"Bailo, Bailo, understand that you are not dealing with childrens
here." (Suntou)
Suntou, sometimes you tend to behave like an unruly kid hence I caannot help but make parternal-like interventions from time to time.
" I am sure every regular reader of the Gambia L knows your
position so far as Gambian politics is concern." (Suntou)
That's good! I suppose it is the case with yourself as well. Every keen follower of political conversations or shouting matches on this forum also knows about your stance on Gambian politics especially your insatiable spite of our courageous freedom fighter, Halifa Sallah.
"Hence you are not a
neutral person to discern valuable advice on the premise that people
will fall for the deception." (Suntou)
Indeed, you are correct in stating that am not a neutral person. I have never pretended to be neutral. The problem with your kind of partisanship is your conviction that your political opponent could never be right. You exhibit the false notion that since Ousainou is your preferred choice, Halifa must always be potrayed to be wrong. On the contrary, I believe that notwithstanding that Halifa is my first choice of a candidate, I could also alternatively support Ousainou if the need arises. I have been a fan of PDOIS since 1987 and make no apologies for it whatsoever. I guess by then you might have been a supporter of the RUF. Let me make it clear to you that I sincerely believe Ousainou is a good and genuine person and he could become a very good leader for our country were he to be elected as President. I also firmy believe that were Halifa also to be elected as
our President, he would become an excellent and examplaryAfrican leader. I have similar opinions on Sam Sarr, Seedia Jatta, Dr Isatou Touray, OJ and others.
"You see, I left Modou Nyang, aka little Halifa to prance on and on
and expose himself more on each scribble and he never failed me." (Suntou)
I personally don't know much about Modou Nyang but I salute him for sharing his perspective and I urge him not to be deterred by anyone. I would however still urge him not to reciprocate hatred with hatred. If you dub Modou 'little Halifa' then that is a big compliment to Modou. And Who are you? The big bolong? Eh?
"We have got words from serious Gambians doing their best to patch
together any semblance of hope to let Halifa be, yet Modou Nyang
continued bragging and polluting the mail boxes with toxic propaganda
materials from his boss unending proofing the position of sound minded
Gambians that, Halifa never wish to be part of any coalition he will
not be a leader of." (Suntou)
The highlighted is just to once again expose your deliberate and habitual falsfication of Halifa's position. Halifa is advocating for a 'neutral' candidate to lead a possible coalition of opposition parties. Remember that you also wear a political cap as Coordinator of UDP-UK, so any falsehood that you peddle would reflect unfavourably on the UDP. Ousainou would not approve of such. Please stop ascribing your preconceived prejudices to Halifa.
"Bailo, you attempted to pretend to us that, you are advising
partisan, which includes yourself to stop and allow for talks to
continue, yet your false intention couldn't stand the test of 24hours." (Suntou)
I did not and never shall advise for partisanship to stop. As a pragmatist, I know that such would not only be insincere on my part but also futile. I am a partisan. How dare I advise others not to be? Since you failed to understand my consistent views on this matter, I will attempt doing so again in very simple termss: I am once again urging all the opposition to work together towards attaining some sort of an alliance for the next elections based on a solid foundation of commitment to indisputable democratic principles. Also, towards attaining such a noble objective, I am advising for all genuine opposition supporters not to engage in counterproductive and fruitless exchanges such as smear campaigns against one another or leaders of the opposition. Take it or leave it, it is as simple as that but If
you have any problem with my position, I am ever willing to further discuss it up with you.
"You went on to advise Modou about Halifa's haters. Now Bailo, i
respect your understanding of politics but i cannot understand why you
will make such claims.
Let us take Obama and Hilary as an example, did Obama cried foul
that Hilary hated him for wanting to be the president of America? Can
we also say that Halifa hates Hamat, Ousainou and Yahya simply because
they are in different parties? In as much you want to create
sympathy for Halifa, certain statements are unnecessary. Politics is
not fadinya (sibling rivalry) hence the out of place comments about
hate and jealosy is just lazy arguments." (Suntou)
Suntou, everybody have their respective strengths and weaknesses. In HR perfomance management terms, it is even suggested that regard every identified weakness should be perceived as a 'development opportunity'. It is therefore only a poor performer and someone who is not good results-oriented that would not concede his/her shortcomings and take approprite measures towards redressing them. Unfortunately there is a constant attempt by you in particular to interprete or potray every word or action of Halifa in negative or cynical terms, even his universally acknowledge good and courageous actions for example his investigation and reporting of the witch-hunting crimes against Gambians. One of your friends who purportedly has a legal mind even argues that for visiting villages only after crimes have already been committed there, Halifa had demonstrate lack of courage
or 'cowardice' in other words. How could Halifa go and investigate and report about a crime in Sanimenteteng for instance even before a crime has been committed there? How?
"Be yourself Bailo, it is not a problem to us that you support and
sympathise with Halifa, but don't try to be cleaver by pretending, it
only make you lose our respect. (Suntou)
I am wholly myself, ever had been and ever will be. Amen! Are you so called Suntou, yourself? Are you really yourself? I sincerely believe that you could be better than what you potray yourself to be.
"If you have taken a position to advise, then stick to your guns no
matter what. But you cannot advise us partisans in one posting and then
attack them in subsequent ones because you want to lend a hand to the
hardworking Modou Nyang.
Modou is working too hard to sell Halifa, unfortunately no new
person is coming forward to buy him, hence Modou repeating himself over
and over." (Suntou)
In politics, It is absolutely normal and to be welcomed for people to attempt to sell the political agenda that they ebelieve in. What I detest are smear campaigns whether such be towards Obama or Hilary; Halifa or Ousainou. I believe that as Obama and Hilary could put aside their past differences and work together for the interest of USA, so could leaders of the Gambian pposition. However I shall nevr share your belief that only Ousainou is working for the general interest and Halifa is only working for his own personal interest.
I don't know whether you realised that you are still going round in circles. If a united opposition stance against the dictatorship depended on you, then the dictator is at greatly at ease. Please tell me you have near zero influence in this regard.
While you are still going round and round, the incumbent is busy misusing our public funds buying the loyalty of unsuspecting Gambian voters. Please let us instead give emphasis to alerting our friends and relatives that all these donations by the dictator is merely to buy to entrench his tyranny over Gambians. Abdoukarim, you and Banka need to work on Brufut.
I could already hear some political pundit telling us that since any future Government in the Gambia is likely to resort to such tactics albeit on a lower scale, then it is no big deal. It is indeed a big deal.
