*Musa Jeng Got it Wrong on ' The Compromise'
by SS Daffeh*

*Madam Editor, *

Please allow me space to respond to an article, The Compromise, I read in
your well established and reputable medium,
authored by none other than our dear friend and brother, Mr.  Musa Jeng of
the U.S based Save The Gambia
Democracy Project [STGDP].

In this article, Mr. Jeng articulated how a compromise could be reached to
break the stalemate that has taken grip of the
coalition negotiations between the main opposition United Democratic Party
[UDP] and PDOIS with the former joining
NADD, a political entity he described as belonging to all opposition
parties, and assume leadership of it. He posited this
as the only realistic option to break the stalemate, and went on to justify
his call on the basis that due to their experience
in 2006 and the aftermath, PDOIS will never be willing to go along with what
the conventional wisdom dictates and
become part of a UDP led coalition. However, he did not state what this
experience was and why UDP should be held
responsible for it.

First of all, Mr. Jeng should be reminded that this process like all
coalition negotiations requires an honest approach that
puts national interest above all others including ideologies and personal
egos and differences. This can only be done if
all stakeholders including PDOIS, accept the universal standards and
practices of coalition building to be the unfettered
guiding principles of negotiations. These standards and practices require
that the biggest party be adopted as a
vanguard and for all other parties and political entities to throw their
weight behind.

In 2006, both NADD and UDP presented themselves before the Gambian
electorates as independent sovereign political
parties and tested their individual electoral strengths. The UDP had almost
five times more votes than NADD and
currently has more representation in parliament than any other opposition
party in the country. It also has a bigger and
more robust grass root support base than any other opposition party in the
country. To put it in a nutshell; UDP is by far
the biggest opposition party in The Gambia. I am sure this is a fact that
Mr. Jeng himself would not like to challenge for it
is irrefutable and beyond questioning. I therefore do not see any wisdom in
his call for UDP to join a smaller party or
entity in the guise of compromise. This is obviously illogical and lacking
conformity with the dictates of common sense. It
is like, as one observer put it, Hilary Clinton offering the vice presidency
to Barack Obama when in fact, it was Barack
who had the most votes. It doesn’t work like that in politics, am afraid.

The common sense approach would be for the smaller parties and entities
including NADD to adopt the UDP as a
vanguard and rally behind it in line with internationally recognised and
acceptable norms.

Given the polarising and intractable nature of the NADD dispute of 2006, a
dispute that still lingers in the background, I
find it incomprehensible that Mr. Jeng would like to think that the
resurrection of the same old squabble that causes
serious damage to inter-opposition party relations could engender a
realistic compromise, especially given that the
demand for opposition unity is more palpable today than ever before. If he
had done a careful and balanced
assessment of the situation and the facts, it would have surely occurred to
him that this idea has no potential except for
the opening of the Pandora’s Box once again. I envisaged no realistic
compromise in such an environment.

The premise of Mr. Jeng’s compromise solution is also flawed and lacking
objectivity. In using an unexplained grievance
that the PDOIS party supposedly has against the UDP as the sole rational
behind his proposal, Mr. Jeng has failed to
take into account the already known UDP grievances in the same regard and
particularly on the question of registration
that altered NADD’s status from that of an alliance to a political party in
contravention of the terms of the Memorandum
of Understanding [MOU] that established it and which cost the leader of NRP,
Mr. Hamat N.K Bah, his parliamentary seat.

It is obvious that both NRP and UDP can also use, and quite legitimately,
their NADD experience as a reason to reject
Mr. Jeng’s proposal. Thus, pandering to personal egos and differences as a
form of appeasement just for the sake of it
is not helpful in debates of this nature. Our task should be to allow
national interest to reign supreme over all others and
ask the same of our political leaders.

