Hi folks,

Congratulations on the completion of the petition about President Jammeh's
excesses.  It goes to show how much we can accomplish when we work together.

Regarding distributing it, I would like to suggest that we restrict it to a few
organizations and officials.  A good rule of thumb, in my view, is that we
should only send it to people we can schedule meetings with, to follow-up on it.
I think the objective should be for the petition to generate some action to help
put a stop to Jammeh's human rights violations.  I don't think we should spend
too much effort sending the petition to newspapers, unless we draft a shorter
press release we can send out to the media.

The above suggestion raises the question, who should we send the petition to?  I
suggest we send it to members of the US Congress, the EU, British officials,
and non-government organizations interested in African issues in general, and
Gambian affairs in particular.  We must also not forget to send copies to the
foreign missions in The Gambia, both for their records, and for them to pass on
to relevant authorities in their governments.  I suggest anyone interested in
volunteering to send out the petition, and follow-up to set up an appointment
for two or more representatives of Gambian groups to meet the recipients should
let us know.  For example, any US Congress member who receives the petition will
be asked an audience with Gambian organizations to discuss matters in greater
detail.

To make things easier, I would be glad to collect a list of who is sending a
petition to whom, unless someone else wants to do it.  I think such a scheme
would avoid a duplication of effort, and prevent recipients of the petition
getting it more than once.

Let's remember that while President Jammeh has our $500,000 to spend on public
relations to shiny up his image, we can do better than whatever PR he can buy.
The key here is a nothing more than the collaboration and cooperation we've been
doing all this while. We just have to keep it up.

Have a great weekend, and best wishes.

Katim

----- Original Message -----
From: Alpha Robinson <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, July 27, 2000 2:29 PM
Subject: final draft of petition


> Greetings,

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