Simply a masterpiece.  I salute the indomitable Ndey Tapha Sosseh not
forgeting of course Fatou Jow Manneh and the many dynamic women who are
doing their part in the struggle to bring back sanity and dignity to the
Gambia.

Enjoy




*Operation Girls Catch Yaya? I Am Pissed Off Fatou!!!!
**- by Ndey Tapha Sosseh
*


   *Dear Fatou Jaw Manneh,**
   *
   *Eid Mubarak. * Let me first of all apologise to you for the delay in
   getting back to
   you on your article *“Operation Girls** Catch Yahya”* in which you call
   on
   Gambian women to take the lead in putting a stop to the madness that
   prevails in
   The Gambia today.  I must confess that I felt honored and humbled that
   you
   singled me out, alongside a list of women as ‘comrades’ for the job.

   I am more than willing to be enlisted in any legitimate cause that seeks
   to restore
   sanity in our dear motherland.  As is evident, given the breakneck speed
   at
   which the powers that be, obviously with the support of the women around
   them,
   have decided to plunge our dear country into the pits of darkness, many
   things,
   many negative things, including the utterly nonsensical call for a
   Monarchy
   despite its foolishness, legal implications and complete disregard for
   our
   sovereignty as a people are unfolding under our very eyes.


As a woman, as journalist and as former columnist specializing in women’s
issues, I have the utmost respect for the
average Gambian woman, especially rural women.   My then Daily Observer
Column, Women In Development led me to
tours across the country with a view to portraying the rural woman, the
woman farmer, the woman teacher, the
housewife, the house help and women in leadership in order to highlight our
contributions to national development from
our various quotas.  In all the women that I met, the ones that have
impacted me so far, have been the rural Gambian
women who work from dawn to dusk, undertaking arduous, back-breaking work
and yet still they managed to be
cheerful in their responsible role as mothers, wives and hosts.  Their
conversations on a wide array of subjects always
left me wondering what they would have been had they been offered the
chances that we have had, to be educated, to
be adequately sheltered and clothed, to be protected by parents, schools and
communities.

I must state that the Diaspora women you have listed and countless others at
home and elsewhere who  in their various
fields and locations have the commitment, intellect, charisma, endurance
 and most importantly loyalty to our beloved
country The Gambia to take the mantle of leadership both in public and
private life.

I was raised by two women, my biological mother and her younger sister who
taught me to be God fearing, respectful,
honest, selfless,  giving but most importantly to have a very clear sense of
right and wrong and to be truth abiding – at
all times and at all costs.  I put this last not because it is the least
important but because it is something that my two
mothers inculcated in us by action, by punishment and by constant
repetition.  These are also virtues that I saw
neighbours’ across the street and in the wider community imbibe in their
children and us the friends of their children.
And for this, I will forever be grateful.  The education (formal) I have
been given aside, I can safely say that my
character as an individual, as a journalist has very much been defined by
this constant consciousness to be on the
side of truth, to speak out against what is wrong and to be completely
intolerant towards injustice of any kind.

My character could not only have been formed by the influence of my two
mothers, no.  However to a very large extent,
what I am today, who I am today has been defined by Gambian woman of great
presence, women of fortitude, women of
conscience and women who have given back to their country, their communities
a thousand fold.  My grandmother the
late Anna Ngulu Carayol (nee Beigh) used to tell us “even if you think I
will kill you, you must tell me the truth.”  It is a
mantra I repeat day in and day out and which has become a sing song for my
four year old son.  My army of aunts,
grand aunts and the very many cousins of my parents who have all in one way
or another, contributed to my upbringing
and whom I can never thank enough for their role in my life is enough
material for a book and we’ll keep that for
another discourse, which I hope this letter will open.

