A toast for the UDP
Bully, bully. This is what Jammeh wants to do to the United Democratic
Party(UDP). In fact, if it were not for impending international outrage and
condemnation, Jammeh would hammer the UDP out of existence by incessantly
unleashing terror on the party hoping to smash into smithereens, the party's
growing membership and its political crusade. He is poised to snuff life out
of the UDP.
But like former Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda discovered in the
opposition party Movement for Multiparty Democracy(MMD)under the leadership
of the loose-tongued and acerbic Frederick Chiluba,then a trade
unionist,Jammeh will find the UDP a hard nut to crack. Of course, Kaunda
never tried to unleash thuggery on the MMD. But Jammeh does it to the UDP in
ways unimaginable. The UDP is, however, destined to stay. Its stinging
criticisms, which Halifa Sallah of PDOIS recently paraphrased, "attacking
the president from all angles," of Jammeh's tyranny and corruption, must be
sustained in pursuance of accountability in government and its
constituencies.
Effective, credible opposition is so vital to the functioning of a true
democracy that it will be unthinkable to live without it. The fact of the
matter, however, is that, an opposition needs outrage, aggression and even
more importantly, a powerful political machinery to be effective in calling
the government to account. Which is what the UDP has been doing in its
chequered four-year-existence.
Speaking of which:consider the sum of $21.7m,which was a loan from Taiwan,
and which was held at the Citibanks of Switzerland and New
York. And consider also the second sum of $30m which "was sent to a special
development account in a New York bank." The Governor of the The Gambia
Central Bank, reported the UK-based New African magazine, was instructed to
"write to the Taiwanese government to confirm receipt of the loan funds."
Yet the magazine reported that the funds had not arrived in The Gambia.
Lawyer Ousainou Darboe frequently questioned the government about these
"missing millions". He even went as far as alleging that these amounts were
deposited by the then AFPRC spokesman Captain Ebou Jallow in accounts under
the name of Yahya Jammeh. The president hasn't sued Darboe to court yet.
Worse still for the president, Darboe later discovered the secret oil deal
Jammeh struck with the late Nigerian dictator Sani Abacha. With outpourings
of criticisms of Jammeh's corruption, the UDP has forced the president on
the defensive. His response to the crude oil scandal has been at best
misleading; at worst, dubious. Next week, the National Assembly will debate
a UDP-sponsored proposal to mount an investigation into Jammeh's crude oil
deal.
Which is nightmarish for Jammeh. But the Lawyer and his party remain
doggedly stubborn. They ought to be. They must continue their outpouring of
outrage each time Jammeh unleashes his excesses on the people. They must
also continue using whatever available legal means to fight their political
case. In the past the UDP sued the government on a number of issues. The
pursuit of legality should be continued while Jammeh self-destruct himself
with his despicable despotism.
In the end sanity will prevail.
Cherno Baba Jallow
Detroit, Michigan
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