Hamjatta, another masterpiece. I also noticed the sinister way Chongan's
name was planted in PDOIS' statements together with names of former PPP
members in order to convince gullible people that this was a PPP affair.
Nothing can be more misleading. Malick Kah should have shown some integrity
and ask Chongan his title in the current Movement and state that in the same
vein Bahoum's was stated. This might be a minor matter to some, but when
looked at in light of PDOIS' insistence that this is about Decree 89, one
cannot avoid concluding that this is all a sinister way of peddling APRC's
favorite propaganda (lie), viz., people that oppose Yaya want to bring back
Jawara. They think that if they convince Gambians of this ridiculous notion,
Gambians will opt to stay with the status quo rather than go back to the
Jawara era. This argument is childish to say the least. PPP people (like
Buba Baldeh, Fatoumatta Jahumpa, Aji Fatou Sallah, Nafa Saho etc.) are more
instrumental in the APRC party.
I think the PDOIS people owe MRDG(UK) and people like Chongan an apology.
PDOIS has a history with Chongan and I am sure people like Sam Sarr would
not have bad things to say about Chongan. When the latter had in his hands
power to assist PDOIS activities, I know for a fact that he assisted them,
even at the risk of offending PPP stalwarts. So, it is unfair to try and
smear the man by painting him as guilty by association. Even if he did bad
things in the past (and I do not believe he did), the important thing is
that he is now embarking on a noble cause.
Chongan was among a few Gambian men that stood up to bandits like Yaya (at
Denton Bridge) when they wanted to steal power from a democratically elected
government. For doing his constitutionally mandated duty (protecting the
legitimate government of the country), Chongan was incarcerated for many
months by thugs like Yaya. He would not even be accorded the right to a
speedy trial. Instead you had sadist like Sanna Sabally come to Mile Two
Prisons daily to torture Chongan and the other political prisoners.
After his release, the man has worked tirelessly to educate himself in
Britain and provide a decent living for his family. You cannot compare his
achievements, against all odds, to those of the uneducated, uncouth and
callous thieves running our country. If you ask me, Chongan paid his debt to
society already by languishing in jail for a crime he did not commit. Being
active in the Movement, is a bonus, in my humble opinion. At the very least,
if we cannot encourage the brother, please let us not try and knock him
down.
Hamjatta, thanks again for your contributions.
KB
>From: Hamjatta Kanteh <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list
><[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: On the PDOIS' Hubris: Time to Call a Spade a Spade
>Date: Thu, 8 Mar 2001 11:05:15 EST
>
>For all that it is worth, i'm not amongst those who were taken aback by the
>smarmy, cynical, treacherous, arrogant, self-righeous and tawdry posting of
>the PDOIS on the London Briefings. Whatever these left-wing turncoats do or
>say when it comes to Jammeh never surprises me.
>In their condescending and smug posting, the self-righteous editorialists
>informed us that:
>"PDOIS considers its self to be more effective in promoting change in the
>Gambia than a British MP. In our view, the limited work of trying to
>promote
>the restoration of democracy in the Gambia should be done by human rights
>advocacy groups. PDOIS is engaged in the work of transforming the Gambia.
>We
>are now building grassroot committees for the enlightenment of the people."
>Needless to point out that for all their servile treachery, PDOIS has
>nothing
>to show for succumbing to the tyranny of Jammeh. Since the slaughter of the
>students in April last year, PDOIS was exceptional amongst all the parties
>in
>swallowing the lies that Cheyassin came up with. Even then i pointed out to
>them that given their record, the APRC can ever be expected to keep their
>pledges. Talk less of the very terms of reference of both the Coroner and
>Commission set up to "investigate" the slaughter of the students - a move
>which the PDOIS was only full of plaudits for. So since then, what
>practical
>achievements has the PDOIS got to show for its servile reception of the
>crap
>that the APRC continues to throw at them? Last time i checked with them,
>they
>are still burying their heads in the sand chanting songs of, ahem, truth
>and
>reconciliation commissions. Are these people for real? For more than six
>years they were witnesses to the most violent political repressions and
>thuggery the Gambian peoples had experienced ever in their entire history
>since independence. Since that fateful day in July 1994, nothing has
>changed
>with this gov't. And we have the editorialists of Foroyaa still claiming
>that
>"PDOIS considers its self to be more effective in promoting change in the
>Gambia than a British MP" What nonsense. Can they honestly point out to me
>what their servile low risk and soft criticism of Jammeh brought for
>oppressed Gambians? Froth and nonsense. Save revealing that they have been
>reduced to an appendage of the APRC and a rump of fanatical obsessives for
>whom the enemy can only be Jawara, Jawara, Jawara and only Jawara! Somehow,
>it must be grinding them inside to see the likes of OJ re-invent themselves
>and being accepted by Gambians after being in the political wilderness
>since
>July 1994. Sharing the same table with the likes of Jawara, OJ, Femi
>Peters,
>et al to discuss issues common to all Gambians is just too much to ask of
>these holier-than-thou do gooders.
>What i did find utterly nonsensical about the PDOIS posting is their
>assertion that to convene at the House of Commons to dialogue with British
>MPs tantamounts to treason - perhaps the editorialists of the paper helped
>draft the gov't's line of argument against the London Briefings. Indeed,
>with
>all the usual froth, it told us that:
>"PDOIS also call on opponents of the government to trust our own abilities
>to
>change the country. We must not undermine our achievements. We must not see
>our salvation to depend on a British MP. We must show that we are capable
>of
>defending the sovereignty of this country. We must therefore rely on our
>people for change. Gambians abroad should know that they do not have
>impotent opposition parties who need to be rescued by British MPs."