All said and done, it remains the right of every qualified Gambian who wishes to contest for political office to do so. Therefore no person should be maligned into supporting another's candidate. That's coercion! It is both uncivilised and unacceptable. I expect the leadership of the UDP or NADD alliances not to resort to or fall for this.
Halifa is not the barrier to the realisation of Ousainou's presidential ambitions, nor is Ousainou the obstacle to the fulfilment of Halifa's Agenda 2011. Let us therefore stop feigning that such is the case.
Finally, I urge you all to leave my niece, Kumba Gaye out of this discussion; she is just 12 and have no interest, whatsoever in politics. Let the writer try another pen-name.
Who does this Modou Nyang thinks he is; asking you to call "Darboe and ask him whether they have reached the decision that the only alliance he Darboe and the UDP would be a part of is one which endorses his candidature for the 2011 Presidential elections".
Maaaaaaaaaan!!! Tell this Ndokey Nyang not to play with us! Who does he thinks
we are; his errand boys!!
As for his claim that he wants "to be fair to the UDP leadership. I know they are matured people and know what is at stake. We are dealing with the future of the Gambia and I do not want to judge the UDP by the words of its sycophants".
He seems too late for to reckon that fact, as he had already been unfair to the UDP
leadership and judged the UDP leadership in his reaction to the UDP UK's rejoinder. Less that reaction had not been written by Nyang but by his Halifa Sallah; to make
him not to realise his errors.
One other point for Mr Nyang, is that we wait for his article about why UDP's strategy will fail, which he promised to publish on Freedomnewspaper. I'm sure his knows it will
no go unchallenged.
Suntou, one more thing before I come Daffeh’s way. This just came to me while scribbling in response to Sonny. Because you are the coordinator, I saw your photo with Darboe during his visit to the UK, you look good bro, however that still does not make put you in major decision making position in the party especially with regards to opposition unity.
And when I wrote to Uncle Haruna the following: "If you want to be Darboe’s Press Secretary could you give us the UDP position on the way forward instead of pouring venom on Halifa for being bold enough to come up with concrete proposals?", Yanks tried to take ownership of it. But I am not interested in his ranting but only for the part he quoted Daffeh as thus: "Halifa Sallah and his PDOIS Party should put their personal pride, egos and idealism aside and immediately embrace a UDP led alliance without any obnoxious precondition whatsoever". This is where I want to tackle Daffeh.
But before that I need your help first. I want to be fair to the UDP leadership. I know they are matured people and know what is at stake. We are dealing with the future of the Gambia and I do not want to judge the UDP by the words of its sycophants. Before I write I would want you to call Darboe and ask him whether they have reached the decision that the only alliance he Darboe and the UDP would be a part of is one which endorses his candidature for the 2011 Presidential elections.
I am still not convinced that the UDP leadership will be calling on people to give it money so that it prepares for failure. That is political suicide and any body who helps them in that venture must be seen to be either driven by nepotism, tribalism or opportunism. Only people who are infected with such disease could reason in the irrational manner Sonny Daffeh chose to do. The issue that the UDP Sycophants refuse to look at is how to bring about change.
Suntou, please do this for the sake of our country. I know you were with Darboe not long ago but you can talk to him again at least one more time. Agreed? Good, and thank you. I will be expecting you within the next 24 hours to give a reply and I will then prove to you that it is the positions you take which makes Agenda 2011 the best option available so far for those who want change.
That is why you are focusing on hate messages against Halifa and not showing why the agenda is unworkable. I am using my real name but you people are hiding to a point of using the name Kumba Gaye to attack me for exposing the bankruptcy of your position.
Modou, I can see that you are desperate to tag me with every negative jargon. Bring them on. What you are failing to notice is that, the way UDP dominate in terms of support on the ground, is the same right where you are. So hold your horse on the negativity, it doesn't bother me. KKK, we know who the real ones are.
Suntou and his UDP fellow members are focus on what matters, exposing the dubious political propaganda by Halifa is just a small part of our work. Don't get affected to the level you are willing to stoop low as some of your coward colleagues. Halifa should also stop writing stuffs for you, people can tell the difference. It is making me cringe, in as much as wish to see him do the right thing, taking unnecessary disastrous route is something i don’t recommend he will do.
Wherever Suntou is confirmed a KKK, Modou Nayan and his friends will be loyal members too.
Uncle Haruna, I got you loud and clear. You do not want to wade into political mathematics and you are not the Press Secretary of the UDP. There is nothing for us to debate. I will then go back to the UK club.
However I must tell you that I have noticed in your writing that there is a generation gap between us. This is why you cannot identify some of my cultural symbolism's. Even though it is out of place for a nephew to give advise to an uncle I do see the desire in you to do something constructive for the Gambia. I therefore hope that you will give up the posture which gives you the image of a person who want to be on top of every body else.
I really could not understand what problem you have in the provisions of the constitution being disseminated in a practical and relevant way ad infinitum. It is our national document and we need to know it to promote the rule of law. I also could not understand why you felt that those who give birth to educated children cannot understand government budgets if explained in their own language. The problem of the Gambia is not the people but those who claim to know but are illiterates in our local languages. Hence they cannot communicate what they have learned to the grass-roots.
Certain kinds of information are meant for the goose and another to the gander. I certainly wanted to challenge you on your comments regarding the Brufut donations but now I think I will leave you alone. However, I will not close my chapter with you for the moment without expressing my disappointment at your comment that you did not read Agenda 2011 but used it as toilet paper.
Please don’t be a partner to Suntou’s friend whose Ku-Klux-Clan and Rush Limburg attitude is so full of hate and prejudice that does not allow him to see good in anyone who does not bow down to his wishes. Uncle Haruna Halifa and those in their fifties belong to the last group of the generation of people who have now reached retirement age and you the people in your 40s (am guessing, as you informed me that Sam was your teacher) belong to the first group who should be leading our generation. I feel ashamed that those of us in our 30s could be reading such vulgar words from people who should be our role models.
You must promise that any time you speak again you will do so as a responsible elder who aims to inspire the generation just after you. If we follow the footsteps of Suntu and the haters Gambia is in trouble for a long time to come. I will now devote my time to them to prevent them from misleading themselves since they can mislead no other person in the world. There intolerance is already becoming apparent. Even Jeggan is now PDOIS even though he is advocating for a primary that include people who are not members of political parties. What could be more democratic than that? To them it must be their leader or no one else. We are now beginning to see who the real sycophants are.
Yanks, Thanx for sharing. Although I don't know the man, but I liken Daffeh to Carl Rove and James Carville. The man is simply excellent. You would wish UDP/NRP had a 1000 Daffehs, Karambas, SUntous, Ansus, and Yankses.
