Halifa,

For a better understanding of where i stand on the upliftment of the African
Continent and more specifically the Gambia, i would judiciously ignore the
frivolous bits of your pieces and concentrate on their numerous strengths and
interesting arguments.

I always find it incredible when i see people referring to the economic
arrangements that prevail on the African Continent as Capitalist. Stuff is:
Whatever it is that prevails on the African Continent is NOT Capitalist but
largely representing the remnants of the mercantilist economic landscapes
which have their roots in the Continent's colonial past. Now, what has been
added to this is a desultory comestic make-over of adding bits and pieces of
IMF-World Bank sanctioned elements of "laissez faire" economics in a
grotesque parody of Western economies. Yet, at its core, only the ignorant
and rabid socialist propangandist and ideologue would doubt that far from
resembling a Capitalist order, whatever it is that prevails in Africa is an
unsystematic hotch-potch of the left-over of the mercantilist structures and
policies that post colonial Africa inherited from the colonial master. The
only novelty herein is the IMF-World Bank interventions in adding a colourful
subtext to this overarching mercantilist heritage - in the form of an
all-powerful, sclerotic and inefficient State as the main engine of economic
development; the be-all and end-all of everything that transpires between the
peoples of a polity - of the colonial era. This is why i always look askance
at such absurd suggestions which claim that because Africa is still stuck in
a time warp of chronic political, economic and social break down, it suffices
to say that it is a failing of Capitalism as a system of economic management.
This, needless to say, is nothing but socialist claptrap. To call what
prevails in Africa as Capitalist is a gross misapprehension of the realities
of the Continent. It suffices for me to say that Africa has of yet not gone
Capitalist. To figure this out, look no further than the Gambia; where, as it
happens, the overarching reaches of the mercantilist State grows by the
second. If you have a very good understanding of liberalism and the
Capitalist order, then you will not allude Capitalism to whatever it is you
believe to be prevailing on the African Continent.

It is worth a precious moment's pause to make myself clearer on the
aforementioned statement that it is still the left-over mercantilist
structures, tendencies, policies and mentalities that dominate economic
management in Africa. To make the point, i shall give two examples from two
relatively different periods in Gambian history. During the Jawara era, what
highlighted the procedural discrepancies associated with that regime - as was
indeed to be expected of a State that still exudes of the mercantilist spirit
- was the fracas that ensued after the State became involved in the
Jimpex-Gacem dispute over whether the latter's cheap cement would not in fact
make it a de facto monopoly in that market and deprive the former of
hitherto an unrivalled dominance in that sector of construction procurements.
As it happened, the PPP gov't decided it would be a breach of its
"competition rules" if it grants Gacem a license/certificate to import cheap
cements on a scale that it intends to. This, of course, is economic nonsense.
The truth of the matter was that no matter what Gacem imports of cheap
cements, the worst that can happen to the construction procurement sector is
that Gacem will become the new dominant and dynamic force in the said sector.
And its dominance would only be perennial before others join it in the
honey-pot that is the construction procurement sector and make life difficult
for it as they compete for a peculiar market like the seasonal construction
industry; as opposed to the monopolist myth that the vested political
interests that had a stake in Jimpex thoroughly whipped up and peddled at the
expense of Gacem. This is understandable: Jimpex, in its embryonic stages -
if deep throat were to be ever believed - was largely bank-rolled with State
funds and has myriad of political interests vested in it - especially the
ruling PPP. In essence, the political establishment that had stakes in Jimpex
were never going to wimpishly stand by as a privately bankrolled Capitalist
enterprise end the dominance of their cash-generating mercantilist
corporation that is an extension of the mercantilist State. Similarly - a
very rich irony here: as the mutation of that same Gacem is heavily involved
in this example not as a victim but as a beneficiary of the same mercantilist
distortions of the State  - the AFPRC/APRC regime's relationship with
industry and corporations strikes similar chords with the PPP one; even if
one contends that the PPP records fares better. With the AFPRC/APRC, the
relationship has become more pervasive and more corruptible that those
companies that don't go out of their way by politically endorsing the
AFPRC/APRC lose out in the process. In short and literally, with the
AFPRC/APRC, no gov't/Sate department is left untouched with this pervasive
and corruptible reaches of the mercantilist order. As such, only such
companies like Boto Construction, ATEPA and Gamsen/Gacem - that the president
has personal insterests in as does rest of the AFPRC/APRC establishment -
enjoy the largesse of the mercantilist State that Jammeh presides over. There
are NO tenders for huge gov't contracts; rather, it is merely handed to the
State sponsored companies who would politically cooperate with the regime at
the expense of genuine Capitalist corporations like Taf Constructions which
is pathetically being sidelined by the mercantilist order. It suffices for me
to sum up that in a mercantilist order, the only viable business entities
that declare huge profits are those closely and politically allied with the
political establishment and as a result enjoying the patronage and protection
of the mercantilist State.  Can anyone who truly understands what liberalism
and the Capitalist order entail ascribe Capitalism and liberalism to such an
order like the one that currently prevails in the Gambia and else where on
the African Continent? This is a question critics of Capitalism and the
liberal order have failed to answer. Maybe you should be bold now and answer
it.


An astringent liberal diagnosis of the African plight, should lead the way to
a liberal prognosis and an eventually a prescription of the ailment. It is -
again! - worth a moment's pause to tell you that because of the nature of my
schedules and the time constraints it has literally imposed upon me, i
wouldn't be able to give a detailed or technical diagnosis, prognosis and
prescription of the African plight. Rather, i would concentrate on a more
generalised approach - crude at times as that can tend to be. An astringent
liberal diagnosis of the African plight would reveal a trend which by itself
should suffice as a starting point for a liberal prognosis of the African
problem and its preferred liberal prescription.

