If Africa Confidential understands Yaya Jammeh and his slimy tactics so
well, it's inconceivable that any honest observer of the Gambia's political
scene could miss the point. Read on...
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The Independent (Banjul)
March 30, 2001
Posted to the web March 30, 2001
Banjul, the Gambia
It is easy to break western precepts of good governance and still haul in
international aid. President Yahya Jammeh's regime shows how. In December,
the International Monetary Fund relieved Gambia of debt worth US $91
million, despite worsening government corruption, rigged elections and the
killing of 14 demonstrators last year. Now opposition parties are
campaigning internationally for free elections and foreign governments are
looking more closely at the Jammeh order.
Jammeh has banned many leading politicians from this year's national
elections and those eligible to stand face harassment and detention. The
real winner of the 1996 elections, the United Democratic Party's Ousainou
Darboe, sought refuge in the Senegalese Embassy for fear of assassination.
Two years earlier, Jammeh had seized power in bizarre coup against the
elected government of Sir Dawda Jawara, whom he accused of corruption and
nepotism. None of Jawara's officials has been charged with any offence but
all save a couple are banned from politics.
Jammeh's officials say the presidential election will be in October, with
the National Assembly elections in January 2002. Yet the local government
polls scheduled for last November have been postponed indefinitely because
of 'problems with constituency boundaries'. Bishop Solomon Johnson, the
Electoral Commissioner, doubted this, as did others, and took the government
to court. In December, he was fired and replaced by Gabriel Roberts, who ran
the dubious elections of 1996.
Nobody expects free elections like those last year in Senegal and Ghana,
since nobody believes Jammeh and his Alliance for Patriotic Reorientation
and Construction could win a free poll. The APRC's thuggish youth wing -
formerly the July 22 Movement - is ready for action in marginal
constituencies. Under the command of Baba Jobe, who operates out of the
presidency, the Libyan-trained youth wing is the APRC's enforcer. Last June,
the UDP's Darboe asked for police protection after an ambush by the youth
wing. His request was turned down and he was arrested, along with 24 UDP
supporters.
Darboe has since been improbably charged with murdering one of the militants
of the July 22 Movement who had laid an ambush for a group of Darboe's
supporters. It seemed at first that the government hoped to divert attention
from squabbles among its security officers. Now it seems Jammeh wants to use
the murder charge to disqualify Darboe - easily the country's most popular
politician - from the elections. Some securocrats are still quarrelling but
all key positions are under the control of Jammeh's tiny Jola ethnic group;
Army Chief of Staff Baboucar Jatta; Minister of Interior Ousman Badji,
Military Commander Momdou Badji; Director of the National Intelligence
Agency Abdoulie Kujabi. Grotesquely, Jammeh condemns Fula and Mandinka
politicians for engaging in ethnic politics.
The President's poverty trap Poverty, official corruption and insecurity
worry Gambians more. The government has rejected the findings of its own
Commission of Inquiry into the killing of 14 demonstrators, mainly students,
last April. Jammeh's officials claimed the Commission hadn't investigated
events leading up to the killings; the Justice Secretary and Attorney
General, the deeply unpopular Pap Cheyassin Ousman Secka, led the
government's charge against the inquiry. Then Secka, once described as 'more
Jammeh than Jammeh', was sacked on 30 January and replaced by a member of
the officially criticized Commission Joseph Joof.
The affair rattled the judges. The senior judge who conducted the inquiry,
Ousman Jammeh, was reportedly sacked; Chief Justice Felix Lartey, a
Ghanaian, was pressured to resign - then withdrew his resignation several
days after the presidency had assured him that political pressure on the
bench would cease once the furore over the report had died down.
The Commission named several Police Intelligence Unit officers in connection
with the killings. Many blame the feared National Intelligence Agency. The
government has tried to stifle the debate but its rejection of the
Commission's report has strengthened the opposition campaign for the repeal
of the decrees: Number 45, which set up the National Intelligence Agency and
allows for detention without trial; Nos. 70 and 71, which muzzle the press
and civil society; and No. 89 which bars politicians of the Jawara era from
elections. Worse may be to come: the government's proposed Media Commission,
comprised of Jammeh appointees, will have the powers of a court to suppress
publications and prosecute for sedition.
The Commonwealth Secretary General, Don McKinnon, was in Gambia on 19-20
February to remind Jammeh that he had agreed to repeal Decree 89 last
November. McKinnon, like others, was assured the decree would be repealed
and free elections would be prepared. He told Jammeh that Gambia would
remain on the watch-list of the Commonwealth Monitoring Action Group until
the oppressive decree was rescinded. Gambia got another wrist slap from
Commonwealth ministers when they met in London on 18-19 March: he was again
told to repeal Decree 89 'well before' this year's parliamentary and
presidential elections. However, the Commonwealth didn't give a deadline for
the decree's repeal nor did it threaten sanctions if Jammeh ignored the
request again. Britain is also applying pressure.