For the attention of Modou Nyang, Pa Samba Jow (Coach), Halifa Sallah, and the rest of the anti-UDP Movement! I bring to your attention this article culled from freedomnewspaper, though with a slight change to its heading! NADD Should Have Done Better
By Sonny Daffeh, UK
Mr Editor,
Please allow me space to respond to Jeggan Grey-Johnson’s article of 9th February 2010 which was published in your well established medium under the heading; ‘‘Agenda 2011; The Opposition Leaders Must Do the Right Thing.’’
While I agree that the opposition should get it right this time around, I do not however agree that Agenda 2011 is the right basis for this. This is an ill-conceived theory that was propounded by a disingenuous political ideologue on the basis of two premises namely; that the NADD alliance did not work because it was unable to gather significant amount of votes in the 2006 presidential elections, and also that the UDP led alliance did not work because it had registered a drop in votes from their 2001 electoral standing. While I agree with the former, I beg to differ with the latter. That premise is not only flawed, it is also fraught with the propounder's very own personal prejudice against a possible UDP led alliance in 2011.
Although, it is true that the UDP registered a drop in votes from their 2001 standing, this however cannot be attributed to the type of alliance [party led alliance] they adopted in 2006. As was rightly indicated in the UDP- UK rejoinder of 1st February 2010, UDP’s drop in votes resulted from two things; their own lack of adequate preparation thanks to their prior membership of NADD, and the unprecedented low voter turnout [58.58%] that was witnessed in 2006 which when compared to the 2001 voter turn-out [89.71%], indicates a drop of 31.13% and this is notwithstanding the fact that the national voter register had been updated with 219,630 new voters in 2006. Going by the results of 2006 presidential election, it doesn’t appear that these voters had voted for a different party rather than the UDP. They just didn’t vote. Otherwise, why is it that NADD barely
crossed over the 5% threshold?
Some might argue that the low voter turn-out was a direct result of opposition disunity.While this may be true, it does not however lend any credence to Agenda 2011 as there is no evidence which suggests that this was a specifically directed protest against the UDP led alliance. Even if the connection between opposition disunity and the voter turn-out is validly made and I am not saying it is not, it would appear that the situation would still have been the same irrespective of whatever type of alliance any party might have chosen to adopt, be it party led alliance, the so-called umbrella party or indeed a grand coalition. Therefore, it is not the nature of party led alliance that is the issue here but the factors that inhibited the realisation of its full potentials in 2006. That is what folks with genuine interest in opposition unity want to talk
about, not some kind of superficial political theories that are specifically invented to circumvent the rules of conventional politics in furtherance of a particular individual’s selfish agenda. A grand coalition as spelled-out in Agenda 2011 is pretty much akin to the NADD coalition - the only difference being the name - and would be vitiated with the same problems that eventually led to the breakdown of NADD. Hence, it is not an option. It is just a mere but crude academic exercise. Therefore and instead of asking the leaders to commit the same mistake and somehow expect a different result or levelling false accusations against the leadership of the United Democratic Party – accusing them of paying a lip service to the call for unity -, Jeggan should have been bold enough to ask Halifa Sallah and his PDOIS Party to put their personal pride, egos and idealism aside and immediately embrace a UDP led alliance without any obnoxious precondition
whatsoever. That is the only thing that has never happened before and it is about time history is made.
The UDP has proven itself over and over of being the dominant force in Gambia’s opposition politics. Any future alliance/coalition of all opposition parties must therefore be built around them. This is a sacred principle of any democratic political dispensation and no amount of spinning and hypocrisy will be allowed to circumvent it. The earlier the fringe parties recognise this, the better for our chances of forging a unified alliance of all opposition parties against the ruling APRC in 2011. This is not about helping someone to become an elite as Halifa would say. It is about adhering to the rules of conventional politics; coalitions are usually led by the biggest party in the group.
Jeggan’s suggestion of a primary election as a mechanism for selecting a candidate for a possible coalition of all opposition parties is both misplaced and untenable. Primaries are normally an internal party contest where individuals contest for the leadership/candidature of a given party in a forthcoming general election. Coalitions of independent sovereign political parties don’t contest primaries to determine who their leader should be. That is normally determined by the results of the preceding general election. This is what we have seen in Israel, Germany and Italy just to name a few. There is no reason why this should not apply to the opposition in the Gambia.
In 2006, 127,473 electorates voted for the opposition combined. Out of this, 81% voted for the UDP candidate and 19% for NADD – the so-called PDOIS and PPP-OJ coalition – This exhibits a clear expressed will of the Gambian people which is valid for five years – it expires only after the 2011 presidential election – and have therefore effectively rendered the whole idea of a primary utterly obsolete as a legitimate candidate can easily be determined from these statistics.
Jeggan’s claim that PPP-OJ and PDOIS coalition [NADD] registered an increase of 100% in their 2006 score is really laughable. I couldn’t stop asking myself whether he is in his trees. This shows that our dear friend is detached from both the facts and the political reality on the ground. PPP and PDOIS never contested a general election together as an alliance prior to the 2006 presidential election. Hence, there is no prior statistics that could be used to determine whether they have registered an increase or a decrease in 2006. What is however crystal clear is that this alliance or whatever they chose to call it, is not fit for purpose for it is an extremely weak one. Out of forty-eight constituencies, they had 1,000 or more votes in only five constituencies. In thirty-three constituencies, they had less than 1000 votes and in ten constituencies less than 100 votes. I
see no potential in such a diabolical electoral performance.
As for who leads the UDP, that is a matter for the general membership and if Jeggan doesn’t like the current leader, he should join the party before its upcoming congress and fight from within. Otherwise, he should, frankly speaking, shut up.
I hope he will do more research next time before going to the press.
"...The issue is in fact not so much about the figures but the ludicrous claim that they somehow indicates a manifestation of electoral shun on the nature of alliances adopted by both NADD and UDP led alliance prior to the 2006 presidential election i.e. party led alliance and the so-called umbrella party. That is absolute nonsense. Although there may have been a degree of voter discontent over opposition disunity or the incumbent’s employed harassment and intimidation tactics,-depending on which side of the story you want to believe- there is absolutely no evidence that the low voter-turnout seen in 2006 was as a result of the types of alliance adopted by either NADD or the UDP. This defeats the whole essence of Halifa’s agenda 2011 and that is exactly what UDP-UK rejoinder was all about..."
Suntou, with your above statement I am done with you and your other two guys. I will focus on Uncle Haruna. And when I return you and your friends might have solved their invented puzzle of who is chatting with them.
