Great piece of work, Cherno Baba Jallow. Njarama mawbe!

Seedy
----- Original Message -----
From: "Momodou S Sidibeh" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 2004 2:07 PM
Subject: Re: FWD:Paradise Lost: How Ten Years of Jammeh's Presidency Ruined
Gambian Society


> Hi All,
>
> I hope all of us, but especially the APRC and its darlings past and
present,
> would study this. A truly fresh, purifying,  and hope-inspiring gale.
>
> Sidibeh
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Momodou Camara" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 2004 2:38 PM
> Subject: FWD:Paradise Lost: How Ten Years of Jammeh's Presidency Ruined
> Gambian Society
>
>
> Paradise Lost: How Ten Years of Jammeh's Presidency Ruined Gambian Society
>
> The Independent (Banjul)
> OPINION
> July 19, 2004
> Posted to the web July 19, 2004
>
> By Cherno Baba Jallow
> Banjul
>
> They stand there muted, puzzled and inquisitive. By the second, this small
> crowd is teeming up as passers-by snail down and just mill about.
>
> They are all leery, and their eyes darting around as the cacophony inside
> the Serrekunda police station on the other side of the road reaches a
> crescendo. There, armed soldiers of the Gambia National Army are holding
> captive the on-duty police officers. Outside, more soldiers are holding
> guard, prancing around the premises and exchanging mutterings.
>
> The bystanders just look besieged. Their collective anxiety worsened only
> by their incapacity to comprehend the suddenness of military activity,
> indicates to them that something strange is happening. It is unlike any
> other day. But what it is they can't figure. The soldiers, armed to the
> teeth and glaring in their looks, are only talking amongst themselves.
They
> are keeping the crowd anxious and at a safe distance.
>
> Suddenly an old man, perhaps a retiree, emerges and walks up to the
> soldiers. "What is happening here?" he asks angrily. "If this is a
military
> coup, go to the radio and announce it. You cannot hold the people hostage,
> it is not right," he demurs.
>
> Well, guess what? It was an army coup. The date was July 22, 1994. An army
> lieutenant Yahya Jammeh announced in a late evening radio broadcast that
he
> had seized power to rid the nation of corruption and institute
> accountability and transparency in government. It has been a decade since
> Jammeh took power; his political cause spawned out of the crucible of mass
> disillusionment.
>
> By 1994, the diminishing returns of Sir Dawda Jawara's presidential
utility
> had already accrued, reducing his leadership to anachronistic levels. The
> PPP was in the throes of decadence epitomizing the fate of institutions
> averse to adaptability. Carelessness and lethargy had taken deep roots in
> government. Corruption and the insatiable thirst for power had rendered
> Jawara's presidency apathetic.
>
> So when a little known army lieutenant seized power and declared to end
> corruption and bring sanity into government, it occasioned national
> euphoria. Indeed, the decade began on an optimistic note. Perhaps not
since
> independence in 1965 did Gambians participate in such earnestness to shape
> the destiny of their own nation. Jammeh's coming enabled this sudden spurt
> of national action. He was energetic and his was the kind of energy that
> Gambians had badly needed to enliven their hopes and revamp a political
> culture gone awry. Gambians were asked to submit ideas and were encouraged
> to engage in dialogue to bring fresh impetus into the machinery of
> government.
>
> Newspapers went chock-a-block with contributions from the general public.
> Halifa Sallah, James Abrahams and Pap Cheyassin Secka in particular,
> submitted copious literature on the mechanics of political transition.
Baba
> Galleh Jallow, in his famous article, Egg on the Rocks, criticized
Halifa's
> decision rejecting Jammeh's invitation to his new cabinet. He reasoned
that
> the Gambian situation was fragile, and for matters of national survival,
> Halifa ought to have joined the fledgling government to help navigate the
> ship of state across stormy waters to a safe harbour. Halifa responded,
> citing that his party's ethics and principles had barred him and his
> colleagues from joining any government that came through the barrel of the
> gun.