Unless Jammeh makes the reforms well before the October polls, they won't be
recognized as legitimate. That doesn't worry the Jammeh regime unduly: on 4
March, Attorney General Joof said that the 'government was not in a rush to
repeal Decree 89'. Joof and Jammeh may reckon that another six months on the
Commonwealth watch-list are preferable to lifting the ban on popular
politicians, especially in Mankinka areas, where there is plenty of support
for Jawara's banned People's Progressive Party. Jammeh may rescind Decree 89
a few weeks before the presidential elections, leaving his opponents little
time to rebuild their political networks.
Gambians in Britain and the United States are stepping up pressure on
Jammeh. Their 'Movement for the Restoration of Democracy' organized a
meeting of banned and unbanned oppositionists in the House of Commons in
London on 28 February. Former PPP minister Omar Jallow and several others
came from Banjul for the meeting which was organized with a group of British
Labour members of parliament led by Diane Abbot, John McDonnell and Jeremy
Corbyn. A second meeting there is planned in April. This would try to work
out a common coalition platform for the elections, something that's easier
to do in Westminster than in Banjul. Also in the background is 76-year old
Sir Dawda, living in exile in Sussex.
However, Jammeh has brought into his camp a couple of old regime politicians
- Jawara's former associate Buba Baldeh and PPP veteran Lamin Nafa Saho, who
is set to be the APRC candidate for his home area of Central Baddibu, in a
by-election on 31 March. Musa Njadoe, National Reconciliation Party member
for Kiang Central, is under pressure to cross the floor, though the NRP's
parliamentary leader pressure to cross the floor, though the NRP's
parliamentary leader, Hamat Bah, keeps up the public confrontation from his
Upper Saloum power-base. APRC politicians claim they have won over thousands
of former UDP supporters in key constituencies such as Lower Fulladu West.
Jammeh has said he favours Sharia (Islamic law); some think he is currying
favour with backers from northern Nigeria and Kuwait, who are financing
public works in Banjul; the Imam of State House mosque, Abdoulie Fatty, is
close to Saudi Arabian religious conservatives. The deputy UDP leader, Lamin
Waa Juwara recently warned Jammeh that Sharia would kill tourism and cut
Western aid. Juwara suspects Jammeh of wanting a Libyan-style government,
with no parties and no elections. Jammeh is active in the Libyan-sponsored
Community of Sahelo-Saharan States, which held its third annual summit in
Khartoum, Sudan, on 12 - 13 February.
How to pay for the pilgrimsJammeh personally committed himself to sending 20
pilgrims from each administrative region to Mecca and Medina on the annual
pilgrimage, the Hajj; opposition figures suggest that the bill will be met
from links to diamond-running out of Sierra Leone. APRC dignitaries who
lobby for funds for Arabic-language religious instruction include members of
the Council of Elders, set up by Jammeh to co-opt religious leaders.
Abroad, things have been moving against Jammeh. His old pal Babani Sissoko
(known as 'Babanding' in Banjul), a Malian-based businessman and airline
proprietor, is wanted by legal authorities in several countries and rarely
leaves the Bamako suburbs. Links between Jammeh's regime and Charles
Taylor's in Liberia provoke more interest. Ansoumana Jobe, a brother of
Jammeh's security advisor Baba Jobe is one of Taylor's top securocrats: the
two Jobes were trained in Libya. Gambian army officers freely admit that
some of their personnel (serving and retired) have freelanced in Sierra
Leone for Taylor's militias and the rebel Revolutionary United Front.
Gambia produces no diamonds but had become a major exporter, mostly of gems
smuggled from rebel-held areas of Sierra Leone. Last year, Jammeh's
government didn't respond to questions from the United Nations team
investigating the region's diamond smugglers. In 1998, Belgium recorded
imports from Gambia of 449,000 carats, valued at $78million. The volume fell
by half in 1999 and 2000 but half is still a lot of money for Banjul's
democrats.
Nigeria's President Olusegun Obasanjo sees Jammeh as a jumped up lieutenant
putschist and friend of Obasanjo's gaoler, the late General Sani Abacha.
Obasanjo advises Jammeh to do as he is asked by CMAG (chaired by Nigeria
Foreign Minister Sule Lamido). Obasanjo's censure didn't stop the
British-based Nigerian soccer star John Fashanu going to Banjul in
mid-February to give football kits to the Jammeh Foundation.
Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade distrusted Jammeh's peacemaking gestures
in Casamance and his friendship with Guinea Bissau's late army chief, Gen.
Ansoumane Mane. Mane helped smuggle arms to the Casamance separatists, with
finance from the cannabis trade. Mane's death and the new peace deal in
Casamance undermine Jammeh's regional position. That might explain Jammeh's
meeting with Wade on a rare trip to Dakar on 19 March.
Gamia's economy is surreal. The IMF, desperate to show its readiness to
relieve debts, approved $91 million in relief under its Heavily Indebted
Poor Countries Initiative and so rescued the Finance Ministry from impending
crisis. The 2001 budget projects a surplus of 280 million Dalasis ($20
million), after a 15 percent rise in current expenditure (which Finance
Secretary Famara Jatta is expected to spend in key electoral areas). Yet the
dalasi has weakened sharply in recent months, on the back of a 16 percent
drop in tourist arrivals and major disruption to the groundnut trade. Still,
with a tricky election coming up, Jatta will be expected to produce some
economic magic - with some help from Jammeh's shy foreign friends.
Culled from Africa Confidential of March 2001



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