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Political parties must respond to the dictates of times and circumstances in order to be relevant. What the continent of Africa in general and The Gambia in particular need are a leadership that is an embodiment of magnanimity, sobriety, humility, courtesy, ingenuity, industriousness, resourcefulness and selflessness.
The PDOIS leadership has made a commitment, at its 24 April 2010 Congress, to pioneer a new era of inter-party relationship that would ensure the cultivation of an exemplary political leadership for the Gambia which must come from the opposition, if it cannot come from the ruling party.
Hence, when we gathered that you are going to go on tour for the first time, after the PDOIS Congress, we became most curious to know what type of message you will deliver to the Gambian people during your Nationwide tour. In our view, the content of the speeches we have heard so far falls far short of our expectations, despite the fact that we do recognise that ,you have the right to exercise your freedom of speech.
First and foremost, you are required by section 222 paragraph 15 of the Constitution to undertake a Nationwide tour in order to familiarise yourself with current conditions and the effects of government policies on the people. This is the primary objective of your tour.
Mr President, you may be aware that, as conscientious citizens of the country, we have been investing time and money to monitor the day to day problems of the people and have been conveying our findings to those who are managing the different sectors of your government. We thought that you would dwell on all these issues with a view to addressing them, to the satisfaction of the people.
We have conveyed numerous land disputes to those who manage the affairs of the state. We have reminded your government that the Constitution required a law to be enacted to ensure the establishment of a Land Commission to handle such disputes. We have made it very clear that since the law was enacted your Government has failed to constitute the members of the Land Commission to handle land disputes. In the face of such grave omissions precious buildings are still being demolished and years of hard work is being reduced to rubbles.
We expected you to address such a perennial problem once and for all after 16 years of leadership. Yes, we in PDOIS have studied our land tenure system and have resolved how to handle the problem in our current manifesto. We will share that with the Nation in due course and hope that the ideas will be instructive to your government which has the mandate to manage the affairs of the country. This is how to show exemplary leadership from the outside since we are not given the mandate to govern.
Mr President, we have also followed the trade season in all the nuke and crane of the country. We are aware of the views of the presidents and members of Cooperative Primary Marketing Societies in all the regions. We have monitored the explanation of the authorities and have facilitated access to information on the strengths and weaknesses of the trade season.
It has been made clear to your government that over a Million dalasis is still owed to some farmers. We have even given recommendation that your Government should seek a grant from the European Union to address the plight of the farmers and then constitute a committee to find out the source of the problem.
Mr President we have followed the life of the people in the rural areas. We have indicated the unfinished water projects such as the one that should have covered Kerewan, Suwareh Kunda, Kinteh Kunda and Saaba which required compound owners to deposit 2750 dalasis per compound for a meter which has not materialised for a period of 6 years.
We have referred to the inaccessibility of fertilizer because of the price of 650-to 700 dalasis per bag in the border area. Many farmers are still waiting for the local cost. We have referred to the inaccessible feeder roads which hinder the free movement of goods and people thus making goods from villages to be expensive because of high transportation cost. We have shown how such high transportation cost of perishable goods, the high duties paid at weekly markets, the inadequacy of water and toilet facilities and the low earning capacity of consumers are leading to the reduction of the economic advantages of rural markets and the contraction of rural economies.
We have exposed the shortage of labour saving devices to reduce the drudgery of women and the stagnation of rural productivity thus eroding or fettering the earning capacity of rural youths which encourages rural urban drift and their venturing into the sea in search of greener pasture.
Mr President, we have shown the persistence of electricity outages in major towns such as Farafenni, Soma, Bansang, Basse and so on. You have the mandate to rule and should have explained how to address all these problems. We do not have the mandate to govern. Exemplary leadership dictates that we should point out the shortcomings and include the solutions in our manifesto so that it could inform any other person who has good intentions for the country.
Mr President, you have decided to use the platform of your tour to refer to opposition leaders as ouyou or bandits. Let us make it abundantly clear that the PDOIS leadership has always been an asset to the Gambian society since the days of the Jawara administration.
This leadership inspired many in your generation, the one before it and the one after it. Hence where ever we turn to today we see people yearning for the knowledge, character and values we have always advocated for.
We therefore wish to take exception to your name calling. In fact if it was not for your manner of Government we would have retired from politics by now and spent the rest of our lives in knowledge production for posterity. We are still around because we wish to offer the Gambian people the exemplary leadership they deserve; leadership which exalts them as the sovereign rulers of the land.
Mr President, in reviewing your achievements you gave the impression that the bridge you have built at Janjangbureh could only be done by your government. We wish to defer with you.
In short, the bridge is said to cost 5 Million dollars or approximately 130 Million dalasis. We have highlighted that your Government has authorised the expenditure of over 400 Million dalasis from the funds accumulated by Social Security to purchase and refurbish Ocean Bay Hotel. That could have built three times the number of bridges you built at Janjangbureh.
May be others do not know what sovereign National Wealth is. We know what sovereign National Wealth is. We have followed your government since 1998 and have given clear evidence that you are not committed to building sovereign National wealth in a transparent and sustainable manner. Only a Government which has a clear strategy on how to build sovereign national wealth would be able to develop a pool of national wealth from which to draw finances required to implement projects like the one you inaugurated in Janjangbureh.
Mr President, in 1998 the gross turnover of public enterprises amounted 804 Million dalasis or 18 percent of GDP . In 1999 this increased to 940 Million dalasis or 20 percent of GDP. This was almost equivalent to the Government revenue of 979 Million dalasis in 1999. It goes without saying that the public enterprises could contribute 69 Million and 82 Million dalasis to Government Revenue in 1998 and 1999 respectively.
