Juwara Goes Blisters Again! Says Jammeh Encouraging Religious Intolerance

The Independent (Banjul)
NEWS
August 4, 2003
Posted to the web August 4, 2003

By Alieu Darboe
Banjul

In a blistering reaction to President Jammeh's statement disallowing the
veil in schools, the National Democratic Action Movement's leading light
Lamin Waa Juwara has asserted that The Gambia has caught on with the "virus
and contradictions that have torn countries like Rwanda, Burundi, Sierra
Leone, Congo and Liberia apart".

In an exclusive interview with The Independent, the former Niamina Dankunku
parliamentarian charged that President Jammeh has no vision to resolve the
controversy revolving around the veil but has merely created fresh
religious contradictions that may just fan the flames of religious bigotry.

Juwara accused President Jammeh of introducing tribalism and nepotism in
the Gambian body politic and asked the Gambian people to close ranks and
save their country from falling apart, since theirs had always been
tolerance and peaceful co-existence.

"Jammeh can blame none but himself for the spate of religious
fundamentalism that he has been using hypocritically for his own political
ends" he charged.

Juwara explained that since time immemorial Gambian Christians and Muslims
have co-existed without incident of bad blood aggravating into a national
crisis. He claimed that the pre and postcolonial experience had never
brought an occasion when the political leaders had used religion as a
political weapon for their own selfish ends. He said all that were to
change when Jammeh assumed power and appointed people on the basis of their
loyalty to him. Juwara also charged that Jammeh's appointees to the Supreme
Islamic Council instead of propagating Islam used the religion to propagate
Jammeh.

"Jammeh built a mosque at State House for a political purpose. He and his
so-called religious leaders toyed with the idea of introducing Sharia in
the Gambia a country observing secular law. They also attacked the
Ahmadiyya Jamaat in The Gambia, a situation, which is very regrettable.

Jammeh has been fighting against the peaceful, religious co-existence of
the Gambia. The evil issue was a directive from his office and it has
created a lot of bad blood between the two major religious groups in the
Gambia and instead of him admitting and taking full responsibility for the
dispute, he gave a flimsy excuse and tried to apportion blame on so-called
fundamentalists who as everybody know was working under his direction" he
postulated.

"I am calling on the Gambian Muslims and Christians to tolerate each other,
and disown and discredit Jammeh's divisive politics, which if it unchecked
may destroy the Gambia. The only person that is using religion divisively
is Yahya Jammeh. He has created that very problem in Banjul, which led to
the defeat of his party by an independent candidate" he claimed

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To Search in the Gambia-L archives, go to: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/CGI/wa.exe?S1=gambia-l
To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to:
[log in to unmask]

To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface
at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~