Mr. Jeng’s claim that NADD belongs to all opposition parties is not borne by
facts. Although the UDP participated in the
creation of NADD the alliance, they did actually pull out from the
organisation in 2006 together with the NRP after careful
consideration. Therefore, if there was any UDP or NRP claim to NADD, that
claim has been entirely relinquished in 2006
when both parties pulled out. The rest of that story is now history and it
would be pointless for me to deliberate on it. In
any case, the NADD debate is an antiquated one that has not only being made
obsolete but also lacking taste.

Talking about compromise; it is clear that the onus is on NADD and PDOIS to
recognise and accept the political
legitimacy of a UDP led alliance at least in principle and then ask for a
policy concession[s] that accommodates their
core values, or concessions in respect of positions in a subsequent
government. This is the norm, and it is the kind of
approach that is capable of creating an environment in which a real and fair
compromise could be engendered and
achieved. Any proposal that does not take cognisance of this is not likely
to deliver a fair deal and therefore, not likely to
result to a compromise. It is the bigger parties which have more to bring
into any coalition arrangement than the smaller
ones, and this has to be recognised.
*
PDOIS is being Disingenuous *

In another development, I have stumbled on an article written by the
gibberish talking Administrative Secretary of PDOIS
in which he described the position of the UDP, in respect of the coalition
talks, as ‘support for a UDP led alliance without
any conditionality’. This is clearly a misrepresentation. UDP’s position has
been widely disseminated and understood as
calling for a party led alliance in which all parties throw their weight
behind the biggest. Anything further than this is
nothing but a blatant embellishment that does not represent UDP’s position
in anyway. This is how the UDP leader
articulated his party’s position in his statement of 8th December 2010;

‘‘I then made the point that the well known norm for the creation of an
opposition alliance is for the majority party to lead
and others throw behind that party’’.

Neither Hon. Sidia Jatta, who was purportedly representing NADD and PDOIS,
nor Mr. Ousainou Darboe, who
represented UDP, made any mention of conditionality in their separate and
conflicting statements regarding their
discussion.

It is not for UDP to attach conditions to their own proposal- that is simply
an unreasonable expectation- but for those who
would like to see conditions attached to first accept it in principle and
then demand, as a bargaining chip, that conditions
be attached. That way, we can move this process one step forward from the
principal issue of formula to a more
secondary issue of conditionality and thereby making final resolution to the
impasse more realistic and feasible.

If PDOIS wants to see conditions attached to UDP’s proposal, the sensible
and most practicable approach would be for
them to accept it in principle first and then state what kind of conditions
they would like to see attached. However, PDOIS
must not think they can have it both ways; they would have to either
indicate their willingness to be part of a UDP led
coalition with conditions attached or accept that it isn’t for them to talk
about conditionality.

The statement by Hon. Sidia Jatta to the effect that the international
standard of coalition building posited by the UDP
cannot be adopted in The Gambia in the light of the absence of a second
round voting system is the most ridiculous
statement I have come across in this whole coalition debate. As far as facts
are concern, there is no second round
voting system in South Africa and yet it was the ANC that led the coalition
which brought President Jacob Zuma to
power; there is no second round of voting in India and yet it was Sonia
Ghandi’s Indian National Congress that led the
coalition which returned Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to power; there is no
second round voting system in the United
Kingdom and yet it is the Conservative party of Prime Minister Cameroun that
is leading the coalition government here
despite having not won an outright majority in the last general election-
the list can go on-, and in all these examples, it
is the biggest parties which assume leadership without any resort to
primaries. Hon. Jatta’s statement is therefore not
only absurd but simply lacking basis. It is nothing but a glib.

It is really sad to see a man [Hon. Sidia Jatta] who is widely acclaimed to
be a man of impeccable integrity falling for the
temptation of misinforming Gambians just to score cheap political points
against perceived opponents. His Guinea
Conakry-Ivory Coast comment is totally irresponsible and without a place in
this all important debate.
*
SS Daffeh
Essex, United Kingdom.**
*



-- 
Surah- Ar-Rum 30-22
"And among His signs is the creation of heavens and the earth, and the
difference of your languages and colours. Verily, in that are indeed signs
for men of sound knowledge." Qu'ran

www.suntoumana.blogspot.com


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