Jabou,
By and large, I agree with most of what you are saying. Unfortunately
however, i have the feeling that you do not understand my logic. Let me try
to put it this way:
1. The deprivation, destitution and downright poverty that some of you
people assume is consuming us is not true. I would never say that there is
no deprivation, destitution or poverty in the country. On the contrary, I
would be one of the first to acknowledge that. What I am saying is simply
this, it is NOT government's responsibility to provide food for the people.
Government does not have that money or power to do so. To do so tantamounts
to turning The Gambia into a welfare state or worst, a communist state.
This is precisely why I have a problem supporting PDOIS. When I heard Sidia
Jatta say that the D7,000.00 or so Dalasis he is paid as a member of the
national Assembly is too much, I asked myself, What would a PDOIS
government do? Would they want to regulate or decide what is adequate pay
for the jobs we do based on what one needs to have decent living standard?
This is not acceptable to me. What I expect from government is to
facilitate the production of wealth by providing the much needed
infrastructures such as those being put in place by government. It is our
collective responsibility to do all that we can and as honestly as
possible. The justice that some of you claim to want in our country will
never be if we cannot produce the lawyers or judges. Doesn't it strike you
as pathetic that in a country of over 1.3 million, we do dont have 30
Gambian lawyers or 20 Gambian magistrates or 10 Gambian judges?
2. Your assumption that some of us who support the government are either
living flamboyant lifestyles, out of touch with the plight of the ordinary
citizens of this country or are afraid of losing our jobs cannot be further
from the truth. I have always said it here that If one is sacked from his
job and his/her departure is not felt or he cannot move on, then he/she did
not deserve that job in the first place. I fervently believe that those of
us working for the government are doing so out of love for country and
wanting continuity. I do not delude myself for once that I deserve my job
more than any other Gambian or that I am indespensable? On the other hand,
I also believe that I adding value to what government is doing. If they or
I do not like it any more, we can just call it quits and I move on.
3. While you lot are covered by insurance in case of falling ill or
incapacitated, the average Gambian does not enjoy that. You lot are also
spoilt for choice when it comes to moving from point to point. You can
travel 2,000 miles in a matter of hours whilst some of us would need to
budget for it for months if not years and even when we have the money it
would take us days. Try transporting a sick man from a village like Kayai
in the CRD to Bansang or from Kiang Kollior to Farafeni and see how long it
would take you even though the distances are less that 40 miles. If an
emergency happens that requires you to evacuate such people to those
facilities after 5 PM, forget it, for you will not make it. Hence our
delight when health facilities are put up and roads constructed. And before
you start telling me the rubbish peddled here by some disgruntled people
that our hospitals do not have medicines or equipment, let me tell you that
that is not true. Facilities like RVH, Farafeni and Bansang are well
equiped. In fact telemedicine would be up and running in a matter of months.
4. Finally, if some of you assume that we do not appreciate or are
unwilling to accept constructive critism, then you cannot be more wrong. We
travel and see what we do not have and we listen to genuine critism. What
we would not accept is for people living in yonder land telling us that all
we are doing is wrong and that we are out of touch with our own realities.
This, my friend, we will not accept! We know our realities as we are living
them.
Have a 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)
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