What is Gambia as a country for? Why do people seek power? These questions
invoke the idea of a vision, a plan for action. What does Gambia mean to
its people, poor or rich, powerful or powerless alike? Do we have a common
sense of belonging and responsibility?

Almost always, you can understand the contempt of those who feel and
probably rightly so, that many Gambians in high office see their country
and government in terms of a natural farmland with the common misconception
of "ku neka chi geta gi naan chi mew mi" meaning "those who control the
herd shall drink the milk." To them, dreams of power or control do not
essentially go further than having a spot at the dining table and
benefiting from the 'gratitude of public functions.' Their efforts, or lack
there of, in the name of national development seems more like a
battle of the bellies where the eaters are always questioned but no one
questions the act of eating. The givers and takers are questioned, but not
the benevolence or the patronage.

For those fighting for and seeking divine intervention to get to high
positions, Gambia is more like a farmland tended by Allah and harvested by
a few lucky folks. It should strike us odd that the president, sectaries of
state, permanent secretaries or directors fly their pregnant wives to
America to have their babies in order to gain American citizenship or to
feel the so called prestige or illusive superiority. Does such a person
feel that Gambia is a country with a bright future? Do they feel for the
Gambia? Do they have a vision for the country?

If the president, who is supposed to be the glittering example of
patriotism, prefers foreign citizenship for his baby, should it surprise
anyone that that same president sees Gambia as a farm that needs clearing
out when it is time to harvest? None of these people give any Gambian a
reason to think of true patriotism, not loyalty to Jammeh, as a virtue.

What benefits will it yield to fight a real war over such depleted
illusions, worthless illusions sucked dry by the lavish greed of those in
control? Those who embezzle and stash the loot in banks abroad, lest their
investments at home will provide jobs for the unfortunate, those for whom
misery has become a faithful companion.

How can we Gambians think of getting together pretending to one another and
to the rest of the world that we mean business for the Gambia? The foremost
ambition seems to be to plunder the limited resources and squander as much
as possible, everyone at their own level. Thanks to such appetite, the
government machinery has become so infested with the cancer of corruption
that the virtues of honesty, diligence and accountability are chuckled at.

The culture of corruption has permeated the basic social fabric. This is a
harsh reality in today's Gambia. Most of those who can are doing it at
their own level, from the top to bottom, the only difference being that
those at the helm have more to grab, they are looting and making off with a
lot more. Obviously, they all have an interest in maintaining the status
quo: from the "gelegele" driver and the police officer at the check-point,
to the customs inspector and the businessman at the port, the civil servant
chasing files from office to office, right up to the desk of the president.
Because each of them has become so attached to the system and thus a vested
interest in it, it has become very difficult for them to contemplate the
undoing of the system without contemplating their own demise.

The addictive lack of vision as a nation takes away any feeling of
patriotism with which the idea of a nation should normally be inspired with
a shared vision. The tendency is for Gambians to devalue each other as they
glorify themselves, everyone believing that they are the best things to
have happened to the country while working so hard to destroy their
compatriots. Such selfish tendencies hardly allow for the time to think of
Gambia in real terms as a collective treasure to be valued and protected by
all. A constitution or a social contract of some sort is definitely
essential for promoting social stability and for protecting individual
rights and freedoms, but a good constitution is hardly enough to put things
the way they are supposed to be.

A chronic lack of vision as a people is more of a problem than the lack of
a good constitution. For consistent attitudes of disregard of public good
remains a dreadful neutralizing force for any chance of a common sense of
purpose and direction. What I believe is that we can have the best blue-
print such as the Vision 2020 document, but when there is blatant
disregard, with impunity, of the laws then the constitution and all visions
become worthless.

Our biggest problem is not the lack of laws, nor a problem of good laws.
The truth is, the Gambian social fabric is yet to be permeated with a sense
of mission and purpose for the Gambia as a nation. There is little public
control of power in Gambia due to the lack of public participation. The
masses are passive spectators in decision-making at any level, perhaps
because we have always relied on politicians and technocrats rather than on
our ability to organize ourselves into social forces with a contribution to
make. Political and social affairs are not organized and conducted in a way
that should allow effective access to decision-making for all. Yet, only by
returning power to the people in this way, could Gambians hope to
stop 'living within a lie', and start 'living within the truth.'

In this write up, I have attempted to convey my opinion of Gambia as a
country that is controlled by selfish, greedy individuals who see the
nation as a farmland to be harvested when the time comes. It is obvious
that the APRC, instead of capitalizing upon what Gambians have in common,
has opted for the 'devilish or satanically manipulative' approach that is
in line with the Machiavellians, which Maya Angelou paraphrases
thus: 'divide the masses that you may conquer them; separate them and you
can rule them.’

By attaching the seemingly elite to the illusion that having a place at the
dining table is just a matter of time for them, Jammeh has succeeded in
dividing Gambians into haves, have-nots and the hopefuls.

At no time could the gap between the poor and the rich be so expanded in
the history of the country as it is today. How long these conditions are
likely to continue is hard to say. But as the 'national cake' diminishes
with the worsening economic crisis, corruption, mass misery and nepotism,
it becomes more delusive for the bulk of Jammeh toadies to claim the same
or any benefits from their connections with the 'big dogs' in power. We
have a lot of work to do folks.
_________________
-BambaLaye
==============================================
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
-Martin Luther King Jr.

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