I cannot just swallow this tasty piece of understanding in African political maturity, awareness, and understanding you have proved yourself to be. If we care for the people's well-being, we will have to educate them to be able to understand what this western imposed politic is all about and how they (people) can run the country and take issues into their own hands without using force, how to rely less on politicians but their own hence they are the ones who put the politician where he or she is. This kind of political thinking is what is missing in our political awareness. In terms of African politic, you are damn right that, one cannot weigh the effectiveness of political messages by the election result due to the short-coming in the process.

This is one of the reason why, instead of choosing a representative based on whom we know or tribal politic which is not working in terms of general well-being. If you go around asking people why do you vote for Mr.(A) and not (B)? must will say the fact that, because the choice is who they know or is my tribe mate. But can he deliver your general needs? what level of education did he/she had as far as international politics is concern? 

Therefore, we should try other means, that is to educate the people on the basis of selecting through capability to deliver, capability to handle their affairs by listening to them (the people), as well as their (The politician)'s understanding on the affairs of the government.  Although this process will  not be easy  considering  the  educational level of the population but can  be effective  in the long run.  

Talking about education, I am not referring to schooling in learning English language or mathematics etc, because I believe been intellectual is a gift which even an unschooled individual can obtain. instead, I am referring to the fact that there are very few African politician who will devout their time and money to educate the people due to the fact of their own educational level or else selfishness and hidden agendas of taking advantage of the people's ignorance if elected. Although tribal politic is injected into our blood like racism in westerner's blood, but through education and awareness, changes are possible. 

Again, hence nothing can works without the involvement of experienced know-how and educated individuals  on this journey, we need the so called western intellect and Diasporas  to show us how politic is like in their place of  residence even thus the political structures will be different, besides if some white folks will vote for Oboma,  I see no reason why Mandingo cannot vote for jolas or fulas vote for  manjakos.
Edi 

Musa Jeng <[log in to unmask]> wrote: Suntou:

I think raising issues about PDOIS' effectiveness, and whether they have anything to show for over the years is indeed a genuine question. Now, you are making this argument base on the fact that you are using election results to judge the effectiveness of PDOIS's message and whether Gambians are actually buying into the message. Now election results in the Gambia as a barometer can only be used in this case, if there is a democratic environment where Gambians are at least free to choose.  Now, allow me to bring in another scenario, if PDOIS in the past twenty five years decided to take arms with mercenaries and took over the government of the Gambia, of course with the justification of putting the rule of law in place, I have no doubt they will be winning elections all over the place. Will that then suffice as an indication that the PDOIS message is getting through.

The reality is that people are not winning elections, or loosing elections base on their party message, and this will continue to happen until we at least adopt the process of building a real democracy in the Gambia. There is no way of measuring the effectiveness of PDOIS, or any political party for that matter in the Gambia base on using election results as a base because that it self is flawed. The PDOIS message can be put in this way: let us create an environment where Gambians will take ownership of their own destiny. That has not happen because few among us are willing to use other methods outside of the rules of any descent civilization. As long as we continue to have some among us impose their own will onto us, you will expect to see the suffering of people in our country, and there is nothing any message can do to bring about immediate change. But for me,  I will continue to respect people who are willing  and committed to stay on message by fighting and reminding
 people th
eir rights and how to remove the chains of oppression.




Musa Jeng







       
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