The women teachers and high school principals that I’ve had, never focused
on just the academic aspects of our lives
as girl children – we were taught to be responsible and responsive sisters,
wives and citizens.  I remember very little
about my day care years but I cannot forget the stern and towering but warm
presence of the day care’s founder, Aunty
Leigh.  Years after this, as a high school student with growing interest in
the political developments around me, I found
out that she stood as councilor in local government elections. The founder
of the Saint Joseph’s Primary School (Mrs
Harriet Ndow) was feared by all students and parents alike for her
insistence on discipline, cleanliness, good conduct in
and outside of school.  Young female teachers at the Saint Josephs High
School including Ms Harriet Chorr, Ms
Kuyateh, Ms Kippi Coker and senior teachers Mr Helena Njie, the late Mrs
Harriet Baldeh, Mrs Adele Sock, Mrs Vicky
Ndure, Mrs Gomez taught in their various disciplines but also inculcated in
us St. Josephs girls attitudes of self respect,
service to the community and again drilled honesty and truthfulness as core
values to be embraced by women of all
cultures and backgrounds.  The same can be said about Mrs Vicky Clark, Mrs
Marian Forster of the Marina
International School where I completed sixth form.

As a trainee journalist, I had women like Bijou Peters (Aunty Bijou), Amie
Joof Cole and Amie Bojang Sissoho to look
up, there were the rest, senior ones who read the news well and flawlessly
but these were the ones I could remember
who wrote or on their broadcast programmes dealt with challenging realities
of the day.  Aunty Bijou, despite her age
and up till now will write an article to speak out against a social ill or
an issue of concern.  I remember our lengthy chats
for hours on end and she would despair asking me what is wrong with our
society.  The two Amie’s used their various
platforms to speak on behalf of Gambian women from all different
backgrounds.  These are the two women journalists
who despite their positions at the State owned broadcasting services, walked
away with no regrets when they felt this
was not the enabling environment for journalists, for defenders of the truth
and for those who serve as the eyes and
ears of the public to operate in.   These three female journalists were the
ones that I aspired to be like, in the days that
I joined the profession as a trainee.  I am equally pleased that over the
years, they have not let me down and we have
cemented lasting relationships.  They now serve as my mentors, guides and
partners.  It is also through my work as a
journalist that I’ve found friends in remarkable women like yourself, Amie
Sillah, Fatou Jagne.

Unfortunately Fatou, despite the examples abound of all these exceptional
Gambian women who are an inspiration to
me and the many others who serve as an inspiration for the Maafanta team,
readers and other Gambian women, I
cannot share your optimism especially in regards to women of the political
class given the role played by Gambian
women in institutionalizing a lawless state, and I’ll list a few examples.

Taking us back to April 10 and 11, 2010, it took a woman, whom many women
look up to, whom many women respect,
whom many women love, in the person of the *Vice President, Isatou Njie
Saidy* to have the audacity to use the
national television, to list for us, all the properties that were destroyed
by the students, to tell us that the shooting
actually emanated from the students and then finally tell us that 14
students died.   Going by the chronology of events,
it seems to me that the loss of young lives was the least important to her.
 Apparently after this, she did lead a
delegation to condole the families and offer some cash on behalf of the
Government.  *What an insult and I still
wonder why and how any mother would be convinced to accept such money.

*Still on April 10, disgusted as I was then, I reacted to this as a much
younger person, more from the perspective of the
students, than from that of the parents.  Ten years later, as a mother, I am
more disgusted and usually find myself
wondering how any mother can allow her teen child to remain obscure and
become just a number (the fourteen
children who died on April 10) after giving birth, raising them, educating
them to a point where they can and should be
of use to themselves, their parents and their communities and then to be
taken so cruelly away from you, and then you
do nothing. You do not demand for justice, you do not commemorate/celebrate
openly the anniversary of the death of
your child which is normal in our tradition.*  Whenever I’ve raised this,
I’ve been told “oh but you know people
don’t know their rights,” “Ngurr ken du ko heh” and this angers me further.
* I always illustrate my response to
that of a mother chicken and her brood.  Should you want to touch any of
them, the first thing she’d do is to claw your
eyes out.  And I’m sure that is what I’d do in defense of my child.   I
daresay that nobody, military, police or any state
actor does not have the conscience or guts to stop a mother of an April 10
victim from holding the picture of her child,
every April 10 with a question* “Where is the Coroner’s report?”

