A country that had one man at the helm for over 10 years, that is a period long enough to ruin a country’s institutions especially when the one presiding over is a selfish person who doesn’t respect institutions. Many nations have crumbled because their institutions have been mismanaged and misused to profit a section of the people in power leaving the minority to slave for the majority. Whenever there is an abuse and disrespect for institutions, the period that follows is a transition to restore sanity and respect bac into those institutions, there must be painful and hard decisions to be made on all sides especially from the leader of the transition after an incumbent losing power to his opponents.
There was a short moment when former of Kenya Mr Arap Moi stepped down, there was a bit of stability and concessions were made from Moi and other political leaders for a peaceful transition, but Kenyan leaders again dropped the ball on the Kenyan people. Leaders must make measured but responsible choices for all citizens. Leaders must put the country first and above all their aspirations anything less than that will sink the country into chaos or anarchy.
The 2007- 2008 Kenyan crisis went past an election mismanaged, never should any sane leader use elections as a means to create a humanitarian crisis for any nation or settle a political challenge gone bad.
Change is not when one with power loses it to his opponents but when those with power manage it well enough to accommodate everyone.
Fatoumata Jallow-Tambajang, the Opposition coalition chairperson spoke to The Guardian
“We don’t trust him. The longer we leave him, the more possibilities he has to leave the country, to escape from the country and to even do an insurgency. He is capable. The man is capable. In Kanilai, he has bunkers. I have reliable sources that [say that] he has bunkers. I have been reliably informed that he has treasure in Kanilai, he’s sitting on treasure, on gold as they say.”
“He can’t leave. If he leaves, he’s going to escape us,” she said. “We are stopping him from leaving. We are negotiating. He said he wants to go to Kanilai. Any day he tells us he wants to go abroad, then we say no. It’s the presidential prerogative.”
The Gambia Opposition coalition and its team failed to manage their personal egos, a nation’s aspiration for change must be big enough to bring a new way of doing things for all. Change is when your persecutor sees no retribution but a country they missed and betrayed when they had power and misused it.
I have spent all my adult life advocating for a peaceful change for Uganda when the people of Kasese were massacred by the same army that we call our national army I weep for Uganda. I thought Luwero and Northern Uganda was but the last drop of blood we could spill as a country so immature in politics, but I was mistaken after all that I saw happening to the people of Kasese I fear for the future of this country. But I hope that we can end the cycle of guns ending lives for sake of one climbing at the helm. There is nothing a nation profits when it loses its own people because someone wants to be in power by means arms. The use of violence to get power is the first failure on the part of those who want to take part from those that have failed. There is no change when the one who you want out used guns to get in while you want to use the same means to get in.
We all want justice for all but when a country is going through a transition like a chance Gambia got every word must be calculated and every action double checked for the good of the nation, not for politics of the day.
“He will be prosecuted. I’m saying a year but it could be less than that, this is my personal opinion – it might have taken three months because we really want to really work fast. Jallow-Tambajang said.
Meanwhile, the Gambian President Yahya Jammeh has promoted 49 Sergeants to the rank of Captain and the military has been deployed across the country because of a recklessness of the Opposition coalition. This might take back Gambia into uncertainty and bloodshed.
There seem to be mixed signals that are coming from the Opposition Coalition which is a dangerous thing for the Gambian people the President-elect seems to be a reconciliatory man while as the leader of the coalition opposition parties is a very angry lady prepared to hide what she wants President Yahya Jammeh to face when he is out of office.
President-Elect of Gambia Adama Barrow Photo Credit: Inger Anne Olsen.
President Adama Barrow posted on his Facebook Page calling Yahya Jammeh to accept defeat and hand over power peaceful so that the people can enjoy peace and freedom they deserve;
Let him know that leaders come and go sooner or later, I must also go. This is a fact that all of us must accept that all times and act in the supreme interest of The Gambia. I urge him to change his current position and ACCEPT the verdict of The Gambian people in good faith for the sake of The Gambia, our homeland, whose people deserve peace and freedom and prosperity.
