By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT The Gambia’s National Assembly is composed of fifty-eight (58) National Assembly members of which fifty-three (53) are elected and five are nominated by the President. The current National Assembly is the fifth legislature and has six female National Assembly Members (NAMs) and one person with a disability. Coincidentally only one person with a disability is running in the 9th April 2022 Parliamentary Election. The lone person with a disability running is not backed by any party so Mr Lamin Manneh will be contesting in Sanneh Mentereng as an Independent Candidate. On Saturday 9th April 2022, nineteen…
Author: Yusef Taylor
Yusef Taylor
Yusef Taylor, commonly known as Flex Dan is an editor and practising journalist based in the Gambia with a keen interest in human rights, the economy and good governance among many others. He continues to break news on the economy, human rights violations and is highly engaged in security sector reforms, constitutional reform and the transition of the Gambia from dictatorship to a democracy, the NewGambia. Yusef has been working with Gainako as a media practitioner from 2015 to date. He has a degree in Civil Engineering with 5 years of Design Consultancy experience.
By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) and Gambian Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) launched the MoJ-CSO Platform during a three-day coordination workshop for representatives of both Government and CSO leaders starting on 5th April 2022. The three-day workshop provided an opportunity for Government and Civil Society stakeholders to plan and coordinate efforts toward the implementation of the Truth Reconciliation and Reparations Commission’s (TRRC) recommendations. The event was jointly organised by The Association of Non-Governmental Organisations (TANGO), the MoJ and the Global Initiative for Justice, Truth and Reconciliation (GIJTR) and took place at the Sir Dawda Kairaba Jawara Conference…
By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT The Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) has rebuffed claims that President Adama Barrow’s National Peoples Party’s (NPP) failure to hold a congress will invalidate over forty National Assembly candidates up for elections on Saturday 9th April 2022. Speaking at the Sir Dawda Kairaba Jawara Conference Center on Wednesday 6th April 2022 at an Election Observer Briefing, IEC CEO Sambujang Njie responded to calls from two Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) to invalidate the nominations of NPP Parliamentary candidates. On 4th April 2022, two Diaspora CSOs namely Right 2 Know (R2K) and the Gambia…
By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT Gambian-Great British Athlete Mensah Elliott, shattered the Masters Athletics 60 meters hurdles record with a time of 7.91 seconds in mid-March 2022. Back in 2012, Mensah won silver for The Gambia, however, injuries and a lack of competition convinced him to switch allegiances to Team Great Britain (GB) back in 2015 and he’s not looked back since. Winning Silver for The Gambia Born in the United Kingdom (UK) to Gambian father Mensah Elliott (Senior), Mensah Elliott Junior bears the same name as his father who relocated with his family to The Gambia when Junior Mensah was…
By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT The Gambia’s Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) has announced that the Parliamentary Elections will proceed in the Foni Region after some ten thousand people were affected following clashes between Senegalese Soldiers and MFDC Separatists in mid-March 2022. Independent candidate for Foni Kansala, Mr Abdoulie Bojang believes that the elections must proceed in Foni and that the authorities must guarantee the safety of voters come 9th April 2022. GFA Replacement to Submit Additional Signatures Following the death of the Gambia for All (GFA) Party candidate, Mr Lamin Njie for Kiang West Constituency, GFA has submitted a fresh nomination…
By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT The International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA) and the Committee of Eminent Persons announced that over 80% of Parliamentary Candidates have signed the Peace Pledge for the upcoming 9th April 2022 Parliamentary Elections. Speaking on behalf of the delegation H.E. Muhammed Ibn Chambas told members of the press that they “liaised very closely with the IEC” from the collection of nomination papers to the submission candidates “who agreed willingly sign it”. The Peace Pledge for Parliamentary Elections is a continuation of a similar Peace Pledge signed in the run-up to the 4th December…
By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT The Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) has announced that one Candidate has died and a further three candidates have withdrawn from the 9th April 2022 Parliamentary Elections. Only last week the IEC issued a press release indicating that two Independent Candidates have withdrawn from the elections meaning that a total of five candidates have now withdrawn from the elections. To date, the total number of candidates has dropped from 251 to 246. Interestingly enough the Commission also announced that By-Elections will be conducted for four Council Wards in May 2022. Our research has shown that Councillors from…
By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT Members of the Gambia’s Police Intervention Unit (PIU) and Gambian Security Institutions have failed to heed the TRRC Recommendations to train “security forces on crowd control (riot management), and all other relevant security and legal issues concerned with the management of violent demonstrations and riots”. This is evidenced by two statements issued by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) condemning the PIU for heavy-handedness when dealing with public gatherings. The Gambia’s Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission (TRRC) was enacted by the National Assembly to investigate the human rights violations of former President Yahya Jammeh’s regime from…
By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT According to the latest audit report issued by the National Audit Office (NAO), thousands of Gambian Diplomatic Passports (DP) have been issued without following due process. The Auditor General’s report titled “Administration Management of Diplomatic and Service Passports” revealed that “the Gambia Immigration Department supplied 6,500 machine readable passports to the MoFA in 2014. However, officials at the Ministry were unable to account for 5,395 passports”. This means that only 1,105 passports were accounted for. Unfortunately, the President’s Office (OP) also joined into the fraudulent act and issued at least 70 DPs without supporting documents. Although…
By Yusef Taylor, @FlexDan_YT According to a leading campaign organiser of President Adama Barrow’s National People’s Party (NPP), their candidates for the upcoming National Assembly elections will not participate in any debates just like their party leader. President Adama Barrow declined to attend the Gambia’s first-ever Presidential debate in the run-up to the 4th December 2021 Presidential Election. However, that did not stop him from winning with an absolute majority. In an exclusive interview with Mambanyick Njie of the NPP he confirmed that together with Seedy Njie, they were the main organisers for the NPP National Assembly elections campaign. It…