Uncle Haruna, do not worry much about Coach understanding your posting. I am with you all the way. Just bear with me a little I will be back.
I take your counsel into advisement. Pa Samba is a dear friend. He and I will come to understandings. It takes a little nudging and explanation for him but it shall come to pass. I am not a novice at conflict resolution.
Here is what I advise of you though.
Today, today. If Halifa for some reason went into a trans and declared - Let us have a total opposition union and let UDP/NRP lead it, wIll you and UDP/NRP waste your times to join PDOIS??????????????????????????????????????????????????????
This is the question I want you and UDP/NRP and even GMC to ponder. After you do, you will throw away Agenda-2011 and focus on building your parties and alliances. As I can see, both UDP/NRP and GMC have shortcomings in party administration that leave a lot to be desired. Simple tasks take days or months to complete if at all. When your leader is busy defending Femi Peters, the party's entire activities stop. WHY???? If Ousainou is not free, the party's executive committee need to ensure the continued functioning of the party. WHY is that? Some due-diligence does not require money. Organising and visiting with your supporters regularly as far away as Koina and Jimara and cultivating new supporters should be done all the time, Ousainou or no Ousainou. NADD/PDOIS has the same problem or worse. But the time you partisans spend on chatter could be better used developing your parties. The way I see it, none of the parties is capable of governing Gambia
in this state. And if you should dream about forming a singular union, you will have multiplied the inefficiencies ten-fold.
So focus your time and energies on value - building and strangthening your parties. We are not interested in a United Opposition any more. At least we will not depend on that idea as the means to remove Yahya. So don't feel burdened to form a united opposition on account of the people.
Thank you and may DaarManso continue to bless all of you in your self-interests.
Haruna, your comments are simple, logical and straight forward. But the sad facts is that, some people cannot even think for themselves without Sallah telling them how. Halifa's attempt to be Jack of all trade meant that, he did injustice to himself and UDP/NRP analysing absent voters and the synergy effect with him being a mortal man could'nt quantify.
Halifa should display his formula of his cirtic of the UDP/NRP not adding the absent voters to the pool. Absent voters affected all the parties, including PDOIS and NDam.
Haruna, your efforts are honourable and honest. Where you criticise me and my attempts, i recognise the reasoning in them. When we send our rejoinder, Halifa's few fans in American made all sorts of noise, some saying:
Halifa is under attack, we should stop all talks
Now who did we responded to? The wind or Halifa? Did this people actually read anything Halifa wrote?
My hunch is they don't. But when Mr Grey-Johnson again repeated Halifa mistakes, i didn't hear this people who nearly went into coma when we their patron, when Darboe was branded power hungry etc by a misguided bigoted partisan.
The two face mentality is the real reason Halifa is continuing what he doing. Behind his back his own guys are dissolution with him, among people, they defend his ideas even after knowing they don't make sense. And as for Pasamba, true peace will come to pass when you are bold enough to confront Halifa. But for now, it will be a dream.
Olfactor you can't help but take a swipe at yours truly. What is wrong with you men? I'll have you know you can't have a better friend than Haruna. I just got off the phone with a friend. He tells me president Clinton is doing marvelously and with our continued prayers, he should be back up, straight up, to continue to assist in Haiti and Northern Ireland. I told him I have a friend in Dublin who could hold the torch for Ireland as the president recovers. So I messed up your hibernation long before you perceived it. SOmeone will be looking for you over there to lend all Ireland a hand as she works through devolution. Won't you do Ireland a good turn? Migrant worker or not, you still live in Ireland. So why go into hibernation on account of your friend Haruna when you could be working for Northern Ireland???? Learn to not take, take, take. Learn to give, give, give. Besides I did not hear where you tried to get our mutual friend Demba out of
box. I know your life has some value. I just gotta figure it out for you. I still love you.
Now then Dad, you did a marvelous job in amicus of Halifa's electoral arithemetic which you inform us was the basis for Agenda 2011. You must be commended for this. It is what mortal man can expect of a partisan. I totally admire your zeal and sport. I guess it is not necessary therefore for me to read Agenda 2011 afterall. I will share some notes with you and they will be brief.
In my view, Halifa's un-intended dishonesty does not lie in the arithemetic adduand. As a philosopher and sociologist par excellence, Halifa must have been taught that linear arithemetic is not terribly valuable for philosophers and sociologists. That is why linear algebra and additional math were introduced in those years where sociologists and philosophers shared their agonies in explaining human conditions and considerations. Throw in the philosopher and sociologist who wishes to use politics to solve the landmark equations of social engineering. Why do people vote? Why do they vote the way they do?
Let me be the first to share with you that the adduand exclusively should not be considered in electoral arithemetic. You cannot explain the distributive and associative properties only by using addition alone, addition and subtraction alone, Or addition, subtraction, and multiplication alone. Electoral arithemetic must include the use of addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, the operations of integral and derivative science are a complex use of these four, and they cannot even begin to tackle electoral mathematics. Secondly, you must endeavour to include the time value of elections and votes and the time value of human considerations. That is where the accountant comes to the aid of the philosopher/sociologist/politician. Even further, electoral calculus contains some intractable variables such as personal considerations of the voter that are a function of his/her state of mind at the time of voting. What you must not do
under any circumstance, is to extrapolate or compare votes of different periods or periodic elections. Your quandry is not complete even after you satisfy the foregoing. There comes the matter of vote-buying, vote-selling which Halifa himself was at pains to convince us happens during the elections in Gambia. Well throw in the mix of the Gambian voter's problems of Yahya's intimidations, electoral riggings, and ballot stuffings, why you have just thoroughly discombabulated yourself.
In essence, the dishonesty displayed by Halifa, though unintended, is a result of using a dishonest formula. Now when you skew that formula to portray another opposition party as incapable to win future elections, you burden straightforward dishonest calculus with odious bias. If the premise therefore of AGENDA 2011 is the result of such arithemetic, well you know the rest of the story.
Therefore, I urge Halifa to apologise to the readers of Agenda 2011 and all other opposition parties, and when we work on a roadmap, to cease redefining past elections in Gambia. Past election results in Gambia will not afford any valuable or meaningful discernment for any opposition party. And Foroyaa, based on such arithemetic wishes opposition parties to go back to the drawing board. For what????????? We are all unduly mesmerized by the sanctity of a total opposition union. I advise sobriety and caution against disingenuity and pretense.
I commend you nonetheless for efforting amicus of Agenda 2011 and Halifa.
Olfactor, any minute now you'll hear a knock on your door. Nobody hibernates in Ireland anymore. She invests enormous amounts to market herself as a lively tourist destination. You should help her in that regard. I love you all.
