Friends, compatriots in the surging struggle against the entrenched Dictator and Butcher of Kanilai, Yaya Jammeh, it’s time to drop “ maslah” – the fear of not offending or stepping on people, the blind eye – and call a spade a spade! Hamat Bah of the NRP is a collaborator, an enabler, , a plant, a Jammeh spy or mole, an accomplice to crimes ( human and economic) against the state and battered people of The Gambia!
For every armed robbery, there is a diversion, a distraction, a look-out, an ‘inside-job’, and Hamat Bah provides a perfect foil, a decoy, as Yaya Jammeh callously and willfully robs and rapes The Gambian people and economy. Collaborators by definition and default are traitors! Historically collaborators are motivated by economic or political (including ethnic or tribal) benefit or advantage. Hamat Bah meets the criteria for both categories. As Jammeh systematically de –constructs and displaces the established business and professional class, he has created a new one overnight, and Hamat Bah is one of the beneficiaries.
Hamat Bah’s calculated back-stabbing and connivance has historical precedence, and in this struggle for freedom, we must also rid ourselves of the likes of Hamat Bah. During the struggle against Apartheid in the late 1980s and ‘90s, the behavior of the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), led by Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi, was tantamount to collaboration and accommodation. Buthelezi was afraid of the impending diminished role for his tribal Zulu enclave of Kwazulu Natal so much so that, he collaborated with the Apartheid regime to butcher hundreds of his own African people. The ANC promised to eliminate the tribal Bantustans created by the Apartheid system. Amilcar Cabral of Guinea Bissau ( PAIGC), was assassinated in 1973 by an ‘insider’.
Hamat Bah is trying to ‘kill’, disrupt and destabilize the opposition from within by his, sometimes, unpredictable, but calculated, juvenile, and treacherous behavior and buffoonery. Folks, 2016 is pivotal, because we have reached a proverbial cross-road in the struggle against the Jammeh Dictatorship and kleptocracy. We cannot lose sight of the prize. We have Jammeh and his defenders on the defensive and under incessant pressure; we cannot let our guard down. We need to STOP giving legitimacy to Hamat Bah by inviting him into any future coalition. If the recent election results are any indication, Hamat Bah has already imploded! Dictator Jammeh has no Plan B, his only desire is to hold on to power, at any cost, but he needs the support and accommodation of some business elites and professionals, for legitimacy.
I have always suspected Hamat’s motives, erratic behavior unwarranted attack against his so-called ‘colleagues’ in the opposition. It always seems to reserve and direct his harshest and most venomous criticism at the opposition! Is that not ironic, that Dictator Jammeh always seems to spare Bah’s businesses and his person? Pa Samba Jow sealed the deal for me, on Tuesday Dec 17, 2013, during his show on Freedom Radio Online! Pa Samba systematically catalogued Hamat Bah’s acts of betrayal and sabotage against the opposition to the Dictator, and also raised some poignant issues and thought provoking questions and theories. If you have not listened to Pa Samba’s eloquent analysis, please find time to do so. Pa Samba made his case before the Gambian people, and made it plain, without any reasonable doubt, that Hamat Bah of the NRP is a closet Dictator Jammeh sympathizer and collaborator. Bravo to Pa Samba Jow and his colleagues for their work!
Politically, over the years, Hamat Bah, has always been the lone wolf, Jammeh’s ‘fifth column’ working in our midst. Economically, Hamat Bah’s busniess enterprises seem to be thriving while the Gambian economy sinks and collapses under the Jammeh ‘Juju’ economic policies of ; manipulation, confiscatory tax policies, tax evasion, and intervention. On the other hand, Ousainou Dabo and OJ Jallow are prevented from earning a living! As Pa Samba theorized, Bah always seems to be ‘below the radar’ of Jammeh economic police, while other businesses are being confiscated and taxed to extinction! The opposition, by definition, is a threat to the status quo, yet, Bah’s businesses are thriving under the brutal regime of Yaya Jammeh. I cannot think of any other country where the president is the businessman-in-chief! By artificially intervening and dominating every sector of The Gambian economy, the cost of living has only increased and become unbearable. The basic infrastructure, such as transportation (ferries come to mind), energy supply and communication have all collapsed. Jammeh is still in denial, just as Nero fiddled while Rome burned. For Hamat Bah, and many others, if you lay with dogs, don’t be surprised if you wake up with fleas!
The opposition has many challenges, the least of which is to convince the suffering and lethargic Gambian people that, under the Jammeh Dictatorship, life is not going to get better! The opposition should cease and desist from inviting Hamt Bah again – period! We can do this without him! The only people who are doing well and looking healthy are those connected to the regime one way or the other. The life has been sucked out of the economy; the groundnut industry, the re-export trade and tourism are all decimated, all through Jammeh’s manipulation and intervention.
There are certain truths about economics, that one person cannot artificially create both demand and supply! Local traders have no chance against a businessman-in-chief who is exempt from paying taxes. It used should to be that high school graduates were almost guaranteed their first job through the vibrant tourism industry, but today the youths have become chronically unemployed. Somehow, Hamat Bah is claiming to be a leader in the tourism sector!
The screams of defiance of the opposition have reached a crescendo and the Gambian people are slowly beginning to wake up. We cannot afford to sit on the sideline anymore and we must also put our money where mouths by generously supporting the opposition and organizations like the GUC, DUGA, and lone voices out there. We need to keep supporting opposition media as well, As for Hamat Bah, the game is up!
Kaba Sallah.