*April 10 is one of the many indefensible acts the vice president has so
shamelessly defended to date but by far the
most inhumane and unbecoming of a mother and a woman.

This brings me to the wives, the mothers, the sisters and daughters of the
victims of the many so called coup attempts,
from November 11, 1995, if it is not the papers, in particular the online
papers asking, debating and our making
reference to them, all dead and or disappeared victims are as good as
forgotten.  In the case of Daba Marenah and co
whom the State insists escaped whilst being escorted to another prison, mind
you from a maximum security wing, to an
open prison.  *By the way, this information was relayed and defended on the
international news by a female
minister then, Nenneh Macdoul Gaye.*  Which mother, wife, daughter or sister
will accept that a man in your life, can
have escaped from 2006 to 2010 (four years) and never, ever get in touch,
directly or otherwise.  So long as they are
detainees, they are under the responsibility of the State, in particular the
Prisons Services and the Ministry of Interior.
The absurdity surrounding their case, and the fact that no family to date
has challenged this still beats me.  Where
exactly was the location of the accident?  Where are the prison guards who
were with them at the time of the escape?
Where is the driver of the prison vehicle?  These are in my opinion
legitimate questions to be asked by the female
relatives of any of those involved.

Fatou, we have not yet counted the scores of state officials and civil
servants who turn up for work and end up at the
Mile Two Central Prisons or NIA and NDEA offices for weeks on end, without a
word from their wives’ even when
contacted by the press, they refuse to acknowledge that truth.  *What
message are these women sending to their
children, in particular their daughters about their future roles as
wives?* That it is o.k to run and hide when
your husband is being bullied?  Is that the role they want their children to
also play as siblings?

*In her position as minister and before that as a journalist, Nenneh Macdoul
extolled the very many
accomplishments of the Jammeh administration especially in terms of
infrastructural development. * As
Minister she vilified, ignored and made efforts to destabilize the Gambia
Press Union which stands to defend her
colleagues in the profession.   Her other documentary on the President
Jammeh’s HIV Aids Treatment is so shockingly
ignorant and lacks any merit from a professional (journalistic) point of
view, that words need not be wasted commenting
on it.  *Today, she is running, hiding in fact from her virtuous man, her so
called man of peace, man of
development, man of the people, man who he has brought to The Gambia what no
one has ever done or no
one can ever do. * *What exactly is she running away from?*  After all,
female journalists like you, Amie Bojang-
Sissoho and me are “impolite”, “unprofessional” we think “we are above the
law” and we “have no respect for the
powers that be”.

*Like her many of her then so called cabinet colleagues and other
Presidential appointees like the famous
or should I say now infamous FJC, who even opined on national TV, as Speaker
of the National Assembly
that should Jammeh ask her to polish his shoes, she’d gladly do so,
insulting the position she held. * Then
we had *th**e short-lived minister of energy Sira Wally Ndow on how she’d
serve with her whole being*. I’m
afraid my being and its service are left for the Almighty Allah and him
alone, oh I forget *Nyimasata Sanneh Bojang’s*
claim on Jammeh’s emancipation of the Gambian women and the bringing in of
the advent of ‘free education’ of the girl
child, calculating, she probably most likely started her education under the
colonialists and then later the Jawara
administration, during which term she was elected a member of Parliament,
not nominated; under which she served as
a Minister of State. * So, when we have women, who can forget their own
personal accomplishments and or
hand over all the credit of their hard earned status, the credit of the
input of their own parents and
communities had in their success, it bothers me and it also makes me afraid
that we are sending all the
wrong signals to our children.