Sent: Sat, Feb 13, 2010 4:54 am Subject: Re: Let us turn a new page
Nyang,
Keep up the good work, however dealing with grouchy characters is difficult, for reason and reality is not their forte. Let me go back to my hibernation as our grouch par excellence here has snorted at people who have decided to ignore his incessant and vapid rambling. I do not want to be splattered by his grotty stuff, so hibernation here we come.
Nyang once again keep the fire burning and keep helping me out of my hibernation with your good work. Thanks for a very well written piece.
How Many times am I to prove that you do not do your homework well? I can see that you are trying to get allies from all those People with hate messages. This is weakening your course. Such hate messages cannot isolate any one.. We have seen those types of people here in the US during Obama’s campaign. They cannot explain why they hate him.
Consequently their hate messages worked out very well for Obama. Here too you are giving Halifa more publicity than he has asked for. The worse thing that you did to your self is to raise issues which led to the challenge for Halifa to explain the role he played in NADD. I am still waiting to read part 3 so that things will be clearer since your camp is still trying to distort the truth even though no NADD leader had come out in public to do so.
Your last hope to discredit Halifa is your claim that he distorted the result of the 2001 Presidential elections just to prove that the UDP lost more votes than it really did, when compared to 2006 so that its leadership would be discredited. In my reaction to your rejoinder I decided to skip the issue of the exact number of votes your party the UDP had in the 2001 election in order to do a proper research on it. I have now scanned the results of the 2001 Presidential elections with the signature of the then Chairman of the Independent Electoral Commission Gabriel Roberts.
However, before going into your distortion of the results I would want to help one of your friends to understand what I meant when I said Darboe was not brave enough to tell his colleagues what he wanted and stuck by it before they ventured to form NADD. He misunderstood me completely and strayed into accusing Halifa of promoting that a brave person should be selected to lead an opposition alliance. My position is that if Darboe is strongly convinced that he should lead and others should follow. He should simply declare that for all to understand and then proceed to sell his agenda to the people. Whoever wants to join him would do so and those who would not want to join him would go on with their own programmes. Since UDP is not ready to compromise on leadership it should make that clear and stand by that decision and should not join any arrangement where leadership would have to be negotiated with other stakeholders.
let me now deal with the results of the 2001 Presidential elections. Halifa made it clear in his Agenda 2011 that UDP had 149448 votes in 2001 while NRP had 35,671 votes. Please read the Agenda again. You will get the real figures rather than approximations. If you want a copy of the Agenda i will mail it to you electronically.
Halifa indicated that the two parties formed an alliance in 2006 along with GPDP and had votes numbering 104,808 votes..Halifa concluded that compared to the 2001 figures the two parties lost 80,301 votes. Where then has Halifa gone wrong?
Could you not do simple addition and subtraction? Add 149,448 votes to 35,67. You should get 185,119 votes. Subtract 104,808 from 185,119. What is your answer? Is it not 80,301 votes. Halifa is dead correct and you the members of the UDP camp in the UK are dead wrong.
I have investigated and got the results a long time ago. I wanted to check whether you have leaders who would guide you to know the truth. The fact that you are still persisting in claiming that Halifa’s figures are wrong has forced me to request for a scanned declaration of results signed by The Chairman of the IEC and I hope you will now apologise to Halifa for your misleading statements. I am surprised by the fact that you are still clinging to the view that Halifa quoted wrong figures even though your leaders in Banjul should be able to tell you the truth instead of leaving you to humiliate yourselves before world public opinion. I have decided to share the copy of the declarations of the 2001 election results with the online media for all to see for them selves since I cannot directly place it here unless as an attachment.
Furthermore Suntou, you claim that it is the UDP who enabled Halifa to win his Serrekunda Central Seat. Let us look at the results of the elections in Serrekunda since the UDP was put up by the three major parties of the first Republic, that is, the PPP, the NCP and the GPP.
In 1997, the UDP campaigned against Halifa Sallah in Serrekunda East and put up a major PPP supporter, Bakary Manneh, as their candidate in order to exploit OJ’s popularity as the MP at the time of the coup. The results were as follows Halifa had 8, 529 votes, The UDP had 8, 067votes and the APRC had 9, 575votes. Contrary to your position that the UDP put up a candidate against Halifa in the 2007 National Assembly elections to humble him while it left Sidia Jatta’s seat uncontested since he was a humble PDOIS leader, Halifa did not stand as a Presidential Candidate in 1996. It is Sidia Jatta who stood as a candidate against the UDP. And in the 1997 National Assembly elections, the UDP also put up a prominent NCP supporter in Wuli against Sidia Jatta. Alhamdu Conteh who stood as The UDP candidate had 1,098, Mamadi Karlo Jabai of the APRC had 4, 641 and Sidia Jatta of PDOIS had 5, 499. Sidia won despite UDP"s attempt to contest the seat.
In the 2002 National Assembly elections, the UDP boycotted the elections and called on all its members to stay away from the polls. In Serre Kunda Central, Halifa had 5, 563 votes as a PDOIS Candidate while the APRC candidate had 5, 143 votes. Halifa won.
In the 2005 by election in Serre Kunda Central, Halifa had 5, 911 votes as a candidate of the alliance while the APRC had 3, 984 votes. Ther alliance added only 348 votes to the 2002 votes Halifa had as a PDOIS candidate. As a NADD candidate Halifa had 4, 302 in the 2007 National Assembly elections, UDP had 1, 548. and the APRC had 6, 386.
It should be clear that Sidia and Halifa both won their seats as PDOIS candidates irrespective of the UDP. UDP made a big mistake in contesting the Serrekunda central seat. It did not spoil anything for Halifa. It spoilt its own name. Many young people started to describe it as a party that pours the sand in the porridge if it is not invited to share in the eating. UDP UK is also doing more harm to the UDP. I will take up this issue later.
Suntu you concluded that: "The UDP U.K knows very well, Halifa's students will come trying to defend the indefensible. They will again continue to twist the facts and try to blame others for Halifa's inability to convince Gambian voters. What the UDP propose which is respectfully talked by sincere Gambians, Halifa don't want to pay attention to that. What he want is to talk directly to Gambians, the civil society, the NGO's etc and then create a cadre of people who will later chose him as their saviour."
This is your allegation. This is your fear. You do fear that Halifa could convince the Gambian voters. Your objective therefore is to prevent this through premeditated character assassination. You claim that I am trying to distort facts. What facts are we trying to distort? If Halifa cannot convince the Gambian people then why is he your headache. Halifa is not Darboes problem and Darboe is not Halifa’s problem. The problem of the Gambian people should be our problem .Allow me to quote what Halifa said recently.