>
> But those debates were necessary. Never mind whose viewpoints stood the
> test of time or smoldered in the ash can of history, the exchanges between
> Halifa and Baba Galleh and other comparable ones were conditioned by but
> never limited to, an ardent desire for an intellectual terrain conducive
to
> the germination of new ideas. Indeed, we witnessed new and bold thinking,
> tons of it, streaming into the public consciousness and sloshing through
> the arteries of the new political dispensation. To cap it all, the
National
> Consultative Committee, under the leadership of renowned poet Dr. Lenrie
> Peters, went about the country to register the ideas and opinions of the
> citizens on the timetable for the restoration of constitutional rule.
>
> This national consultation was an imperative exercise in participatory
> democracy. Time was, Gambians participated in the political process only
> during periodic elections when leaders keen on retaining power made it
next
> to impossible to be voted out. But in 1994, their contribution to the
> political process was far more consequential, contiguous to the very
> existence of their own society. The Gambian state was living dangerously
in
> the aftermath of the military coup. The abruptness of political change,
> especially through violent means, had caught the people unawares. Yet
> unfazed by the challenges of national survival, Gambians went to work,
> laying the foundation for the Second Republic.
>
> They demanded a return to constitutional rule quicker than had already
been
> outlined by the new military government. It was granted.
>
> But while we celebrated the sudden unraveling of the PPP regime, and
> perhaps entertained ourselves in what Germans call schadenfreude (the
> malicious pleasure one feels at the misfortune of others), we avoided the
> brushstrokes of history: Military coups have only wrought deep-seated
> political instability. They are a drag on a country's institutional
> capacity for political and economic development. The prevalence of
military
> dictatorships and their consequential wreckage in Nigeria, Sierra Leone,
> Niger and others couldn't even bring us to the realization that the entry
> of the military into Gambian politics wouldn't bring us any good, only a
> hardened authoritarian streak in the mannerism of those in leadership and
a
> frontal assault on civil society.
>
> When Jammeh instituted the commissions of inquiry, the public barometer
> registered unprecedented national optimism. Accountability and
transparency
> entered the lexicon of Gambian political vocabulary. But their necessity
> aside, these commissions ushered the beginnings of tyranny that would
> threaten human rights and liberties of the people.
>
> Ministers of the deposed government were dehumanized, lumped into trucks,
> transported under heavy guard from one destination to another.
>
> Yet there was very little, if any, corruption found in these ministers.
>
> Omar Jallow and Buba Baldeh were publicly exonerated. So, too, was Dr.
> Momodou MSK Manneh.
>
> The sittings in these commissions generated national spectacle and at the
> same time gave imprimatur to the actions of leaders who violently seized
> the reins of power. Exultant in self-righteousness, Jammeh wrapped himself
> up in absolutist individualism, thinking - no, behaving like in Lord
> Acton's epic warning: power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts
> absolutely.
>
> Indeed, the political theme of the last decade was the rise of state power
> at the expense of civic society. Government expanded its constituencies
> while civil society was left skidding at the margins. The APRC established
> the July 22nd Movement and the Paramilitary. These bodies, acting as
> surrogates of government, went on the rampage, bullying and
> torturing "enemies" of the APRC. They incited mass hysteria and invaded
the
> private lives of the people. The opposition United Democratic Party
> suffered incalculable pain at the hands of the July 22nd Movement whether
> at the Denton Bridge or in Kulari. The paramilitary forces arrested and
> detained people at will.
>
> The press came under constant attack in the last ten years. Foreign
> journalists were kicked out, indigenous ones arrested and detained. The
> Independent was burnt down and its editors frequented the detention
booths.
> The government closed down the independent radio, Citizen FM, and its
> lackeys allegedly burnt down Radio One FM. It almost succeeded in enacting
> into law, stringent, suffocating measures to stifle press freedom.
