Gambia's Lost Virginity



The Independent (Banjul)

EDITORIAL
November 9, 2001
Posted to the web November 9, 2001

Banjul, the Gambia

What is going on? Something is gravely amiss when living in The Gambia
today.

Its image as a haven of peace and tranquility is under some insidious
threat. When people living here are exposed to the dangers posed by the
activities of armed thieves and bandits the state of security is at its
lowest ebb. When people no longer think it safe to stroll in the peace and
quiet of the Gambia night because of the wafting shadows of knife and gun
wielders ready to slit throats or creak bones, something is grossly wrong
with how our security is being managed. It seems it is only a matter of time
before our country is consumed by crimes we have only been privileged to
hear as news coming from other countries.

When Aziz Faal, a Mauritanian trader called it a day and closed his shop
last Saturday in Bakoteh, little did he know that he would never see the
light of day anymore. He was safe in the thought that he is in The Gambia,
an island of peace in a turbulent ocean of conflicts within the sub-region.
Sadly enough, the shopkeeper was found the next day lying murdered and
abandoned in a pool of his own blood, with a throat slit and his goods and
money gone. The attack on Bureng village near the Senegalese border is still
fresh in our minds of Gambians. The brazenness of such atrocities is the
latest testimony to the fact that The Gambia has caught up very fast with
the rest of the troubled world as far as crime is concerned. The want of
money or material could draw raw brute from individuals or groups. What is
left is to own up to the fact. We are no longer the virgin territory. That
chastity ended years ago when shops are broken into and their occupants
maimed and even killed. This situation drives home some pertinent questions
about security - questions that should be addressed before everything
degenerates without end. The security forces, maintained by the taxpayer's
money, are handy for more conventional ways of keeping the peace and
tranquility. There is little ingenuity to crack the complicating equation of
things out of the ordinary namely tracing and telling where criminals are
and what is up their sleeves. Intelligence officers would be more useful
following the trail of the criminals to their dens instead of barging in
homes and taking away mostly unsuspecting and innocent people leading quiet
and law-abiding lives. If intelligence work not only entails trying to
fathom the depth of a conspiracy against the state and the government,
people need to be made not only safe in their homes but assuredly safe in
their minds so that they would not have to be turning over their shoulders
in fear and apprehension every time they walk the streets at night. Inasmuch
as people must live without fear in the streets, they must also live without
fear in their minds. We have enough security agents to instill a sense of
warmth in our security when we retire to bed at night and wake up the next
day.

Another unanswered question of crime in this country is about apportioning
blame on foreigners for committing them, despite the absence of concrete
evidence. While we cannot for certain blame Gambians for all the crimes we
also cannot crucify foreigners either. But all the same in as much as we
consider our neighbours as our brothers and sisters, it is time Gambians
started separating good neighbours from bad ones. We have non-Gambians who
are of great service to our country as teachers, mechanics, carpenters and
business. But this sits uncomfortably with the fact that another class of
outsiders are bent on importing life styles, which are incongruent with our
values.

If a handshake passes the elbows, then it is another matter. In this matter
of armed and violent robbers, the handshake has clearly gone beyond the
elbow. Taking action is necessary so that The Gambia would continue to be a
haven to its citizens and a refuge for people fleeing terror in other
countries.




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