the infighting amongst groups or individuals who claim to be working for meaningful change in The Gambia is disheartening, to say the least. Rather than focus on forging a cross-cutting alliance of opposition elements, the rule has been to engage in meaningless and incessant fingerpointing and namecalling.

Unless we change some of our attitudes, we might as well get resigned to the concept that Jammeh's exit will be facilitated only by the bullet. Instead of crucifying Halifa Sallah, why don't we see the good he and Sidia Jatta have done for the country and encourage them to build on that on our way to creating a coalition? Why should we insist on attaching a tribalist label to UDP when all evidence points to the contrary? Afterall, the party and its leader have gone out of their way in many instances to highlight the all-inclusive and democratic nature of the party. Should we be wasting valuable time and space rewriting history to embellish the do-nothing Jawara era? Jammeh has his work cut out for him.

I strongly believe that only a union of the various opposition parties could defeat the APRC at the polls. However, unity cannot be imposed and it's not enough to be united solely by the desire to get rid of Jammeh. While we are forging alliances, we must also carve out the shape of the post-Jammeh political dispensation. With what we are going through, it would be tragic to defeat Jammeh only to replace him with another repressive dictator. We must be vigilant, and at the same time tolerant of those who do not share our views or are hesitant to join our bandwagon. That's the nature of democracy.

My recipe for ending the Jammeh dictatorship and replacing it with a democratic regime is this: focus on what the opposition groups share; encourage unity, but be tolerant of those who want to fight solo; formulate a vision for the post-Jammeh regime; ensure that the political playing field is as level as possible--access to media, voter registration, role of security forces, etc; desist from the idea of re-inventing or re-establishing the Jawara regime.