Jabou,
Remember the adage "God brings us into deep, troubled waters not to drown
us but to cleans us"? What we are going through is the result of decades of
neglect, embezzlement and downright thievery by leaders we trusted with all
our hearts. Had they invested in what this government is investing in now,
we would not be talking about them. We would have been talking about other
things.
Second, development is a process and not an event that just happens. The
developments that other countries are enjoying did not just happen. It took
great minds to work out strategies to pave the way forward. It is of no use
however, if all we have are plans. Plans remain plans until they are
implemented. I am therefore one of the hundreds of thousands in this
country who happen to believe that better things are yet to come.
By the way, did you know that the old and delapidated oil mill at Saro has
been demolished and that a brand new oil mill is at an advance stage of
construction? Did I tell you that the EU is working out the modalities of
carrying out a feasibility study to determine the feasibility of
constructing a bridge between Banjul and Barra?
Did I tell you that we are now implementing the first of several phases to
provide affordable telephone lines and Internet access throughout the
country? Right now we have Siemens of Germany in the country about to start
the laying of a 350 Km fibre-optic cable from Fatoto across the river
Gambia and along the North Bank to Barra. This would then be linked to
Banjul to provide a fully redundant transmission backbone. Our people on
the North of the river would soon begin to realise the benefits of good
reliable communications just like those on the south bank.
These developments and more, is what brings about development and is a
gradual process. The rest, such as "farmers selling their
produce", "journalists not questioned for reporting the news" and much
more, would follow later. No hurry about that yet. For now, we want the
infrastructures built and our human resources developed to enable our
children carry on from where we stop.
Finally, until we can boast of Gambian Doctors curing Gambian patients,
Gambian lawyers defending Gambian laws, Gambian journalists educating
Gmabian people, Gambian agricultural scientists helping Gambian farmers,
Gambian teachers teaching children, Gambian civil engineers constructing
our Gambian roads, Gambian entrepreneurs exporting Gambian produce, Gambian
farmers feeding us Gambians etc, etc, all we can see is what this
government does. After all, none is stopping any of you from coming home
and showing us where we are going wrong and how to do things differently.
Is that asking for too much? Some of your raections to developments atking
place here reminds me of the Wollof phrase "Yobanteh Galgal". We can do
without that.
Have a very good day, Gassa.
--
There is a time in the life of every problem when it is big enough to see,
yet small enough to solve (Mike Leavitt)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface
at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html
To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to:
[log in to unmask]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
|
