Ebou Colly, your account of the November 11 coupe makes very sorry reading.
While I was busy debating Hamjatta, I failed to read your part 3 earlier on.
While reading it I could not help crying. That we have Gambians in our midst
capable of such heinous deeds is beyond me. For the past day and a half, I
could not believe what I read. I printed parts 1-3 and when my wife read it
she could could stop crying.

It may surprise many that very few people know about what you've narated. I
was introduced to the late Lt. Basirou Barrow a few weeks before he was
implicated in the Nov. 11 coupe attemt. The moment I spoke to him he struck
me as some one very smart. From that day, he never called me by my name. He
always called me kotto. It is very very hard to believe that former comrades
in arms, buddies who drink attaya together, can perpetrate such horrendous
acts, is really unbelievable. But again, I shouldn't be that surprised
'cause you yourself said this in part 2 of your current narative:

"They (good Officers) are generally well cultured, Properly educated and
tested to meet the set standards; they have self-esteem and definitely
understand that the country equally belong to them in the very way it
belongs to any president. None of these virtues prevailed in the Field Force
where the service men were literally social outcasts in terms of origin,
education, social status, family background and self-esteem.. So instead of
having fine warriors prepared to lay their lives for the defense of their
nation, we ended up grooming angry jealous armed men full of hate and
destructive tendencies ready to follow any deviant or criminal into a path
of national destruction". It is very sad but I don't think the situation is
any different today.

Believe you me, not even some members of the families of those killed during
the November 11 incident know anything about what you've just narated.

May God, the almighty, have mercy on their souls.

Bye 4Now, KB Jobe.

>----Original Message Follows----
>From: ebou colly <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list
> ><[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: COUP IN GAMBIA THREE
>Date: Sun, 6 May 2001 19:05:33 -0700
>
>                                          COUP IN
>GAMBIA THREE
>KB Dampha, I am pleased but equally saddened that you
>asked about Gibril Saye or Lieutenant Saye. Pleased in
>the sense that his case needs to be told which I shall
>attempt to do the way I understand it. But am also
>quite sad to remember every thing about this fine
>soldier who was too good to die the way he did.
>Everything you mentioned about this soldier,
>especially his devotion and love to promote sports in
>the GNA-had a keen hand in football, basketball,
>volleyball and everything-made him more so a victim to
>be mourned and wept for until that day when his body
>is exhumed from that toilet pit and given a decent
>burial. We can classify Saye as the real soldier with
>difference. He was nice, respectable and highly
>competent. But above everything, the young man was
>soft hearted, couldn't hurt a fly when it comes to
>killer instincts that we saw among the ranks of the
>army since 1994. The guy had conscience and would
>rather die than see the truth twisted and remain
>indifferent to it like so many APRC lackeys we see
>today. One of the reasons I later learnt for the
>AFPRC's decision to eliminate him was among other
>things his constant challenge to all of them over our
>detention at the central prisons without any credible
>reason or explanation for it. I understand he had
>openly and constantly protested to the council members
>to try us if they had anything against us or set us
>free. But death row at Mile Two prisons was not, as
>far as he was concerned, a place for good officers
>like us. He had even gone against all odds one day by
>coming to the prisons to see us with encouraging words
>to the effect that they were working hard for our
>freedom. He had brought us provisions and toilet
>articles as well. It was shocking to learn few days
>later that Saye was dead.

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