Mr President we are also told that mining of minerals started in 1999. We can assure you that if we were running the economy we would not have lost track of the sources of sovereign National wealth and would have allowed them to flourish in a sustainable and transparent manner so as to have a permanent pool of local resources to finance infrastructural development in the Gambia.
We would have created a development fund to which sovereign national wealth would be deposited from public enterprises, sales of minerals and royalties to finance infrastructural development on a sustainable basis.
We take exception to your comment that the opposition cannot bring a needle to the people. We maintain that we have a greater capacity to build sovereign National wealth in order to provide infrastructural development at a faster pace. We, the PDOIS leadership do not lack honesty, ingenuity and industriousness. What we lack is a mandate.
In fact our honest opinion is that, Gambia’s potential is being stifled under the APRC and we challenge your party to a debate on National radio and television if you disagree with this view. Allow us to point out these basic truths to confirm our assertions.
It is common knowledge that over 40,000 Million dalasis or 1.6 Billion dollars is traded in foreign currency in our currency market on an annual basis. We are exporting only 300 Million dalasis worth of goods while we import 1.4 billion dalasis worth of food products. Where is the food self sufficiency? We would have introduced basic import substitution strategies to put 1400 million dalasis in the pockets of Gambian producers annually.
Mr President you indicated that the Janjangbureh bridge should have been completed since last year but because ghosts, devils or spirits were offended the work proceeded at a slower pace. You have also said that unless certain curses are removed Janjangbureh will never develop. You have also identified certain areas as no go areas if spirits are not to be offended.
Mr President, Janjangbureh did not develop over the years because of the poverty of the people in the rural areas and the complete stagnation of river transport. We would be able to facilitate development in Janjangbureh by reviving river transport and transforming Janjangbureh to both a hub for trade and an enclave for rice and horticultural production especially the production of Banana and cashew for shipment to Europe.
We would transform it into a hub by ensuring the building of storage facilities for goods coming from CRR south to be transported by river transport to other destinations. Fuel and other imported goods could also be transported by river transport and deposited at Janjangbureh to be further distributed by land to the outlaying areas in CRR South and the URR.
Mr President our knowledge teaches us that the history of human civilisation has been a struggle against the hostile forces of existence. Some human beings became so lost that they used to offer their children as human sacrifice only to preserve transient lives. They killed in the name of appeasing the hostile forces of existence only to die later as mortal human beings which exposed the myths of their invincibility.
Enlightened human beings however saw the need to conquer evil forces instead of appeasing them and thus made themselves the builders of civilisation. They came to realise that human beings are more powerful than all the hostile forces of existence if they seek knowledge; if they are united, if they care and respect each other; if they are committed to ensuring their mutual survival. Organisation and awareness have been the source of the power utilised by human beings to conquer ignorance and evil. Mr President if we had the mandate the no go areas of Janjangbureh would be the citadel of its development and no other force on this earth would be able to stop that.
If France and the UK could allow the building of a tunnel which goes 75 metres deep into the water way or channel that lies between the two countries which allows speed trains to move across the channel through the tunnel, then Gambians have no right to be mesmerized by the building of a bridge across any of our water ways.
Mr President, you also told the people that neither coup d’etat nor elections could remove you from office until you decide to hand over your mantle to your chosen representative. You have said that elections are means to find out who wants development by voting for you or who does not want development by voting for the opposition. You did make it clear that you will bring development to the door steps of those who vote for you and deprive those who do not vote for you.
Mr President your remarks are alien to the Constitution which states under section 1 subsection (2) that, “The sovereignty of the Gambia resides in the people of the Gambia from whom all organs of government derive their authority and in whose name and for whose welfare and prosperity the powers of government are to be exercised.” Mr President unlike you we are telling the Gambian people that in 2011 they should elect a government that will last only for five years and the incumbent should preside over free and fair elections and leave office like Nelson Mandela.
Let us remind you that Modern South Africa is also 16 years old. Apartheid was put to an end in 1994 when Nelson took over. Now South Africa is proud to display three Presidents whose assumption of office is peaceful and has not led to any erosion of national integrity or the development potential of the country. We would not take pride in claiming that we have ruled Gambia for 30 years. What we will take pride in is to claim that we were part of these growing number of leaders who have contributed their quota to the building of a developed, democratic, free and prosperous Gambia.
Mr President as we move towards an election year your government does not give assurance of a free and fair election to ECOWAS, The AU, The International Community by making remarks that you could not be removed through democratic means. This is time to send the right signals. We would have thought by now that you would exercise your prerogative of mercy to release Femi Peters who aimed to exercise basic democratic rights, refrain from demonizing the opposition, show tolerance to divergent views in the state media and submit to the will of the people. You should not equate coups d’etat with electoral processes and trivialize both. It is democracy that makes coups d’etat unthinkable. Under a democracy a coup d’etat is an assault on the sovereignty of the people since they have the full mandate to retain or change Governments. Gambians would want to be assured that they would have free and fair elections in 2011.
Mr President 2011 is just round the corner. It is an election year. A code of conduct exists for political parties. There is no need for insults or intolerance. Tell the people the truth as you see it. We will also tell them the truth as we see it. Leave them to elect their representatives without intimidation or inducement. This is the dictate of democracy, peace and justice. This is the dictate that an exemplary political leadership should heed.
To conclude allow me to defer with the Head of the Civil Service. Politics is not a wrestling match. It is a competition for the hearts and minds of the people. It requires people who truly love and respect their people to emerge to seek their mandate in a climate characterised by mutual respect and tolerance of diversity.
While anticipating that all Gambian political figures will display exemplary leadership as we prepare for 2011
We remain
Yours in the service of the nation
Halifa Sallah
For the PDOIS Central Committee
