In a message dated 5/19/00 7:07:49 PM Eastern Daylight Time, [log in to unmask]
writes:

<< In the second instance, the notion that a govern that wants to consolidate
 itself in power, against the wishes of the people, must be removed by all
 means necessary, is only relevant to the contractual basis of a
 constitutional arrangement; as such, the collective actions of the people,
 through civil disobedience, the engendering of an ungovernable situation,
 mass demonstrations and strikes, could cause a government to surrender its
 illegitimate authority to govern by resigning, and return the authority to
 empower to govern back to the people. If by all means necessary, is within
 this context,
 it is a right that the people not only possessed but can exercise.

   In the final analysis, the people will always truimph. No instrument of
 coercion, suppression, brutality and savagery, can break the will of a people
 who are determined to be free; a people who are determined to guide their own
 destiny.

     Rene

 ---------------------------- >>
Rene,

Well said. This is what this present government fails to realize and
acknowledge, or perhaps they do, but are hedging on the chance that the
people will not have the courage or the insight to embark on any form of
civil disobedoence that will paralyze a government and force those who impose
their will on the people to return what they were entrusted with, or that
which they entrusted themselves with against the wishes of the people .
However, the people must also come to a point where they realize that indeed
the power lies with them. Mere civil disobedience in the form of a mass
strike is a very effective tool indeed, but those who will embark upon it
must have the cooperation of everyone, otherwise, it will never work. Can
such a unanimous action be undertaken in The Gambia? Time will tell.
Sometimes a people have to be pushed to the brink in order to see that it is
time to take action.
Africans by and large, with a few exceptions,  have had such bad and corrupt
leadership in our midst, and such rampant disregard for our human and civil
rights that I think we have lost the realization that power belongs to the
people, and it does not take the barrel of a gun, or a machete to exercise
that power at all.
Thanks for an insightful post.

Jabou Joh

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