We have female ministers calling Jammeh the father of our nation. * I beg to
differ, I am neither an illegitimate
nor a fatherless woman.  My father and the fathers of the Gambian women of
pride and dignity, who know and value
where they come from would turn in their graves should we  turn to the very
man who desecrates on everything that
they have worked for including Independence, to and refer to him as their
father.

*Where are the Duta Kumasos, the Ramzia Diabs* and until recently the former
*Speaker Mrs Elizabeth Renner.*
The rest aside, Mme Renner had already made her name in the history books of
The Gambia.   Of all the good she has
*done, what had she hoped to achieve as a puppet speaker? * Now when we
focus on the famous Mrs Renner, all
we do is talk about her short tenure as speaker, forgetting the forty odd
years of selfless service she has given to her
country.  I feel for her, but she is one of the many Gambian women of
intellect who have disappointed me and many
other young women who looked up to those like her by getting involved in a
situation she very well knew she could not
positively impact.

These days, there’s talk about this most absurd claim on the formation of
the Gambia Women’s Federation, even
today, there’s an editorial on the Daily Observer website claiming “It is
barely two years since the vice president, Her
Excellency Dr Isatou Njie-Saidy proposed the formation of a National Women’s
Federation, with the principal aim of
boosting the capacity of women organisations and groups, as well as to
enable government provide more meaningful
support to women's groups through an umbrella body…”  My goodness! We all
know that in the early 80s a Women’s
Federation was formed. If we as journalists want to embark on the impossible
task of trying to rewrite history to please a
few, that is one unpardonable act.

What is worse than that though is the silence of those in the know,
especially us women. * We cannot accept that
false be made truth and agree to be a part of the rubbish that seeks to
negate the long held and ardently
fought for* progress and strides made by Gambian women over the years in a
bid to please a monstrous leadership
who wants us to believe that all good things that have come to us as Gambian
women, including the quality education
of the Gambian girl child came through this leadership.  What a farce!  I
wonder how and where this administration
would have had the pool of professional Gambian women to recycle, reuse and
be dumping had we only started
benefitting from and participating in national initiatives in the past 16
years.

*I do sincerely hope that the vice president in “re-launching” the women’s
federation will pay homage to
the late Mrs Cecilia Cole, Bijou Peters, Dr. Florence Mahoney, Mrs Louise
Njie all of whom are founder
members of the Gambia Women’s Federation.*   It is also my ardent belief
that the daughters, nieces and
granddaughters of these remarkable women will not let those who want to
cheat their mothers, aunties and
grandmothers of the fruits of their labour, by allowing such baseless claims
to hold water.  *Those of us women
journalists and historians have a responsibility to unearth our archives and
set the records straight.

*We live in body politic that has evolved dramatically.  This administration
is not one year old, it is not five years old.  It is
16 years old.  If, as Gambian women, in 16 years we choose to be
 blindfolded and robbed of our very dignity, if in 16
years we choose to have our intellect and integrity raped and abused by non,
other than semi-lettered individuals who
represent no one but their personal interests and nothing else, then there
is a lot to be desired from the women in the
political class.

Are these women truly representative of the Gambian women?   I for one do
not see myself in any one of the women
that are in leadership today and I am sure that many of us Gambian women
cannot and do not relate to them for a
myriad of issues.

*It is not only the female political class that I am fed up with, there are
the women in business, the women in
civil society, the women farmers whose family lands are being grabbed by the
powers that be, the wives
who join the ‘thousand man marches’ whilst their husbands languish in jails,
the sisters who die on their
way to Kanilai farms whilst their brothers are serving prison sentences,
 the female lawyers who tell us it is
not the role of the bar association to defend human rights, the so called
female journalists who bicker and
fight and make enemies at the Sate owned radio and television just to be on
the team that covers the
affairs of the head of state with a view to getting noticed for all the
wrong reasons and those unethical in
our profession, the Green Girls who come from communities were their mothers
and grandmothers have
been officially labeled witches and forced to confess and drink concoctions
that have left some dead,
Where are the mothers of the hundreds of girls that GAMCOTRAP projects have
supported?  Where are
the women who willingly agreed to be a part of GAMCOTRAP activities and
celebrations?  Are they not the
same women who are now in Court, testifying against them? And the list goes
on and on.

