Dear Haruna, Musa Jeng, and all,

Thanks for your contributions to the debate about the budget.  There obviously are
differences of opinion about not only the content of the budget, but also whether or
not it deserves to be read.  To me, there's no question that reading the budget is an
obligation on all Gambians who can read it.  By the same token, it is also an
obligation on the Gambia government to ensure that it (or at least it's substance) is
accessible to every mature Gambian.

It is thus unfortunate that the likes of Haruna Darbo insist that there is no point
in reading the budget.  The fact of the matter is that many institutions and
organizations such as the World Bank read the budget, and might even use it as a
basis for deciding whether or not to lend assistance and/or aid to The Gambia.  For
this reason, and for better or for worse, the effect of each budget on our nation
goes beyond the time frame of that budget.  Thus, we are presently paying for loans
that were budgeted for many years ago, and long after we have forgotten what exactly
was in those budgets.

Another reason why the budget makes important reading is that if you want to honestly
disagree with this, or any other government, you'd be advised to know as much as
possible what their development programs are.  At the very least, you can always hold
them responsible for keeping their promises, and use their budgets as ammunition in
your efforts to show how incompetent they are.  From this perspective, it is
self-defeating to refuse to read the national budget.

And on to the contribution from Musa Jeng about the weak local governments we have
back home.  I suggest that this state of affairs is as intended, and serves a system
of government that favors a concentration of power in the hands of a few.  Take for
instance the issue of Chieftancy.  It would have been in the best interest of the
country, I think, to make Chiefs answerable to the people they nominally rule over.
In this regard, each Chieftancy should have had elections every 3 years.  With such a
system, there will be at least 3 elections per Chieftancy every 10 years.  This way,
people will cultivate democratic values at the grassroots level, and be in much
better position to participate effectively in national elections.  But the fact
remains that we have a Chieftancy that's now based on presidential appointment
(correct me if I'm wrong), and hence, the only time people indulge in choosing their
leaders is once every 5 years, when we have our presidential and national assembly
elections.  This certainly serves the interest of the incumbents, and not our
country.

I must also say that while there is a serious need to revamp local government in The
Gambia, I think we should not overdo it.  The reason I say this is that we have in
the United States a property-tax based system of funding education, and what it has
produced is an apartheid-like system whereby the public schools in poor localities
are hurting while suburban school districts once in a while reel from the shooting
sprees of over-pampered students.  We'll be well advised not to have a local
government system that ends up dividing us along class lines.  But neither should we
also use this as an excuse to pull down those local governments that are dynamic
enough to provide well for their citizens.  Walking the fine line between the two
extremes (an excessive devolution of power to local governments, and a system with an
overly powerful central government), is an art; the art of leadership and vision.

I also want to comment on the issue of our use of marbles to vote.  Many people have
written to complain about why we still use such a system.  Others have in fact
suggested that we use voting cards, punch cards, all what not.  I say, let's get rid
of the inferiority complex that always tells us that anytime we do things different
from the way Western countries do, we are doing it wrong.  Afterall, the America that
went to the moon came up short when it came to counting the votes cast in Florida,
where the rockets that went to the moon blasted off from.  The fact of the matter is
that the marble voting system has served us well, and I see no reason why we should
fix a system that's unbroken.

The problem with our democracy has nothing to do with the inanimate objects we use to
effect it. Rather, the problems rest squarely on our laps:  the intolerance, the
corruption, the heavy-handedness, and the un-quenchable thirst for power that the
Gambian political class has.  The marbles have nothing to do with opposition parties
being denied fair access to our publicly-owned media outlets, they have nothing to do
with people being thrown in jail for no reason, or dragged through the courts for
trumped-up charges; they have nothing to do with the bending of, or last-minute
changes of our electoral laws.  So blaming the poor marbles for our problems is
foolhardy, and a practice best left to people who won't admit the reality of our
political system.

I cannot resist commenting on a final (I promise) issue: our inferiority complex.
Many years ago, I read "Shogun", by the late James Clavell.  (He wrote a wonderful
series of books:  "King Rat", "Taipan", and "Noble House" that are great reads).
Shogun deals with ancient Japan, at a time when they were having their first visitors
from Europe.  Because the European sailors that first reached the shores of Japan got
there haggard, dirty, and full of lice, the Japanese started calling them barbarians,
and looked down on them with contempt.

Once I read in Shogun about Japanese attitudes toward the first Europeans they
encountered, I had something like a revelation!  Here, I told myself, is the reason
why there's such a huge difference between the African and Japanese experience in
their relationship with the West.  While the Japanese started with (and still largely
retain) a superiority complex toward the West, Africans thought (and largely still do
think) that we are inferior to Westerners.  The net effect of these attitudes is that
while Japanese are able to pick and choose what they want from the West, we Africans
accept everything the West offers, and look down on everything that's ours.  So bad
is the situation that, as I always tease my Wollof friends and relatives, the Wollof
say: "Maam Yalla; Bai Toubab."  The whiteman, Toubab, is at a higher level, and one
between us and God!

Back to the marbles then: just because it's something that the West might frown upon,
we cannot realize that given the low literacy rate in The Gambia, marbles are a
voters best friend.

Have a great weekend, and best wishes.

Katim

----- Original Message -----
From: Haruna Darbo
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Thursday, January 03, 2002 6:51 AM
Subject: 2002 National Budget-Musa Jeng


Musa, I find your commentary valuable and I identify with your yearning for value in
reading a document which should have borne enough significance to require
mass-readership. I also read Katim's rendition of the "Budget's" significance. I
appreciate the time taken to read the budget and Katim's plea notwithstanding, my
vocabulary, sentence structure, and actuarial acumen may suffer if I read the budget
story. So I will still stick to reading the readers' notes.

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