"Interestingly enough, in 2001 the APRC candidate had 242, 302 votes when it forged no alliance with the NCP. At that time there were 501, 304 registered voters. Suffice it to say, even though the number of voters increased by 169, 032, by 2006 the votes of the APRC could only increase by 22,102 votes. The UDP candidate had 149,448 votes in 2001. Even though it developed alliance with NRP, which had 35,671 votes in 2001, its votes went down 104,808 votes in the 2006 elections, despite the increase in the number of registered voters by 169, 032 voters."
"Foroyaa: What is your advise?"
"It is therefore necessary for political leaders to go back to the drawing board and map out a new way forward. How is the opposition to attract the 542,055 voters who did not vote for them is the subject at hand. This is what Agenda 2011 is all about. Even though I am not excluding acceptance of candidature, I have already declared that the best option is to select a neutral candidate who will be able to run a non partisan transitional cabinet for a period of 2 to 5 years and then step aside after a genuine multi party contest. It is left to Gambians to decide whether they have a better way forward."
Please ask Darboe to state his proposal for a way forward so that we know what the UDP want for the Nation. That is better than endless bickering by the spokesperson of the party in the UK .
Bailo, good to know your ears are wide open. I thought you understood the famous English saying "one man's meat is another man's poison". What you believe to be crap from Suntou is a gem to some and vice verse.
I have always been a fan of politics Bailo, however it doesn't dominate my life. I reveal here last year that, i was reading and consulting with some Gambian opposition parties. trying to know certain aspects of their politics and also to maintain how i can relate to them.
It was after this period, i decided the best option out there is the United Democratic Party. Hence my joining their ranks.
I appreciate your boldness in stating on several occasion that a party led coalition is the solution. Not every PDOIS member wish to accept this fact, but in life we have to accept and politely disagree.
The situation for us all are very similar. Our central concern is to see that a government comes to power that will respect the rule of law and adheres to good governance. And also a government that will abide by term limits and allow for diaspora Gambians to come home anytime and stand for election without any restriction like it it is now.
UDP/NRP all agrees with this principles and also PDOIS. Therefore the deliberate error some people are throwing about saying that, Ousainou will not abide by term limits is the biggest nonsense.
Ousainou is selected by the UDP at there annual party congress to lead the party, yet Jeggan is complaining that Ousainou didn't hand over to someone. Who is the new expert to lecture the UDP on how to select a party leader?
Let Halifa hand over the leadership of PDOIS to Sam Sarr before he too passes the required age. After all, the American system seems to be if you cannot get the presidency, you pass it on. Let Sam step up. Jeggan can lecture his PDOIS members but not us.
The annoying thing in all this exchanges is that, those who cry baby when we reacted are all in hibernation, this world.
No wonder truth is relative. Bee kaa foo ila bori leya, tiw tiw ( each person shout for your runner). Things are moving, albeit slowly. But progress is been made. Ajarama, and Ibalen jam. Ya Allah dandu meen foof kata e katato. Ameen.
I heard you loud and clear. But we gotta move on and not get stuck to the past.
As for the NIA, they are everywhere in the Gambia. Recently a young man was pulled out of a public bus at Denton bridge and merciless beaten to a vegetative state by our so-called security forces. His crime? The bus in which he was travelling was like all vehicles on the road at the time ordered off the road because the Presidential motorcade was expected along it. The wait was apparently long and this young man made the mistake of telling someone he was was speaking with on his mobile that they were waiting for the for the convoy of our stupid president to pass. An NIA informant overheard his indiscretion and decided to teach him a lesson. When the bus reached Denton Bridge; the informant ordered the driver of the bus to halt the bus, the young chap was pulled out and his alleged crime reported to the security forces. Their immediate reaction was to beat him to a vegetative state for his indiscretionary words against the President.
It is therefore ordinary private citizens who are paying a higher price under the status quo than public personalities like Ousainou, Halifa, OJ, Seedia and the rest, the immense sacrifice of the latter category nothwithstanding.
Honestly, I am not a strong moslem as you. Evidence suggests that are not a taleban otherwise the only technology you would approved of is the killing machines. I guess you own a tv and even a computer. As such If you were a taleban, your fellow talebans would have been seeking to publicly flog for your deviation. So you cannot be a taleban! Though I must confess that sometimes I tend to mis-consider you as one very angry ayatollah who considers so-called PDOIS fanatics like myself as supporters of the great Satan. I sincerely hope that is not so. Remember, you cautioned us sometimes ago that politicians are not to be trusted. Your transformation into one within this short space of time is amazing. Who and what is primary motivation? I suppose Halifa is not the one.
Anyway, keep up the good work for your party and the Gambia in general and please leave the crap out. I concur that you reserve the right to.........................
Bailo, your spin was well intention albeit your inability to accept the facts of your Messiah's calamity. He cannot hide neither run away from his mistakes. We are all willing to move on and try to talk as brothers. But what we cannot leave alone the continuous blame game Halifa attributed to others leaving his own saintly person out.
Politics is not a career for saints Bailo, the sooner Halifa recognises that the better. And the gang mentality his supporters manifest is a turn of for even his supporters, ganging up against those who speak about his politics will only cause Halifa less cloud.
I also notice that, some of his guys start calling me Taliban, extremist and what have you. If they are willing to stoop so low in their misunderstanding of politics, my body feel for them.
Bailo, you are strong a muslims brother who actively partake in islamic actvist, those that make you a Taliban? I know some of your Islamic commitments, but I also accept that, as Muslims, we should be interested in politics, science, literature, acceptable art, philosophy, just anything we can enhance our minds with.
But alas, the gossip that Suntou is intolerant pumped up by the PDOIS boys has reached me a long time. Some of this liers are even in cahoot with the Foroyaa establishment providing them with equipment and the like.
My Islam allows me the privilege to be an enterprising citizen wherever I live. I am a Muslim by choice and will practise Islam to the best of my ability and will put across the little I know God-Willing. I respect the laws of the land i reside in. But If my comments on Halifa incense some to the extent that, they are willing to vilify and attribute nonsensical tags to me, then I am vindicated.
Let us see how things pan out, we standby our findings and whenever it becomes necessary, we shall respond to all false analogies on UDP. For those who wish to be taken seriously including you Bailo, distant yourself from errors, no matter who commits them, only then people will accept your subsequent cries.
