As Controversy Shadows Coalition Talks Assan Musa in Self-Defence The Independent (Banjul) August 20, 2001 Posted to the web August 20, 2001 Banjul, the Gambia Assan Musa Camara the founder of the erstwhile Gambia Peoples' Party (GPP) has defended his decision to endorse a UDP-led coalition with Ousainou Darboe as its presidential candidate. Mr. Camara told The Independent in a telephone interview Friday that the United Democratic Party (UDP) has been the only opposition organisation to have polled more than 100, 000 votes in any Gambian election. He said going by the country's political history opposition parties of the past have never gained enough broad-based votes to surpass or rival the UDP's performance in the last presidential and National Assembly elections. Mr. Camara who admitted that it would be impossible for his party to be rehabilitated after seven years of inactivity believes that it was more appropriate to endorse a Darboe-led opposition coalition by virtue of the UDP's broad-based appeal. However, Mr. Camara a former vice president under the PPP administration emphasised that his endorsement should not be misconstrued as ruling out anyone else from exercising their rights to seek elective office not least Sheriff Dibba a public figure who he said has the right to his opinion on issues of national significance. Mr. Camara explained that after the disagreement during the inter-party meeting at the YMCA, he had entreated Mr. Dibba to stay, "but he insisted on leaving". He was also at pains to emphasize that Sheriff Dibba's pullout from the meeting should not be interpreted as a pullout from the coalition. "Mr. Dibba never pulled out from the coalition. He had agreed to the principle of a coalition all the way and that is indicative of his position," Mr. Camara said. In response to the "enemies" of the coalition, Mr. Camara said it was unfounded to suggest that the coalition has failed. Asked whether the coalition controversy caused by the leadership crisis would not create a setback for their chances, Mr. Camara remarked, "there was no controversy and there was no failure. That never happened." Meanwhile Omar Jallow alias OJ has maintained that "Dibba said categorically that he was going ahead to contest for the presidency if he was not allowed to lead the coalition." OJ also confirmed that Mr. Camara had tried to convince him (Dibba) unsuccessfully to partake in the meeting. OJ also sought to clarify that the original advocates of the coalition had invited the National Reconciliation Party and PDOIS to every meeting aimed at determining the modalities for a coalition. He said Mr. Camara had gone to the headquarters of the PDOIS and the NRP with letters formally inviting them to the meeting at the YMCA. According to him during the meeting a PDOIS member had called to say that they had not received any formal invitation for the meeting. "Time is of the essence. For us to be procrastinating is unacceptable at this point," he said. On ex-President Jawara's return OJ said "we have not fixed a date, the security situation has to be put in place." He said if the APRC are confident that Jawara has been discredited "why should they still fear him?" In response to unconfirmed reports that the former Gambian leader is consulting sub-regional leaders for his possible return, OJ said he was not aware of that. On the coalition, OJ said "we are very confident that the coalition would do some serious electoral damage to the APRC and end the reign of terror and the downward trend of the economy." Meanwhile, in an interview with Citizen FM on Friday, the Majority Leader in the National Assembly and a senior member of the APRC Tamsir Jallow had expressed the hope that his party was going to win both the presidential and National Assembly elections because the opposition was in disarray caused by a leadership crisis. He said it has proven almost impossible for the opposition parties to come together under one umbrella, which he said did not come as a surprise to him. He maintained that he could not have envisaged the opposition parties sharing the same platform, and speaking the same language. "They have different ideologies and programmes as far as governance is concerned, and I cannot see them reconciling those differences," he remarked. Responding to a question whether the APRC would accept defeat at the polls, Mr. Jallow said the APRC would not lose. He however denied that the opposition parties were denied equal access to the public media. He said equal access to the public media already exists because according to him the opposition is favoured by newspapers in the country. However, he said as incumbents, the APRC have an advantage, which he said is the case all over the world. He said the APRC was however not making excessive use of that advantage, but instead he said most of what was being reported in the public media were government activities rather than APRC activities. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html You may also send subscription requests to [log in to unmask] if you have problems accessing the web interface and remember to write your full name and e-mail address. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------