>
> No other civic association including political parties, labour and
teachers
> unions, human rights groups and Nawetaan committees, escaped the heavy-
> handedness of government. As a consequence, personal freedom and liberty
> suffered tremendously. How? Because of their suppression, civic
> institutions couldn't act as a buffer to militate against the colonizing
> tendencies of the APRC. Civic associations are meant to be free and
> independent as they are not under the direct control of the state. And by
> virtue of their independence, these associations are meant to strengthen
> the social fabric, protect personal freedom and help in the nurturing of
> civic sensibilities.
>
> The National Consultative Committee had mandated the institutionalization
> of civic education as part of the program for the return to constitutional
> rule. Democracy needs civic education because in part, it helps inculcate
> ethics and values like tolerance and rationality, dialogue and consensus,
> and also in part, it empowers citizens to hold their leaders accountable.
> But accountability was a missing calculus in the decision-making process
of
> the APRC government.
>
> First, Jammeh and his colleagues inserted an indemnity clause in the new
> constitution to protect them against any wrongdoing during the early days
> of the military coup. Second, they negated the popular consensus for
> presidential term-limits. And third, they forced down an indemnity clause
> that protected soldiers against prosecution for the shooting dead of a
> dozen school children in April of 2000.
>
> Democracy was abstract; it lacked practical substance in the deliberative
> process of governance. The executive stagnated in desultory management.
And
> the legislature (read: National Assembly) simply became a tributary of the
> executive. Rather than be a forum for the expression of values and
> positions on state matters, the Assembly became hostage to the hegemonic
> designs of the ruling party. It was incapable of serious legislative
> undertakings. More: it reinforced rather than neutralized, the vacuity of
> leadership emanating from the chief executive.
>
> In fact, in the arena of ideas and leadership, it was the Decade of the
> Trash Heap. Public leadership was reduced down to an oscillation between
> shameless incompetence and wicked complacency, between appalling contempt
> for the masses and political arrogance bordering on the despotic. We saw a
> bumper harvest of mediocre leaders; men who lacked timbre were
pole-vaulted
> to positions of trust. The former Majority Leader Baba Jobe was a man with
> limited ideological ballast. He lacked the know-how of politics and
> governance. And he was a man who sent his fellow countrymen into paroxysms
> of fear and rage.
>
> The National Intelligence Agency became a nursery for leadership in local
> affairs. Senior NIA officials like Daba Marenah, Munir Darboe and Abdoulie
> Kujabi - men who represented the excesses of government - became
divisional
> commissioners. They demonstrated little inspirational leadership to their
> people in terms of ideas and social capital. Jammeh sacked and installed
> chiefs and alkalolu; he took away the democratic rights of the people.
> Under the PPP, local governance was less chaotic and the people had a
> better say in the running of their own affairs.
>
> The centralization of power, and hence its corruptible proclivities,
> resulted in an onslaught against the integrity of politics and of the
> political. Power became synonymous with legitimacy; it ushered chaos and
> dissonance in ways that limited the breathing space for politics. Scores
of
> government leaders fell from grace, leaving behind legacies of discourtesy
> and impropriety. Jammeh's vocabulary coarsened the standards of political
> discourse. He humiliated citizens in public functions. He boasted of his
> wealth and opulence. He warned the people of Wuli against voting for Sidia
> Jatta, and openly threatened to deny them government help if they returned
> the Assemblyman to office. Jammeh harangued and hectored the people; he
> provided no stimulus to political consciousness.
>
> He impaired the workings of an independent judiciary. Jawara tinkered with
> the rule of law; Jammeh disabled it. Scores of people were detained
without
> trial, and sometimes, the government negated the rulings of its own
courts.
> Magistrates were fired at random. In ten years of his presidency, Jammeh
> gave us almost ten attorney generals. The quality of jurisprudence in the
> office of the attorney general and of justice in Gambian courts reached
new
> lows.
