This is culled from the Point Newspaper.
Gambians Abroad Call For A United Opposition  
On behalf of the group called Concerned Gambians in the Diaspora, one Malamin Johnson has forwarded a petition for a strategic Alliance in the upcoming Parliamentary Elections. In it, the group calls on the GPP, NCP, NRP, PDOIS, PPP and UDP to unite in the forthcoming parliamentary elections. Below we reproduce the full text of the petition. We missed a genuine opportunity to take our country from a government, which has fallen woefully short of the tenets associated with good governance.  
Numerous factors contributed to this failure, one of which we had control over yet we squandered. Yes, a united opposition encompassing all the various political parties which opposed the APRC, in our opinion, would have made significant difference in the outcome of the presidential elections in which 48% of voters voted for change. Moving forward, we once again call upon all opposition parties to create a strategic alliance in the upcoming parliamentary elections slated for February 2002. We hope lessons learned in the recent elections will add to your collective political wisdom.  
On our end, we pledge to throw our full financial support and ideas behind you in your collective quest to take over the legislative branch of our government. We urge you to take the following initiative. 1. Schedule a formal meeting without delay to create comprehensive document of understanding to set the ground rules for an opposition alliance. 2. Create a contact group to foster communications between our different organisations abroad and the alliance. It is our sincere belief that our resources weren’t fully utilised by the opposition in the presidential elections hence our dismal financial and strategic support. We are a formidable constituent with tremendous financial potential and fine minds amongst us. These are tools that opposition can greatly uitilise. 3. Create a task force that will explore and recommend (apply pressure) to the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) to let our voices be heard in the parliamentary and future elections.
Our (Gambians abroad) rights to vote is enshrined in our constitution the guiding framework of our country. As one would expect, it is not in the best interest of this administration to allow us to exercise our rights to suffrage so it will do anything in its powers to deny us that right. You on the other hand should fight to ensure that our rights to participate in elections are protected. We had once put our collective faith in you to unite before, we continue to put our faith in you to come through this time around. Partisan politics should be put aside and adopt national interest instead. Sometimes national interest and party interest conflict and we plead with you to let national interest take precedence. We thank you. Get more from the Web.  FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com

<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>

To view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface
at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html
To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to:
[log in to unmask]

<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>