A forensic scrutiny of the African plight - from an astringently liberal
perspective - would reveal the yawning chasm between the ruled and the ruler;
it would not fail to show that far from the archaic nature of the colonial
instruments of influence, that largely determine the political, economic and
social make-up of a polity, being disarmed and laid to rest, the African
polity is still held hostage by the ghosts of her recent past: The
brutalities and rigidities of the imperial/colonial era and the post colonial
dispensation. The evidence would show that the imperial/colonial interruption
of the African life merely exchanged and emasculated Africa's monarchical
past - as socialist or leftist analysis still insists on calling the current
dispensation; i noticed you also go along with this nomenclature - for
mercantilist structures whilst making good uses of the emasculated
monarchical structures where and when it needs it. Thus the creation of the
mercantilist State; resembling very much what the political historian and
principal of Mansfield College, David Marquand, aptly called "the Tory
State". And understandably so since Britain was a colonial master to most
African States and so the mercantilist State was mainly a British creation
and imposition. Both colonial and post-colonial African political struggles,
leaderships and dispensations haven't destroyed or even disarmed the
mercantilist State. Rather, most of the time, they merely clipped its
monarchical appurtenances in order to strengthen their own political
positions. As posited in the three preceding paragraphs on the nature of the
mercantilist order, economic and social dispensation follows similar paths of
progression - or should that be retrogression?

The first task of a regime - that inherits the aforementioned political
dispensation - with a liberal and Capitalist agenda is to completely destroy
the mercantilist State in all its manifestations and replace it with a
secular Liberal State whose sole repository of sovereignty will reside with
the sovereign peoples of that polity. The manner in which the affairs of such
a secular Liberal State's affairs are conducted will measure to a system of
liberal democratic politics which shall form the basis of forming governments
to oversee the affairs of the polity. In such arrangements, the appurtenances
of the secular Liberal State shall be the creation of free institutions;
independent of the gov't and not malleable to the corruptible reaches of the
political establishment; institutions that curb on the despotic proclivities
of the powerful and empower The People to eventually be masters of their own
destinies. Such free institutions shall include a robustly free and
independent judicial order that primarily exist to safe-guard the Rule Of
Law; without which the liberal order falls apart. Such free institutions as
they mature and evolve into truly representing The Peoples and their
aspirations, shall help in the whittling of the State as the members of the
polity have relatively less and less use for it; and as the need arises to
curb the reaches of the State in the event vested political interests use it
to promote agendas that are not necessarily the needs of the members of the
polity. We pause to emphasize two things. First, the Liberal State should
never ever use public policy to promote what amounts to private morality nor
should it prescribe for us the Good life. Exceptions apply insofar as private
activities/pursuits become inimical to other members of the polity. Second,
under the eyes of the secular Liberal State, only individuals exist; groups
and communities are peripheral. There is nothing like the "Sarahule",
"Balanta", Muslim or Christian in the eyes of the secular Liberal State.
There are only individuals. Thus the apotheosis of the secular Liberal State
is a representation of the civic association of individuals who consensually
agree to the terms of their co-existence in a polity.

Without the institutional framework i've outlined above, there is no way a
genuine Capitalist and liberal order can successfully subsist. The mistake in
the past was to assume that the Capitalist order is seperable from the
political order or the State. Or that a mercantilist State - which is what
currently prevails in Africa and much of the "developing world" - can
successfully incorporate a Capitalist order. The experience has been or shown
that Capitalism cannot successfully subsist under the mercantilist State.
This is why the reckless haste in parodying or piggy-banking on certain
elements of free market economics like privatisation and deregulation, has
resulted in such disastrous consequences for the recipient nations. Simply
because such nations never had the appropriate institutional frameworks that
help the normal operations of a free market economy. Post-Soviet Russia is a
case in point. The free market and Capitalist order by themselves are
inoperable without the proper institutional framework that help them to
subsist. That itself requires the dismantling of the mercantilist State and
replacing it with a secular Liberal one. This, in my opinion, should be the
primary task of any regime interested in a genuine liberal and Capitalist
order.

As you would have observed, i have in this piece merely delineated where a
liberal regime ought to start off in its attempt to address the African and
Gambian plight. Because of time constraints and because it would be more
prudent to tailor the discourse at a length suitable for readability in an
informal e-mail forum, i will pause here and pick it up again with an
incorporation of the theoretical edifice outlined here with the specificity
of the Gambian situation. Also i will in the next slot show how your
misguided obsession with farming and fisheries as the core of your economic
plans will not amount to much in a society that evidence suggests is
increasingly becoming urbanised and leaving rusticated existences for urban
ones. I will also take a hard-nosed look at this "cooperative" structures you
are proposing for renewing the viability of farming and rural communities. I
will, however, appreciate it if you could send me your polemical exchanges
with Dr. Taal and new material on your economic programmes. I will be in
touch privately to facilitate this.

Finally, on the coalition business, i think generally you and i are in
agreement. Where we diverge is on the timing issue:You wish to go for a
limited second round coalition whilst i prefer a first round limited
coalition with a maximum life-span of nothing more than 24 months. On this
issue, i will get back to you.

All the best,

Hamjatta Kanteh - An Incorrigible And Unapologetic Capitalist And Liberal :)

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