Jaajef Yusupha,
Reading your posting I must agree with what Hassan says
his posting, in that:
"There is a very serious problem emerging from Gambia that
could lead to something very dangerous and violent if wer do
not put a stop to.This is the overwhelming growth of
violence... we should be doing is trying to figureout how to
bring stability, development and progress to our tiny nation.
There are too much killings,injustice treatment,hatred and
abuse of power in Gambia and now or later the people of this
tiny nation will be tired of these unjust treatments and may
ALLAH porbids they might turn to violence and everything will
be very ugly. I plead to all Gambians to find apositive way to
bring this beloved country to normalsy"
We all have a responsibility for this. What I find of concern in
your posting is some statements which appear could be
interpreted as incitement to acts of violence; i.e. when you
say: "We cannot simply "accept" the "grave situation" that is
beginning to unfold without a fight." or again when you say:
"... we cannot negotiate with an "illegal" government because
their ties with the military make these two separate entities
interchangeable".
What then is the solution or the way forward? Who will "fight"
and what form will that "fight" take? Who will enforce the
ultimatum you suggest to Jammeh? ("Yahyah Jammeh
leaving the country immediately ... and the military returning
to the barracks").
There was a recent screening here in London of a
documentary on Sierra Leone showing graphically the
sensless brutality and destructiveness of the civil war. Under
such conditions nothing good flourishes. How are we to
escape "the quagmire thatcountries like Sierra Leone and
Liberia are unable to escape"? What practical means are
the way forward?
In your later posting , in response to Sajaw, you disagree
that Gambia does not have the resources to recover from a
bloodbath.The examples you give are in terms of physical
destruction in the wake of the 1981 coup attempt. What I
would ask is in relation to the Gambia's greatest resource,
the human resource. You can re-stock a looted CFAO, or
re-build destroyed buildings, but what is the human cost of
war? The Sierra Leone documentary had interviews with
young children of 10 years old who had killed countless
innocent people and had cut of the limbs of others...how
many years will it take such children and their victims to
"recover from a bloodbath"?
Please be clear, I am not accusing you of wishing a
bloodbath (may Allah protect us from such a thing) but rather
pleading for careful consideration and restraint with language
which could so easily be misinterpreted in such a critical
moment.
Yeendul ak jaama
Tony
>>> Yusupha Jow <[log in to unmask]> 15/January/2000
04:19pm >>>
Mr. Saidy and members of the Gambia-L, I honestly have to
say that the
situation in The Gambia is too unstable for anyone to be
comfortable.
Massive allegations of corruption that the government is
unable to refute,
human rights abuses, harassment of the press, covering up
of information and
now this? At this rate, we are headed straight for the
quagmire that
countries like Sierra Leone and Liberia are unable to escape.
There has been talk of reconciliation as well as an open
dialogue with the
government. But I fail to see how we can negotiate with a
government whose
leader has no education, vision or respect for his people, and
who, by virtue
of his ties with teh military, has started a chain of events that
even he,
the supposed great savior, will be unable to control. We
cannot simply
"accept" the "grave situation" that is beginning to unfold
without a fight.
Furthermore, we cannot negotiate with an "illegal"
government because their
ties with the military make these two separate entities
interchangeable. The
military uses their close ties with the government as a
justification to
harass the people of the country, while the government uses
the military to
defend their ill gotten gains by subduing the average
Gambian. What we have
here is what I would call a symbiotic but parasitic
relationship between the
military and the government. One of these two
entities/organizations is
going to suffer at the expense of the other. As evidenced by
the recent
mutiny of army officers in Farafenni and Yundum, and the
attempted heist of
the money in our central armory, the military is beginning to
show signs that
their tolerance for the government is waning quickly. It is my
opinion, that
the military will emerge unscathed from this twisted
relationship, since this
has always been the case in Africa. A military takeover
usually results in
years of other coups and counter coups. And the future of
The Gambia will be
no different from all the other ill fated African countries that
have been
destroyed by years of military involvement in government.
For this reason, I honestly believe that it is too late to
negotiate with the
government. The only agenda on the table should be an
ultimatum; Yahyah
Jammeh leaving the country immediately (he has done too
much damage too our
country) and the military returning to the barracks. Once
these two goals
are achieved, we can move forward with the next step of
reconciling our
fractionated population that has been so abused and misled
over the past 6
years.
Yus
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