Opposition Renew Anti-Jammeh Pledge

http://allafrica.com/stories/200308120506.html

The Independent (Banjul)
NEWS
August 11, 2003
Posted to the web August 12, 2003
Banjul

Returning fresh from the Meet the Diaspora Summit in the American state of
Atlanta last month, Omar Jallow has claimed that Gambia's array of leading
opposition organisations have renewed in superlative terms their
irrevocable pledge to "stay true to the idea" of a coalition aimed at
unseating Yahya Jammeh's "far from impressive" regime.

OJ told The Independent last wee k that "except the APRC all the leading
parties had sent representatives who have all committed themselves to the
process leading to the demise of the current political leadership of the
country and would study the merits and demerits of an opposition coalition
that could emerge from their effort".

"We had recommended that the diasporans themselves should establish working
groups to produce documents about the negative and positive sides of any
coalition and work out an effective strategy for a successful coalition,"
he pointed out. OJ said the different parties ranging from the PPP and NRP
to the UDP and PDOIS are unified by a common purpose to salvage the country
from several years of reckless misrule by the APRC regime, which he said
Gambians could no longer trust in view of their deteriorating economic
condition and the attendant hardship plaguing their lives.

According to OJ, the timing for the coalition's launching and how its
leader was going to be selected are now the prime preoccupations of
proponents of the coalition who are convinced that a strong, united and
dynamic alternative to the APRC could achieve sweeping political successes
in any free and fair election in The Gambia provided that the process
leading to these elections improves remarkably from the "flaw-ridden" run-
up to the 1996 and 2001 elections. Mr. Jallow believes that it requires "in-
depth thinking to work out a successful strategy" that could dislodge the
APRC from power and claimed that it had been pertinently observed by
delegates to the summit that those in the diaspora should bring pressure to
bear on the current regime and the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC)
in order to influence a change in the political playing field that they
believe should be leveled to give any ensuing election result the tag of
being genuinely free and fair.

Halifa Sallah would be the coordinator from within The Gambia in a complex
of political intrigues that the different opposition parties hope would
lead to the ultimate defeat of the APRC regime in the 2006 elections
according to OJ.

OJ explained that with the business of the summit over, he had met the
Atlanta chapter of the PPP and the Carter Centre with which he discussed
the question of elections in the Gambia and the competence of the IEC,
making pointing reference to the supposed flaws in the run-up to the 1996
and 2001 polls. He said he had managed to elicit a positive response from
the Centre over his party's request to use their influence in The Gambia
that could lead to an authentic Master list of voters for future elections
and avoid the kind of controversy that had attended to the last elections,
which led to the opposition crying foul. He also said that the Centre had
also accepted to help in ensuring that all vote counting are done in
pooling stations and that Gambians in the diaspora should be enfranchised
since they constitute a large political constituent of their own outside
the country and are pertinent to The Gambia's political and economic
situation. "They are very much interested in issues relating to The Gambia.

Their excuse was that the only time those issues were revisited was just
two months before the last elections by which time it was too little too
late to influence any decision-making over the process leading to the
elections" OJ observed, adding that the Carter Centre had promised to look
into future anomalies. He also revealed his meetings with the American
State Department, the International Republican Institute and the National
Endowment for Democracy in Baltimore, all of whom promised to look into the
political temperature in The Gambia.



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