*On top of all these, are now the women within our communities and inner
circles who make enemies of us - women like
me and you, women like Amie Bojang Sissoho, Mariam Denton, Amie Sillah, Amie
Joof Cole, the late Satang Jobarteh -
women who choose to see the truth and accept to be one of the few who’ll
stand up in defence of it.  The name calling
“nyi amun yarr”, the isolation (you’ve suffered this whilst you had your
case on in Banjul), the questioning of our
loyalty.  For this last one, I always have a ready answer. I am loyal to my
Sate and to my State only, for it is only one
that is a loyal to a State who will see the cracks, acknowledge them as
national problems and seek corrective
measures.  All those who claim there are no problems in The Gambia, there
are no issues and that we have illegitimate
reasons to speak the truth (in their opinion lies) are the very ones who not
loyal as they all contributing in many major
ways to the destruction of the very fabric of our society for their own
short term, personal gains.  They, especially the
women involved forget that The Gambia belongs to no one individual and that
whatever we systematize or
institutionalize is what our children and their children’s children will
inherit.

Fatou, every day, I pray to God, that my offspring will never deify a human
being as is the case in The Gambia today.  I
fear that we will have a next generation of young adults who will be so
afraid to speak out and stand up for what they
believe and wonder whether there are many mothers out there offering the
same prayers as mine.   What we have in
The Gambia right now, is the inculcation of a culture that promotes the
acceptance of a wrong as a right and truth for
falsehood,  a culture that does not even enable our children to think, a
culture that encourages them to accept the
unacceptable and a culture of mental enslavement.  In a country where
parents have lost all dignity and would accept
to make televised apologies for wrongs they have not committed.  How will
these men in turn look at their children and
wives?  How will they walk in the narrow streets of Banjul were we all know
each other and even be comfortable?
We are setting a very dangerous trend by so easily and comfortably
distorting history and the facts and these are
developments that bother me intensely and the issues that I feel that as
Gambian women we should address if we are
serious about taking on your challenge to “catch Yayha”.

If The Gambia is as close-knit as we claim, there is no one single family or
community that has not been affected by the
vicious cycle that is slowly eating up the very links that join us together.
 What is wrong with us, that in a short span of
16 years, we have set aside blood, communal and national ties to be setting
the dangerous trend of refusing to be our
brothers’ keepers?

To embark on your call, to be seen and taken as serious participants and
contenders for leadership positions, I believe
we as women must be willing to retrace our steps.  Let us all look up to the
women who raised and educated us, most
the women who have contributed immensely to the development of schools,
communities and social structures in the
early days are not here with us, but we can draw from their lessons, from
their pains and their struggles to identify with
them and seek to impart these values on our children.

We must seek and demand selflessness from all women in politics, who claim
to represent us and Gambian women.
The same rule applies to us women in the media and those in civil society.
 The women who step forth to represent us
in all domains must be women of truth and women who would die in defense of
their ideals.  Any woman who is involved
in politics for their own material gain cannot do it alone, they rely on the
backing of the Yayi Compins, the women that
buy the ‘ashobis’ and the women who attend the political rallies to garner
support for their success and that of the
powers that be.

*We can build on the efforts of the late Satang Jobarteh to find women* we
can identify with and relate to, to be
our female representatives irrespective of political or hereditary linkages.
 We should caucus, fundraise and rally
behind women of integrity, women of pride, women of truth and commitment.
 Added to all this, the women we support
must who have the capacity to deliver.

The fact that such a debate has begun, spurned by you, a woman, who has been
victim of the heartless machinery of
our state, means all hope is not lost!

Aluta Continua.

*Ndey Tapha Sosseh

**P.S
Please note that the contents of this letter do not reflect the opinions of
the Gambia Press Union.
*


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