Ten Reasons Why You Shouldn't Vote APRC



I. Since July 1994 to this day, the Gambian peoples - save the exception of a 
few selected crooks - have continued to be at the brunt of an economic 
meltdown the AFPRC and its mutation, the APRC, has helped wrought on the 
Gambia and the Gambian peoples. As a result, Gambians are getting poorer and 
poorer whilst the criminal syndicate that "runs" the country continue to 
illegally amass wealth at the expense of the Gambian poor, especially the 
poor farmers of the provinces.

II. The APRC's presidential candidate is not only an oaf but also an 
unlettered moron. The low-life is intellectually defunct and can never be 
expected to make wise decisions vis-à-vis carrying out the daily intellectual 
rigour required of a statesman; especially, such decision making require one 
to be optimally lettered to be able to decipher the basic meaning of complex 
documents and agendas.

III. The Human Rights record of the APRC regime is the stuff of legend. The 
regime has and continues to seize the basic and inviolable civil liberties of 
ordinary Gambians. The regime perversely believes that it giveth and taketh; 
so that inviolable Human Rights like the right to belong to a political of 
one's choice is up for grabs by the State.

IV. Because of this perverse understanding of basic and inviolable civil 
liberties, the APRC regime has from a year ago illegally and 
unconstitutionally incarcerated numerous Gambians like Dumo Sarho on 
spurrious charges that to this very day it cannot convince reasonable 
Gambians of the validity of such charges. Instead, based on the evidence of 
the paranoid fruitcakes of the NIA and the regime's own paranoia, Gambians 
like Dumo continues to languish behind bars.

V. The brutal and continued harassment of journalists and private media 
practitioners like Mr George Christensen - who was nearly torched alive when 
APRC sponsored arsonists attacked his radio station wilfully attempting to 
destroy it and with it, everything that man has worked to help his society 
through the medium of his radio station - continues unabated. Added to this 
bleak vignette of brutal repression of journalists, is how the regime - in 
blatant disregard of international norms - deported a Sierra Leonean 
journalist back to his home land where he had earlier fled from the 
persecution of Valentine Strasser's crackpot AFRC.

VI. Since July 1994 to this day, the AFPRC and it's mutation, the APRC, has 
carried out numerous extra-judicial killings of innocent Gambians like Koro 
Ceesay, Corporal Dumbuya, Basirou Barrow, Dot Faal, etc., etc. Extra-judicial 
killings that to this day have left numerous Gambians widows, fatherless, the 
loss of loved ones and friends. Extra-judicial killings that, needless to 
say, will never be investigated by this regime.

VII. These extra-judicial killings reached a heinous and nauseating peak in 
April 2000 when some 15 students, a Red Cross volunteer and a child as young 
as three were brutally murdered by security forces on the orders of the APRC 
regime. To this very day, none has been indicted, rebuked or disciplined for 
these heinous crimes against the Gambian peoples. Some of those who were at 
the brunt of the brutalities of the security forces continue to languish in 
dilapidated hospital wards without adequate medical care. Their trauma has 
become that of their families and friends as they brave it silently and alone 
with these young souls tragic and silent trauma.

VIII.  The APRC's presidential candidate is an internationally proscribed 
criminal - well, technically speaking. Since one of his criminal partners has 
been proscribed by a special UN investigation body on the illicit and blood 
diamond trade that sustains the animalistic insurgency of Foday Sankoh and 
the RUF of Sierra Leone, the APRC regime has gone into a denial and rebuttal 
overdrive. What was a proscription meant for a lone criminal, the regime took 
as an international conspiracy against the Gambia government. I submit that 
the reason why the regime reacted in such an imbecilic and frenetic fashion 
has got to with the fact their presidential candidate is in cahoots with the 
proscribed individual and he enjoys the complete confidence of the APRC 
gov't. And so it stands to reason that the APRC's presidential candidate is - 
technically speaking - an internationally proscribed criminal.

IX. Since the AFPRC came to power illegally in 1994, the Gambia's 
international standing continues to plummet as the nation-state, once noted 
for her respectable, realist and pacifist foreign policy, is now an 
international pariah. The regime continues to embrace and abet with 
insurgency movements like the MFDC of Southern Senegal, pariah states and 
known supporters of guerrilla movements that continue to tear the social 
fabric of African societies, like Gadaffi of Libya. The APRC regimes 
continues with this deplorable and misguided foreign policy and as a result, 
the Gambia's neighbours - notably neighbouring Senegal - continue to view her 
with suspicion and heightening both diplomatic froideur and tension in that 
sub-region.

X. The AFPRC and its mutation, the APRC, has never been a believer of liberal 
democracy. Since its illegal usurpation of power from the democratically 
elected government of Dawda Jawara, it has bastardised all the basic tenets 
of multi-party and liberal democracy. Even its own toilet paper constitution 
- which it tailored to suit its illegal ambitions - has not been spared this 
bastardisation: from the rolling back of the frontiers of an independent and 
impartial judiciary to complete disregard for good governance, the regime has 
and continues to despoil all the basic tenets of democracy it continues to 
parrot but will never believe in.

Clearly, and going by the AFPRC/APRC record in office, a vote for the APRC in 
October is a vote for more tyranny, misery and the death of Gambian decency. 
Above all, a vote for the APRC in October, is a vote against both the Gambian 
and Sengambian families. If you believe in a Gambia of liberal decency, 
tolerance, progress and the Rule Of Law, clearly the APRC is not the party 
for you to vote for in October. There is a genuine and credible alternative 
to all that the AFPRC and its mutation, the APRC, has done and stands for 
since it illegally usurped power from a democratically elected government in 
1994. There is an Opposition Alliance that is a credible and genuine 
alternative to the APRC. You are most definitely better off voting for this 
Opposition Alliance than, say, the APRC, its closet appendages and allies - 
come October 18th 2001.

Hamjatta Kanteh


 

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