their marriage of convenience breaks unceremoniously, they are quick to duck and dive under the lame excuse: “I was working for the Gambia government and not President Jammeh”. May be what these people failed to understand is the Gambia under the watch of Jammeh, he and the government are one with different names. There is no boundary between him and the government. People like Sabally who lobby for a position from Jammeh will not hesitate to batter their pride and self-esteem for a quickie with President Jammeh. Consequently, he like his boss negates all that he used to stand for to ensure he remains in his position. It is also encouraging to note that there are some decent Gambians who would rather wallow in abject poverty than work for or with Jammeh. Halifa Sallah, for example, rejected a ministerial position from Jammeh on the principles that he will not work for or under a regime with is undemocratically elected by its people. One thing is very certain dear fellow Gambians: each and every one will be accounted for his or her contribution and/or failure to stop the atrocities and misuse of public offices when the time of reckoning arises.
Burama Jammeh of the USA and a regular contributor on the Gambian online media once asked why the struggle is struggling. For some reason it compelled me to revisit the achievements and failures of the struggle against the Jammeh regime. My father once said in a dispute without witnesses; fairness, logic and reasoning should be employed to arrive at a balanced judgement. With this in mind I subjected the Gambia under Jammeh and all concerted efforts to remove him and restore good governance under the microscope. A number of factors popped up: Jammeh’s continual lying about his government policies; the unabating in-fight, backstabbing and bickering among Gambians; the nagging culture of fear and tolerance; selfishness; greed and unpatriotic.
President Jammeh has been and still continues to lie to Gambians from the moment he appeared on the helm of power. First, he promised Gambians through the Gambian press during his maiden press conference that he will not introduced dictatorship in the Gambia. Suffice it to say, Jammeh has flatly fallen on his backside on this solemn promise. Secondly, he constantly batters the British for colonising the Gambia for 400 years without giving us anything in return. At this juncture, two fundamental issues arise: President Jammeh being an oaf and his inadequacy with world history. If not, he would have known that the British has only colonized the Gambia for 76 years and not 400 years as observed by Baba Galleh Jallow. Even though British did not leave behind an enviable development legacy, they left some instruments which with Jammeh, if he were a good leader, could have used to foster further development of the Gambia and her people. Let’s take the system of government they left behind as a case in point to illustrate Jammeh’s perpetual lies and incompetence as a leader. Since he harbours so much hatred for his former masters, he should empower Gambians unlike his masters by introducing a two-term for the presidency, check and balances for the arms of governmentand create a task force which will be responsible for civil education. It will be tasked with enlightening the Gambian populace on their civic and political rights. Similarly, unlike the former colonial masters, Jammeh should embark on making education free for all Gambians and making it compulsory for children within the school going age.
Among many of his obnoxious lies is when he unashamedly told Gambians that the British through the EU wants to recolonize the Gambia and impose homosexuality on Gambians. On the execution of the Mile II 9 dead row inmates, Jammeh made it categorically clear to the Senegalese officials when they confronted him that he did not carry out his threat only to retract his words when he was exposed by the Gambian online media houses. The list of Jammeh’s blatant lies is long.
The most disheartening factor which is entrenching Jammeh in power is the persistent in-fight between and among Gambians. This cannot be better portrayed than highlighted by the erstwhile media beauty queen Fatou Camara on her interview with the freedom Radio. Below is an excerpt from the interview:
FR: How was your relationship with Momodou Sabally prior to your firing?
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FC: Well, before he became SG and all that, Sabally was always on my show all the time, he wrote poems for me, sent me a thank you card and wrote many articles on both Standard News Paper and The Daily Observer, calling me ” The smartest woman out of kiang” I could remember Sabally would call me and complained about his bosses at the Ministry of Finance until his credit runs out. I once featured him on a TV documentary I did for Jammeh, he appreciated that so much and told me he had many compliments about it, and that his minister was jealous about it. I could remember I once put on my FB that I was at Gaya with friends, few minutes later, Sabally showed up there, he was running after me for publicity, I came to realize that the man is a wannabe and that he was hungry for fame, hence his association with Me, Gibou Bala Gaye, Latirr Carr and Co.
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FR: Few weeks before you were fired, I saw you and Sabally at the State House on GRTS newscast; laughing and smiling while Jammeh was addressing a meeting there. How can you reconcile your statements painting Sabally as your enemy when he was your close friend yesterday?
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FC: I did not know at that time that he was so evil minded, I suspected something, but I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt. At the end he pretended to be very busy each time I wanted to see him.
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FR: Will you say that your strained relationship with Momodou Sabally was as a result of the Balafong Facebook page saga?
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FC: Well I confronted Sabally on the Balafong issue, knowing that he misled the president on the issue, Sabally and I know very well that Balafong does not talk about politics on their forum, but he insisted that they do and that the executions were discussed on there…I also confronted him on the forex issue for the fact that he was writing too many press releases contradicting himself.. I guess he did not like that; it may be another reason why he blocked my access from the president, thinking that the president could discuss the issue with me.
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FR: What is noise behind this Momodou Sabally, Latirr Carr, and Balafong grapevine talk all about?
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FC: Well Sabally once sent me a text message asking for Willie Carr’s number Latirr’s dad, I had to call Latirr to find out why Sabally did not call him direct and ask him for his father’s number, Latirr said he does not know, but he gave me his father’s number which I passed to Sabally by text, he never even say thank you to me. I later learned that he had a meeting with Latirr and his parents; I was not at that meeting, so I did not know what was discussed.
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From the above one can conclude that the likes of Momodou Sabally who will go to any length just to gratify their selfish and personal goal irrespective of what impact their actions have on the nation and its people continues to hinder the fight against Jammeh. They become insensitive to the trail of destruction and the galaxy of people they trampled upon as they rush to sniff Jammeh’s back side. Today, the Gambia has become a nation where anyone can walk in and out to cause the downfall of the other. Until we come to terms with the fact that each one of us is endowed with the power to change someone else’s life for the better despite our own unfortunate circumstances, Jammeh will continue to shackle us and drag us by the forelock to our graves. It is about time that we recognise in this moment of anguish and despair no one will ease our sufferings but ourselves. If not, we will only be comforting our poor souls with the soothing melody of freedom that our aching ears constantly hear but never taste its sweetness.
Gambians in the diaspora who are standing up to Jammeh are ascribed as the bad citizensand Jammeh’s enemies. On the contrary, it is those Gambians who are the true sons and daughters of the Gambia. Furthermore, they threw a spanner on the wheels of Jammeh’s endemic divisive system of administration forcing it to a gradual halt. Without them, this pathetic excuse of a man will continue to wreak havoc on the Gambia and Gambians unabated.
Sulayman Jeng, UK