>Cobblers. It is this type of hubris that has helped fuelled all these
>monstrous travesties of justice that currently prevails in the Gambia. In a
>posting a day before the London Briefings, i noted categorically that: "The
>West no longer has a moral duty to do for Africans what is their duty to do
>for themselves. If there is any role left for the West in Africa, it is to
>complement locally initiated endeavours to turn the tables around -
>especially with "preventive diplomacy" and working with democratic
>opposition
>forces to fight the scourges of African despotism."
>This was the very spirit behind the London Briefings. If the Gambian people
>continue to get repressed incessantly by the terrorists of the APRC
>notwithstanding PDOIS' servile and futile efforts, why on earth should we
>not ask for help from outside when we feel it could complement our efforts
>in
>rescuing the situation in the country? But that is precisely the problem
>with
>PDOIS: its jockeying back and forth as some sort of rational middle course
>between Jammeh and a return to Jawara. It is all part of the hypocrisy they
>have been finessing since they did that historic U-turn after their trial
>in
>1995.
>Witness how they caricature the meeting as being instigated by "refugees"
>who
>were formerly PPP officials. Or the sheer cynical manner in which Malick
>Kah
>paraded the names of former PPP members in his report to that sodding
>Foroyaa
>paper? And in a delightfully mischievious way, paraded Chongan's name as
>being one of those behind the mov't's activities. They were deliberately
>trying to portray the meeting as an all PPP affair. Was this not the same
>line taken up by the gov't spokesman? Why in God's name does PDOIS resort
>to
>being a last resort defender of the despotism in the Gambia? They can deny
>it
>all but we are not fooled when we hear the gov't spokesman excusing PDOIS
>with the following exerpts from the Foroyaa report:"The secretary of state
>took the
>opportunity to apologise and then proceeded to assert that PDOIS WOULD NOT
>ATTEND SUCH A MEETING". [emphasis mine]How does the gov't know that? Anyone
>familiar with the current political terrain of the Gambia is in no doubt
>that
>PDOIS has more in common with the APRC, albeit all the pretense to the
>opposite. When a situation calls for joint action against the regime, they
>act unilaterally and advocate for inaction.
>Most puzzling about the PDOIS is the manner in which they snootily shrugged
>off the meeting as inconsequential as bordering on hysteria and misplaced
>enthusiasm which was best handled at home by the opposition. As it noted:
> "While PDOIS has no objection for any Gambian abroad to try to promote
>good
>governance in the Gambia for PDOIS representatives to leave the Gambia only
>to brief a British MP on what is happening in the Gambia so that he can
>raise parliamentary questions when the opposition has earned so much
>respect
>from the British High Commission to the point that the high commission
>often
>reacts to any deterioration of the democratisation process would tantamount
>to acknowledge of impotency. Such briefings should be done by Gambian
>refugees who should be contributing their quota at that level."
>This is just unbelievable. Since the piece in question bears the imprints
>of
>Halifa's mindset and style of prose, one is stuck between whether to laugh
>or cry over the very disingenuous assertion that attending the London
>Briefings was a trivia and a trifling humbug and not worth the hype being
>made over it. I mean is this the same Halifa Sallah who last year thought
>travelling to London and teaching a nonentity like Hamjatta Kanteh a lesson
>would further Gambian democracy? Just last year this man was all set to
>come
>to the UK to show off to his programmed fanatics by demolishing a non
>person
>like Hamjatta, yet prepared to rubbish genuine efforts to restore decency
>in
>the Gambia - a task to date he has failed to show anything for. Talking
>about
>impotency, what does PDOIS has to show for its potency? Did their potency
>stop soldiers butchering the students?? Did it help bring any of those
>indicted in all the heinous crimes committed against the Gambian peoples
>since Jammeh came to power to justice? Has their potency stopped Jammeh
>repressing Gambians? To this very day, Jammeh and CO remain remain
>unrepentant and remorseless - witness their gov't spokesman's statement to
>the press on the London Briefings. We also hear and see reports that the
>students are on the verge of being tried for the April incidents. Talk
>about
>adding insult to injury. How is PDOIS potency helping these students in
>their
>plights? And they dare serve sermons on what is potential and impotent.
>What
>utter peurile piffle. Needless to say that their potency in taming Jammeh
>is
>just a figment of their feverish imagination.
>Somehow, Halifa and CO has still not come to terms with the fact that they
>backed the wrong side since 1995 and the very fact that they might have
>invested too much political capital in the so called transition process and
>thus haemorrhaging so profusely that they might just have penned with that
>sodding piece on the London Briefings their "suicide note" on Gambian
>politics. One pauses here to reminisce wistfully that PDOIS and Foroyaa
>were
>once conduits to vent out frustration with official despotism and never
>failed/hesitated to call a spade a spade. Today, PDOIS/Foroyaa is a mere
>rump
>and indeed a ghetto of Halifa Sallah's misconceptions, delusions of
>grandeur,
>inferiority/superiority complexes, fanatical obsession with Jawara and the
>PPP, intellectual hauteur, inflated ego, snooty elitism and all the
>personal
>baggages that come with that. This is the tragedy of the PDOIS: How one
>single person's inflated ego, arrogance and grudges has come to exemplify
>the
>very core of a party once upon a time that stood for justice and liberty.
>With their disingenuous stance and in extension their sodding piece on the
>London Briefings, PDOIS left unhinged and unrescued from Halifa's worst
>excesses, might just have penned its "suicide note" in Gambian politics.
>And
>very few will mourn its passing away, tragic as that might be. PDOIS after
>Jammeh? RIP
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>Hamjatta - Kanteh
>[log in to unmask]
>[log in to unmask]
>URL: http://hometown.aol.co.uk/hamzakanteh/myhomepage/newsletter.html
>
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