Modou's abysmal response require no countering from us. he place Halifa in even more serious doubts hence putting across Halifa's line. He is the brave soldier and others not. The facts speaks different. Ousainou's office is man regularly by NIA agents, doing all they can to deter him from actively politics. His clients harassed, his associated harassed, yet the foroyaa guys go about their business selling papers and earning yet claiming to be sacrificing more than others. It make me laugh mate.
Your clarification efforts are highly appreciated. Let us now move on and chart a new course towards helping bring about unity within the opposition movement. In our unity is our strength. However, I strongly believe that the general opposition movement would again fail to realise our common goal of achieving a new Gambia for all if we continue to rely on already tried and tested counterproductive strategies of destructive criticism aimed at promoting one's candidate while vigorously attempting to tarnish that of another's. Some may argue that come on, this is merely politics at play. I personally consider such tactics as a smear campaign. Anyone on the frontline of our national politics conscientiously opposing the retrogessive policies and actions of the unjust APRC regime deserve nothing but support and encouragement from everyone craving and campaigning for positive changes in the Gambia. Ousainou Darboe, Halifa
Sallah, Femi Peters, Seedia Jatta, Mai Fatty and many others like them therefore only deserve our genuine respect and good advice. I had concluded long time ago that under the current poliitcal dispensation in in our beloved country the easiest and most convenient resort for any person seeking only their own personal interest would be to join the APRC Party.
Our primary objective should be towards ensuring that the leaderships of the UDP-led Alliance and the remnants of NADD coalition would both sooner rather later pursue a strategy of meaningful co-operation with one another towards achieving an over-due united front against the incompetent and callous APRC regime. That way, the doubters would have been confounded and hope lost by the silent majority of Gambians would be restored.
Let confidence building measures between all sides of the opposition be pursued in earnest from now on as time is precious sliding away.
Please try to help get your dear uncle bailed out after being found guilty and sentenced yesterday for making a wrongful attribution to our dear colleague, Halifa. Coincidentally, the amount payable which is any, should be envoyed to him in jail for the benefit of good Gambian causes he has been diligently campaigning for.
Finally I wish to commend organisations such as the STGDP and GDP who have been focussing on just that. Let us not be daunted nor depair; ultimate victory is assured for the cause of any struggle for justice, freedom and respect for human dignity.
Let us turn a new constructive page. Let all good works go on. Amen!
Uncle Haruna understands Halifa very well. This is why he prefers to rely on the issue of credibility and not the election statistics which Halifa relied on to draw his conclusion. My uncle is among those who say that politics is about numbers. In fact the other camp rely on this so much that they refer to some parties as fringe parties. They know what Halifa is talking about but like the proverbial ostrich they prefer to bury their head in the sand.
You see, some of these people do not care whether there is change or not. What they are interested in is the change they want. If they cannot get it they prefer to join Jammeh. They should not fool the rest of us. Where is Waa who used to criticize Halifa. He accepted the post of a governor while Halifa rejected the post of a Minister. This is the difference between him and his critics. He wants genuine change for the long suffering Gambian people.
Halifa has made it quite clear that the lowest common multiple in politics is numbers and concluded that the numbers which rejected both opposition and ruling party are so overwhelming that none could be considered credible if that is the yardstick of measuring credibility. He therefore concluded that those who want change should go back to the drawing board. He offered a proposal and called on others with better proposals to offer their own. Where is the bickering? All honest Gambians have seen the light and cannot be deceived any more. They know who is power hungry and those who want to empower the people.
Haruna tendered "So here Evian you will notice that my notes were in response to your notes and I encourage you to read your notes where you re-presented what Halifa said."
This is how I represented Halifa's statement: "You seem to be in denial but that is sadly the truth. The APRC is far from credible and from the perspective of the potential electorate, neither exists a more credible alternative. Otherwise, the opposition would have won last time."
Please note that perspective does always represent reality.
The truth isI did not misrepresent Halifa; you did. Instead of acknowledging your error, you are trying to shift it elsewhere. That's absolute dishonesty!
What i will do Evian is to leave my comments close to yours and Halifa's in order that the proximity may yield further comprehension where cacophany meddles.
Sheikh Haruna, The following is exactly what Comrade Halifa was reported to have stated (emphasis mine):
“Some supporters of the APRC said that the opposition parties in the Gambia are not credible. They should also add that the ruling party is not credible. Their assessment of Gambian politics as it stands would then be correct and balanced."
And this is how you interpreted it:
"As to which party official speaks for the other parties, Halifa shared with us that there is no credible opposition or ruling party. What he should have said was that his party PDOIS was not credible. Then he would have been speaking for himself because he is more intimately aware of PDOIS' credibility. i think he was echoing Waa's assertions that there is no credible opposition. The problem is instead of focusing on his party's credibility, he attempted to match Waa's cluelessness. In so doing he admitted Waa may be right."
So here Evian you will notice that my notes were in response to your notes and I encourage you to read your notes where you re-presented what Halifa said. Then come back here and read the entire quote as it appeared in the Foroyaa note, undoctored by you. What you will conclude is that even given your sophomoric representation, my comment (Not interpretation) here does capture the cluelessness of PDOISards fantastically. You see the APRC supporters are smart people compared to Halifa. They are not interested in selling the demerits of the ruling party because that is who they support. Now Halifa advising them to ALSO say that there is no CREDIBLE RULING PARTY, in addition to There is no CREDIBLE OPPOSITION PARTY, and that they will have been both CORRECT and BALANCED is where he put his foot in his mouth. Implicitly, Halifa agrees with their supposition that there is no CREDIBLE opposition party as CORRECT. Because there is more than PDOIS in
the opposition parties, Halifa is thereby speaking for other parties. That is the reason I shared the advice about when in court and accused of theft, your defense ought not be that not only are you a thief in agreement with your accuser, your accuser is also a thief. The grander picture Bailo is when you consider you are an independent voter. And you hear Halifa utter such. How does it make you feel about him and his incredulous party PDOIS. Forget NADD at this time for there is really nothing in NADD besides PDOIS. Please let me know if this is still not clear to you.
[So now let us focus on separating the chaff from the grain: Halifa reported that "some supporters of the APRC said that the opposition parties in the Gambia are not credible." This is factual. It is APRC supporters like Waa Juwara as you conceded who are claiming the above; it is not Halifa as you wrongly asserted. Halifa is merely a messenger who conveyed the message. What Halifa opined in response is "They should also add that the ruling party is not credible. Their assessment of Gambian politics as it stands would then be correct and balanced."] Evian.
Inutile.
[I hope you would therefore accordingly revise your interpretation of Halifa's statement to reflect the reality of what he expressed.] Evian.
I was not interpreting anything. I was translating. And there is no further revision necessary.
