An Open Letter to Gambia’s Opposition Parties

The 2011 Presidential elections are barely three months away and yet there is little or no progress in forming a United Opposition to combat Yaya Jammeh and his repressive government at the polls.  While there may be political differences between opposition parties, one common agreement is that individually, Yaya cannot be defeated – but collectively, the oppositions’ chances of defeating the APRC government increases dramatically.

Another commonly shared view of the APRC government is its total failure in improving the lives of ordinary Gambians.  In fact, an argument can be made, based purely on official financial and economic data, that the Gambia has regressed markedly in the 17 years that Yaya Jammeh has been at the helm. The incidence of poverty has increased.  It has become more difficult for ordinary Gambians to live on less than a dollar-a-day.   The rural population suffers more than the rest and there is no indication that there will be any change in policy direction of the present regime. Government policies continue to favor cronies of the current regime at the expense of the rest of society.

The agriculture sector - the biggest single employer of Gambians - continue to receive only lip service from the APRC regime.  Despite promises made before every trade season, credit buying of the farmer’s agriculture produce, they labored so hard for under the most hostile of environment,  continues to be the practice, leaving many improvised farmers being owed monies by government-backed and produce-buying agencies.  Some farmers are still owed monies dating back to several years – government arrears that will probably never be paid to farmers.  The agriculture sector seem to favor only one individual – Yaya Jammeh – who continue to use indentured servants to pant and tend its vast land holdings confiscated from local communities from the Kombos to Koina.

Under Yaya Jammeh, Gambia’s public institutions have been decimated – the public and civil services have been reduced to being receptacles of APRC cronies who must display their propensity to transfer their fiduciary obligation away from Gambians to Yaya Jammeh.   The judiciary has been transformed into an instrument of mass persecution of real and imaginary opponents of a regime that is increasingly paranoid and repressive because of its increase isolation from the comity of nations.  The National Drug Enforcement Agency has slowly morphed into a super agency with wide police powers that boggles the mind. 

The Gambian people are yearning for change.  Gambians are looking to the opposition to lead in achieving the desired changes required to usher in a new dawn.  To this end, all opposition parties, especially the UDP, PDOIS, PPP, NRP and GMC, are being urged to put aside their differences and join hands to form a United Coalition against Yaya Jammeh in November.  It takes courage.  It takes a degree of selflessness.  It takes political will.  It takes leadership to forgo personal political ambition to select a flag bearer other than one’s self.   I know, even in the absence of the explicit authority of Gambians in the Diaspora, that I will be speaking for a majority if I encourage you to work diligently and selflessly in achieving a United Opposition in time for the November presidential elections.  The time for new leadership is now.  To fail in this endeavor is to fail the Gambian people.