Brother Ansumana, the personal attacks on your second paragraph was really unnecessary. This kind of statements only gives clowns like Edi Sidibeh, Tombong and Ambassador-in-hiatus Essa Sey, ammunition to sidetrack and hijack the real debate on Gambia and which way forward; Under the tutelage of Yahya Jammeh, the old Jawara nomenclature, or a new Gambia, where the populace are participants not onlookers, the latter being the norm since time immemorial. The overwhelming philosophy of political participation in Gambia is one where the system [rulers/commissary class] perpetrates a notion that 'The average man/woman is so stupid, that, whatever they [the despots] say goes', hence the electoral process would call upon the massive poor and disillusioned every five years to vote for one or more of the myth makers, therefore, continuation of the same crap is guaranteed through the voting scheme. My question to you and other members of the L is: apart from PDOIS and Halifa Sallah [in his personal capacity], could you name me one person, political party or otherwise, that engaged the Gambian population in such sociopoliticoeconomic education or 'edutainment' as you might refer to it from your statements. I will be frank with you, my philosophy toward reading and learning anything that comes my way, started during my second semester in university. An Indian professor of political science asked me to write a paper on Cheikh Anta Diop, for those of us who don't know, the most respected African historian/archeaologist/philosopher/engineer, and being the smart-a-- fool that I was, went into the negative aspect of the nonsense diatribes attributed to him by some Senegalese politicians and citizenry.... he's a fool, baldheaded [the same nonsense Abdou Diouf tried on Abdoulaye Wade; "NIT KU YORRUL PEPE KAWAR CHI BHOPAMBI, NAKA LAI YOREH NGUUR"] and that he must be from planet Mars, because his historical approach that Africans were here before Adam and eve, understandably offensive to Muslims and Christians. This guy took me all the way to Philadelphia to the Lincoln Museum and lend me some of Cheikh Anta's books, which I profess change the way I think and respect others, even though have different perspectives. Guess who was named after Dakar University after Cheikh Anta died? CHEIKH ANTA DIOP UNIVERSITY, hence, it is truly said, "the stone that the builder refused, shall be the head corner stone and that the rejected one, always end up be ing celebrated. I will also confess that, I never followed Halifa's writing seriously, but discussing with levelheaded people that are more versed in comparative political history on the Gambia, Halifa is one person that Jawara really respected because of the well respected nature of his personality, research capability and grassroots approach. I'm not saying that Halifa is perfect and I don't think he ever professes to be such, but the guy is engaged in spheres of interests, such as the constitution, political process, economic development/priority issues etc. that most Gambians, including myself, paid little or no attention to. What I'm saying is that, we have to start agreeing to disagree and that even Jawara or Yahya Jammeh has a right to be heard, then challenge constructively. the moment we start getting personal, we turnoff a lot of symphatizers to our cause of changing gambia once and for all. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html ----------------------------------------------------------------------------