Dear Hamadi,
Thanks. for your refreshing analysis. However I believe that we should give
credit where credit is due. Ousainou Darboe may be gentle and soft-spoken
but he has proved that only he can and has handled Yahya and reduced him to
an international criminal and murderer.
Ousainou Darboe  deserves our respect and commendation for discrediting  the
Jammeh regime by keeping it under constant and  close scrutiny. You would
agree that details of the the Crude oil scandal, the Swiss bank accounts and
other dubious deals of the  Jammeh regime became public thanks to the UDP
leadership. Ousainou Darboe's record as a brillant and selfless attorney
during the treason trials in the aftermath of the 1981 coup  says a lot
about the  fire in this man. Soft- spoken yes, soft for Yahya, No!

mariama




>From: Hamadi Banna <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list
><[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Decree 89 Politicians
>Date: Thu, 26 Jul 2001 14:17:56 -0500
>
>With the repeal of Decree 89 in the offing and the possible resurgence of
>First Republic politicians we are bound to witness unprecedented and
>possibly contentious presidential and legislative elections in The Gambia.
>The electorate could be split further along political allegiances and
>ethnic
>sympathies engendered by a mushroom of political groupings, each trying to
>canvass enough support from the people.
>
>As we wait to read the fine print of President Jammeh's July 22 speech,
>some
>political pundits are wondering whether the un-banned politicians will
>revive their former parties or join some of the existing ones.   With most
>of their members scattered over the various parties that contested the last
>elections, I have serious doubts as to the possibility of a comeback for
>the
>People’s Progressive Party (PPP), Gambia People’s Party (GPP) or National
>Convention Party (NCP).
>
>The PPP’s death-knell tolled on 22nd July 1994, when their three decade old
>government was overthrown with the tacit approbation of the Gambian public,
>their executive arrested, dragged before commissions of inquiry and
>humiliated.  After 30 years in power the PPP myth had been shattered one
>morning by a handful of army lieutenants in their 20s!  Who said anyone is
>indispensable?
>
>Since the party’s fall from grace, we have seen some of its members jump
>into the band wagon of the ruling Alliance for Patriotic Re-orientation and
>Construction (APRC) with the very people who had stripped them of their
>power, prestige and pride.  Is this not the typical ‘nyaaka kersa’
>(shamelessness) that politics are known for? From party chairpersons to
>former ministers we saw the PPP machinery fall apart as their leader,
>ex-president Jawara nursed his wounds in the UK.
>
>While he may still be popular in his constituency, Omar Jallow’s charisma
>alone cannot put back the pieces  of the PPP together.  I doubt if most of
>the party’s exiled members would want to risk going back to The Gambia to
>expose themselves to possible abductions, arbitrary arrests following an
>abrupt change of mind by Mr. Jammeh. For Mr. Jammeh has certainly excelled
>in being unpredictable when it comes to dealing with his rivals.  Those who
>consider him naïve and unintelligent are always taken for a ride, from what
>I have observed.
>
>As for the NCP, I think the party leader Sheriff Mustapha Dibba is still
>taking a vacation from politics.  For a politician who was known for his
>acerbic attacks on the PPP government and who never yielded to threats and
>intimidation his dumb-founded silence since the arrival of Mr. Yahya Jammeh
>in the scene is quite perturbing, not to say disarming.  Most of his party
>stalwarts have re-grouped around the United Democratic Party (UDP) whose
>ideals they identify with.  I don’t want to believe that they would quit
>the
>UDP to re-assemble around their party leader.  Mr. Dibba’s political
>experience could have been very useful for the UDP whose present leader,
>Mr.
>Ousainou Darboe is considered too soft to handle the APRC and beat them at
>their game.
>
>Assan Musa Camara is a septuagenarian whose candidacy for the presidential
>seat is clearly disqualified by the Second Republic Constitution.  The GPP
>came into being after Mr. Camara was expelled by former President Jawara
>from his government following the abortive 1981 coup d’etat.   With a small
>financial base and inadequate resources, his party could hardly garner
>enough support in the country.  But his integrity and soft-spoken humility
>won some sympathy from a negligible number of financiers and intellectuals
>in the Great Banjul Area.  Surprisingly, he failed to retain his seat in
>the
>Kontara Constituency after the emergence of the GPP, losing by narrow
>margins to a younger and obscure candidate, but who is a native of Kontora
>unlike Mr. Camara himself.
>
>As an elder statesman his weight in the opposition could boost up quite a
>considerable image for the Opposition.
>
>The recent declaration by the Peoples Democratic Organization for
>Independence and Socialism (PDOIS) regarding their willingness to form a
>coalition with the other opposition parties has been greeted with silence
>by
>their partners, the National Reconciliation Party (NRP) and the UDP.
>
>As we wait to see what the leaders of  the PPP, NCP and GPP will do next,
>President Jammeh’s APRC is digging its heels into the ground, ready for a
>fight.  Through inducement and clientelism and possibly intimidation
>(burying people six feet deep) Mr. Jammeh has already set the tone of his
>campaign and may pull off a victory unless the Opposition gets down to
>serious work.
>
>In Senegal, the opposition parties started negotiating the modalities of a
>coalition well in advance of the presidential elections.  In their
>collective vigilance, they caught the government trying to smuggle
>registration cards from Israel, they asked for a secret ballot and for the
>first time the powerful religious brotherhoods were asked to stay out of
>electioneering and not issue their infamous ‘ndiguels’ or religious
>decrees.
>  What happened next has been finely caught in a phrase by the Senegalese
>Professor Momar Coumba Diop and his colleagues as the “uprooting of the
>baobab”. The Socialist Party (PS) of Abdou Diouf which had ruled the
>country
>since 1960 was brought down by the opposition parties in one fell swoop
>like
>a giant boabab!
>
>I hope our opposition parties will learn from the experiences of our
>neighbors.
>
>Hamadi.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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