>
> Political patronage and not efficiency informed Jammeh's hiring and firing
> decisions. In 2001, The Independent reported that about 60 ministers had
> taken office since Jammeh took over in 1994. The civil service endured
> constant discontinuities in the flow of personnel and service (Labor
> productivity can't have soared through all this slashing of the
> bureaucracy). In 2001, The Gambia ranked 161st on the world development
> index faring only better than countries such as war-ravaged Guinea Bissau,
> Liberia and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
>
> Agricultural output declined, export revenues fell and imports increased.
> People and goods became prisoners of distance. The roads were terrible,
and
> the Man bus, that locomotive of national pride and multiplier of
government
> revenue during the PPP, had disappeared from the public view. It was lying
> in the industrial morgue.
>
> Jammeh came into office promising much in terms of infrastructure. Alas,
> snubbed by the donor community, he relied on the foreign reserves and on
> the Central Bank to print money for his numerous projects. Schools and
> hospitals were built. A new airport came and the July 22nd arch adorned
the
> capital city. Jammeh raked in a certain amount of respectability.
>
> But it is in the nature of military leaders, eager for acceptability and
> obsessed with populism, to bring quick and immediate benefits to their
> people. The trouble is, these benefits, since rushed, create structural
> problems later.
>
> Ten years later, some of these projects turned out to be exemplars of
> public mismanagement. The Quantity Theory of Money explained the
> inflationary conditions we faced in the last decade: there was too much
> liquidity in the economy, and hence, the depreciation of the dalasi (60%
> against the euro and 45% the dollar), and hence, the soaring prices of
> goods and services. In 2002, the money supply increased to 35.28% from
> 10.02% in 1998. And by December 2003, the consumer price index had risen
to
> 18%, reported the International Monetary Fund.
>
> This decimated the purchasing power of Gambian families. For the senior
> accountant at the Quadrangle and the farmer in Kiang Wurokang, for the
> roadside, traffic police officer in Niamina Sotokoi and the herdsman in
> Wuli Passamass, the meaning of life became a philosophical puzzle.
>
> Abject poverty forced Gambians to think hard on the centrality of human
> existence: survival.
>
> It was the decade of tears and blood. Families wondered where their loved
> ones had gone; they never returned. Lieutenant Basiru Barrow and group
> perished. Ousman Koro Ceesay died mysteriously. Security forces gunned
down
> a dozen school children. Amadou Wuri Jallow, the Guinean shopkeeper in
> Dippa Kunda, fell to a soldier's bullet. Corporal Mamadou Dumbuya ran to
> the Banjul Albert market fleeing from his trigger-happy colleagues. They
> smoked him - there! The columnist Cherno Baba Jallow was enraged: "The
> blood of Almamo Manneh, Mamadou Dumbuya and a horde of others is an
> infringement upon Gambian conscience. The Gambia is at war with itself. It
> is sad. And scornful."
>
> Two positive things happened in the last decade. One, Jammeh gave Gambians
> their first taste of homegrown university education. Despite its
> bottlenecks in terms of lectureship and infrastructure, the university
> extension program had put Gambian academia on the road to sophistication.
> Intellectual growth and maturation, the very essence of university
> education, will be a boon to our society. And second, Halifa Sallah and
> Sidia Jatta were voted into office. Not so much their victories per se,
but
> how they won. It was the triumph of ideas and communicative values over
> narrow-mindedness and mendacity. Their constituents handed them victory
> based on trust and confidence not money and patronage. This was a new
trend
> in Gambian politics.
>
> But what wasn't new and had greatly endangered our society in the last
> years, was bad leadership and its inherent handicapping of statecraft.
>
> And herewith the lesson of the decade: Custodianship of state affairs
> should never be handed to the politically unenlightened and intellectually
> bankrupt. It is a lesson that is at once inescapable and instructive. Add
> this: cautionary.
>
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
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> Copyright © 2004 The Independent. All rights reserved. Distributed by
> AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com).
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
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