[You aso wrote: "I would encourage you to read Halifa's quotation again because I think you misunderstood it. Not that it makes any significant difference whether you understood it or not. It just throws your analysis of that part off quilter a bit. That is the bit about "Not excluding acceptance of candidature". There Halifa is speaking of himself and not the candidature of other. Share with us your renewed understanding."] Evian regurgitating what Haruna shared.
[As you encouraged, I referred again to the relevant statement of Halifa as follows (emphasis mine): "Even though I am not excluding acceptance of candidature, I have already declared that the best option is to select a neutral candidate who will be able to run a non partisan transitional cabinet for a period of 2 to 5 years and then step aside after a genuine multiparty contest. It is left to Gambians to decide whether they have a better way forward."] Evian repeating.
[My understanding of the statement remains the same even though I admit that Halifa did not qualify whose candidature he meant.] Evian.
Halifa did not need to qualify whose candidature he spoke of. The English is sound and very good. If it were you or Mams I would have asked for further clarification.
[He did not indicated either "my" or "any" to give us precision of reference to candidature.] Evian.
Bailo, the MY is implicit. That happens all the time in conversations in English. Just for fun, let us replace MY with ANY just before candidature. That would not have been the best sentence structure but it still tells you Halifa is speaking of himself. This is because MY is the ownership litmus but ANY goes to the quality of the candidature and not domain. Hey Allah, I hope you understand me. So let's extend the semantic game further; Let us say Halifa meant Ousainou, OJ, Hamat, or Waa's candidature, and insert any of these names just before candidature. Now you will agree with me that Halifa does not have the purview of accepting other's candidature. Do you agree? If you don't just ask yourself where is the authority for Halifa to ACCEPT a dog-catcher's candidature????? He can ascend to their candidatures when they accept accept it themselves and the way he does that is by voting his desire or ascension. These are some of
the games Shaky Shaky plays with English in order to improve himself. Please let me know if you need further ideas on these and others.
[In essence, he might have been referring to his own candidature or someone else's.] Evian.
Unless he is retarded, he could not have been referring to any other's candidature.
[It is for him to help clarify.] Evian.
I don't need Halifa to clarify and I am certain most of our coleagues don't need any further clarification of the statement. Let us save Halifa the mental gymnastics where he could try to manufacture extraneous meaning. That will be a bigger problem for the man.
[Whatever he meant, I know that either interpretations are possible.] Evian.
You do the tests and convince yourself either way. It is easy. You can do it Bailo.
[In conclusion, I think you have mistakenly fallen for that proverbial saying of comparing apples and oranges in the following statement of yours: "Halifa endorsing Ousainou's candidature will be equal to you or me endorsing Ousainou's candidature or Halifa's candidature at this point in time. There is not much basis for that."] Evian repeating what Haruna shared.
[In order words, you have over-rated yourself and me at to be at par with Halifa;] Evian.
No. I am not at par with Halifa. Just ask him. We are of different mettle and polarly opposite ambition.
[the latter is a political known and both you and me are virtual political unknowns.] Evian.
Well. Do you want to be a political known Bailo????? I can make your arse famous in a jiffy. You might not like what you become famous for though. Political known. I have not heard such cacamayme since Moussa Camara shared Mbaranbirinbiring with me in 1982 in Kuntaur.
[Therein lies the difference between us Halifa's endorsement of any candidature.] Evian.
I see.
[Cheers] Evian.
Cheers to you too. And don't try to be cute with your Grand Pa again. If you know what is good for you, you'll turn in your PDOIS armband.
From: Modou Nyang <[log in to unmask]> Subject: Foroyaa News : HALIFA SALLAH COMMENTS AFTER THE APRC TOUR To: [log in to unmask]
Date: Thursday, 4 February, 2010, 0:41
Foroyaa News : HALIFA SALLAH COMMENTS AFTER THE APRC TOUR, NO CREDIBLE RULING PARTY NO CREDIBLE OPPOSITION A NEW WAY FORWARD NEEDED
After the completion of the APRC tour, Foroyaa approached Halifa Sallah for comments. This is what he said:
“Political leaders should tell their supporters the truth. A political vacuum exists in the Gambia. Some supporters of the APRC said that the opposition parties in the Gambia are not credible. They should also add that the ruling party is not credible. Their assessment of Gambian politics as it stands would then be correct and balanced. Some leaders who do not want to be honest to their supporters are trying to give the impression that the statistics I have been putting out are over statements. They are not telling their supporters the truth. Political leaders should tell the truth. For only the truth shall set us free. I have relied on empirical evidence to conclude that at this very moment we do not have a credible ruling party or opposition party. We have a duty to create both. Those who are offended by this statement are not prepared to do what is necessary to save Gambian politics from being an exercise in mediocrity.
After the presidential elections in 2006, I wrote a pamphlet in which I quoted the statistics to confirm my assertion. Gambians have to be reminded these statistics to awaken each from our political apathy.
According to the IEC, 670, 336 voters were registered prior to the 2006 presidential elections. When the results were delivered the IEC indicated that the APRC candidate who was also supported by the NCP had 264,404 votes. If this is subtracted from the total number of registered voters it would mean that 405,932 voters did not vote for the APRC candidate. The UDP candidate who was also supported by NRP and GPDP had 104,808 votes, while the NADD candidate had 23,473 votes. The total votes of the opposition amounted to 128,281 votes. If this is subtracted from the total number of registered voters it would be apparent that 542,055 voters did not vote for the opposition. Wherein lies the credibility of the ruling party and the opposition
party if politics is reduced to its lowest common denominator as contest based on the number of votes.
Interestingly enough, in 2001 the APRC candidate had 242,302 votes when it forged no alliance with the NCP. At that time there were 501,304 registered voters. Suffice it to say, even though the number of voters increased by 169032, by 2006 the votes of the APRC could only increase by 22,102 votes. The UDP candidate had 149,448 votes in 2001. Even though it developed alliance with NRP, which had 35,671 votes in 2001, its votes went down 104,808 votes in the 2006 elections, despite the increase in the number of registered voters by 169032 voters.
Foroyaa: What is your advise?
It is therefore necessary for political leaders to go back to the drawing board and map out a new way forward. How is the opposition to attract the 542,055 voters who did not vote for them is the subject at hand. This is what Agenda 2011 is all about. Even though I am not excluding acceptance of candidature, I have already declared that the best option is to select a neutral candidate who will be able to run a non partisan transitional cabinet for a period of 2 to 5 years and then step aside after a genuine multiparty contest. It is left to Gambians to decide whether they have a better way forward.
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