By every measure, he was a towering presence among Gambia’s Baby Boomer generation, yet the story of the man who stood shoulder high above the rest, reads much like an excruciatingly painful Greek tragedy that only Sochocles could craft with such effortless transcendence. But, Kukoi Samba Sanyang was no ordinary revolutionary; for he followed no script, attached to no worn-out Socialist dogma, swore to no political hegemony, and spoke no sterile language of utopian idealism. And like Sophocles’ tragic Greek hero, Oedipus, Kukoi Samba Sanyang’s arguably distinguished character was so often tested by the sometimes violently hostile, but always overtly pugnacious ghosts of the 1981’s foiled coup, and by his intense infatuation with what often seemed absurd and implausible.
As a dreamer, Kukoi Samba Sanyang was truly unequaled in the depth of his fantasies and the breadth his vision; a Pan-Africanist advocate who belonged to a league all his own. Kukoi Samba Sanyang was fiercely protective of the idyllic notion of an Africana that for most seemed forever deferred by the cloud of ignorance driven narcissism of generations of clueless African leaders. And not unlike Africa’s intellectuals and political aficionados who came of age in the tumultuous 60s and 70s, Kukoi Samba Sanyang was troubled by the vexatious Africa’s paradox of extreme poverty juxtaposed on the continent’s vast, unexplored natural wealth. But last week, the death of the man who became Gambia’s leader, if only for one unforgettable bloody week, was not supposed to happen; not now, not this way and certainly not in the decrepit slums of Bamako, Mali. In life, Kukoi Samba Sanyang’s name evoked fear among those who did not know him.
The unapologetic revolutionary was an object of intrigue and mystery, but also of antagonistic ridicule. As a fierce critic and a sworn enemy of Gambia’s Yahya Jammeh, the perennially rebellious Kukoi Samba Sanyang’s presence in Senegal was, for the Gambia’s murderous regime, too close for comfort. And President Macky Sall’s eagerness to expel Kukoi Samba Sanyang, and the highly troubling Mali dimension that ended his life, probably left an indelible stain on Senegal’s future relations with Gambia during Macky Sall’s tenure. Kukoi Samba Sanyang’s banishment to Bamako, Mali, eight hundred and fifty miles from his family, the people who loved him and his country of his birth, totally deconstructed Senegambia’s enduring legacy of two countries; one nation. In the end, to the extent that Kukoi Samba Sanyang’s fate was written in the hands of Senegal, the costly payback for Yahya Jammeh’s alleged funding of President Macky Sall’s elections last year, cast Macky Sall as unconcerned about the mass bloodletting and political tyranny in the Gambia. And in the effort to appease the Banjul dictator, Kukoi Samba Sanyang was drawn into Senegal’s scapegoating dragnet, his insulating refugee status in Senegal was callously revoked, and his bone-fide Senegal citizenship negated. Kukoi Samba Sanyang’s reckless expulsion to faraway Bako, Mali, was a political victimization that rebelled against the sacrosanct Senegambian orthodoxy, and left the sister countries drifting apart and drenched in the blood Gambians and Senegalese who died at the behest of Yahya Jammeh’s dictatorship. Kukoi Samba Sanyang is no more, but the polemical character of the man who paradoxically brought both hope and grief to Gambia, will continue to arouse eerie among some Gambians, even as he continues to live on in the hearts and souls of those who loved him.
Nonetheless, the political undercurrent that led to the crushing premature demise of Kukoi Samba Sanyang blindsided the Gambia’s dissident movement, but the tragedy of his death left Gambians coalescing around a vision Kukoi Samba Sanyang had for thirty years; a vision for Gambia he carried to his grave. President Macky Sall’s deportation of Kukoi to Bamako, Mali, ensured the impossibility of his political comeback in the way he knows best; insurrection, but the death of the firebrand will continue to haunt the ghost of Senegal’s President Macky Sall for years to come. For, the man on whom Gambians once invested so much hope had a mind that did not speak to the interest of the two countries bound forever by culture and geography, to live as each other’s keepers; Senegal and Gambia. And not so long ago, when Yahya Jammeh invited Kukoi Samba Sanyang with a proposal to murder his political enemies, he knew Yahya Jammeh was not in his herd, but it compelled Kukoi to renew and kick-started his campaign to oust Yahya Jammeh. Today, the general is forever silenced and lies buried in Senegal, but the struggle he left behind lives on. Senegal and President Macky Sall let Kukoi down, but as his soul drifts with graceful ease beyond the yonder blue, he will carry our message to Deida Hydara, Daba Marenah, Illo Jallow, Tabara Samba, Chief Ebrima Manneh, and all Gambia’s dead, that we will not rest until the struggle for Gambia’s liberation is won. For, Kukoi Samba Sanyang’s ultimate dream was to “sweep the streets around Banjul’s MacCarty Square. For he longed to once more return home to the country he loved; sweet home Gambia. It is where his heart truly belongs, under the peaceful shadow of Wassadou’s fearfully mysterious mahogany trees.