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Subject:
From:
Dampha Kebba <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
The Gambia and related-issues mailing list <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Wed, 15 Aug 2001 14:55:26 -0400
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You hear from many a sycophantic AFPRC/APRC supporter that Yaya has helped
‘develop’ the country. The man does not hold Gambians in contempt. He has
good intentions for the country. But these are just empty words that do NOT
address the crux of the matter. The Opposition Alliance should explain to
Gambians how these development projects come about.

We should first of all tell the citizens that over 90% of our development
budget comes from grants and loans from so-called Developed Countries. The
money does NOT come from Yaya’s pocket or ‘Allah’s Bank’. To support this
point, let us wave Famara Jatta’s budget to the people. That budget clearly
spells out where the money for our development budget comes from. If it is
not coming from the EU, it coming from AfDB or the World Bank or IMF or the
Kuwaiti Fund or the Islamic Development Bank or other bilateral donors or
lenders. There is no magic about the source of these loans and grants for
the development projects.

Once the money is in, the rest is relatively easy. Some of this is ‘tied’
aid or loan. The countries and lending institutions that give out these
grants and loans, ensure that the money is utilized in the manner the
government claimed in its proposals. In other words, when AfDB gives us
money to build a hospital, they ensure that one is built. When the EU gives
us money to build classrooms, they ensure that one is built. At this
implementation phase, the mental midgets running the country have very
little input in this. Three-year-olds with a mediocre civil service can
oversee these projects. We do NOT need child murderers to oversee such
projects. At the implementation stage, Yaya can only steal from us, but he
can add nothing. This is the stage where he will grant a contract to CSE to
build roads and ask them to build him a villa in Kanilai as a quid pro quo.

The critical phase in these development plans is when we develop a plan to
attract loans and grants. Obviously, we know that High School drop-outs like
the ones leading our country do NOT have the wherewithal to develop these
plans. These plans need people with vision. Critical minds like Darboe’s is
what we need. We do NOT need people that CANNOT even construct coherent
English sentences. But had the mental midgets stopped at being dumb, at
least one can say that competent civil servants can pick up the slack. But
no! The Dictatorship went with a machete to dismember the civil service.
Dismissed good people willy-nilly. The rest are so scared they cannot think
straight. They defer to High School drop-outs on issues the morons know
nothing about. In short, we have the inmates running the asylum. Empty
barrels telling professional economists what to do.

But the Dictatorship does NOT stop there either. The vermin go around
alienating our ‘development partners’. To this day, the most powerful
country in the whole world is imposing sanctions on our country. Why? The
vermin stole power from a democratically elected government and went on to
steal the 1996 elections. But the alienation and the sanctions do not stop
there either. You have some silly low-life, a nobody in 1994, going around
accusing respectable countries of picking on Gambia. You have a Foreign
Ministry that goes around defending internationally proscribed criminals.

Whichever way you slice, the vermin are NOT good for us. If Yaya had good
intentions for the country, he will NOT steal tens of millions of dollars
from the country to go open a Swiss Bank Account. We need to get rid of
these vermin so that the sanctions imposed on our country would be lifted.
We need to get rid of these vermin and bring sanity to the civil service. We
need a leader with a vision who can map out a comprehensive development plan
that will NOT have the net effect of rendering our people poorer. That is
what the vermin are doing to us. Under their watch, Gambians have grown
poorer. This whole development thing is a mirage to bamboozle gullible
Gambians. We need to convey to the people that whatever Yaya did in terms of
development (thanks to the generosity of our development partners), Ousainou
Darboe can do MUCH BETTER than that.
KB


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