Fatou, I have read your memo of 16 August 2000. I believe the essence of communication is to understand each other. You initially claimed that I was sitting on the fence. I responded by agreeing with you that that would be inappropriate at this moment when decisiveness is most required. I believe I have made it abundantly clear that the Constitution makes provision for a second round of voting; that the first round serves as a primary to determine the numerical strength of a political party among the voting population; that it is this instrument which helps a political party to assess the quantity and quality of its work among the population. It is generally in the second round of voting that united fronts are established. I have given example of Senegal in some of my postings where Niasse and Djibou Ka stood as presidential candidates in the first round. In fact there were approximately eight presidential candidates in Senegal. In the second round of voting, Djibou Ka even allied with Abdou Diouf but this did not prevent the opposition alliance from winning. In contrast, there were only two parties in Zimbabwe, yet ZANU-PF still managed to win. I am, therefore, not sitting on the fence. Our position is clear. I even went further to indicate that it would be unrealistic for us to ask other opposition parties to form a united front around a PDOIS presidential candidate, but that we will not oppose such a development in the name of unity in the first round. I said this because of my conviction that other opposition parties have the prerogative to test their numerical strength among the voting population. We are not creating any blockages to bar such parties from testing their numerical strength. this is why they were established in the first place. Instead of accepting the position that each opposition party could say the same ,thus giving legitimacy to the filing of candidate by each party in the first round to determine which candidates are wanted by the people to go to the second round, you automatically try to show how unrealistic it is for a PDOIS Presidential candidate to be the candidate of an opposition alliance by asserting the following: "Halifa we do not need to conduct a poll in Gambia's political environment to know that UDP support is likely to outnumber PDOIS. Halifa even though PDOIS is in Gambia's political scene for a long time it would be unrealistic to suggest Seedia as presidential elect knowing fully well that PDOIS doesn't or will be incapable of carrying the majority vote. I do not need to be a political analyst to predict this." Fatou, what then is the essence of having an electoral system if you advocate the principle that once a majority party always a majority party; once a minority party always a minority party? What is a democratic order based on other than the principle of governing by the consent of the people? What is the essence of multipartyism other than giving opportunity to the people to make informed choices as they gauge the practices and programmes of political parties who appeal to them? Who can guarantee that those who voted for a ruling party yesterday will vote for them today? Let me give you clear examples. People keep on hammering that PDOIS is not getting votes. Serrekunda East is a constituency in the urban area with the largest number of voters. We did not take any colanut to any compound. We did not bribe or induce anyone. Even the committees we have today had not been established yet. Yet, PDOIS had over 8500 votes in Serrekunda East which was more than the UDP vote. Needless to say, PDOIS stood on its own merit while UDP is a coalition of different parties. The same thing can be said for the Wuli constituency where Sidia Jatta stood on his own merit against APRC and UDP and still won the seat without inducing or intimidating anyone. Now, everybody knows what Sidia is doing in the National Assembly. This was not the case when he stood as a presidential candidate. You see, my sister, there is a long story that PDOIS has to tell about its politics. One cannot judge PDOIS on the basis that it has been here longer than all other political parties. One must also understand the quantitative growth of a party leading to its qualitative development. PDOIS started as a small unit with few people struggling with material resources on their own to grow up to have branches all over the country without inducing or intimidating anyone. It was competing with parties with tremendous material resources which could rely on inducement to establish their branches everywhere. Herein lies the slowness of PDOIS in spreading and having grip all over the country. This is a simple and elementary truth. Suffice it to say, it was easy for the UDP to arise and grow by simply assimilating the structures established by the older parties like the PPP, NCP, GPP, as well as to draw tremendous resources from the same spring. This is also very easy to explain. The consolidation of the APRC by assimilating the structures left by the PPP, NCP and GPP, as well as the utilisation of the huge State machinery and immense financial resources from all sources, could also be easily explained. Hence, it will be wrong to simply conclude that even without analysis one can forecast that PDOIS cannot have a majority. This negates the democratic principle. It gives the impression that once people's minds are made up they are forever made up. The democratic principle is based on the presumption that the minds of people are in a state of flux and that political parties are to compete to win the minds of the people on a continuous basis, thus leading to variation in their numerical support from one stage to another. It is this variation that is to be assessed through the electoral process. It is, therefore, only fair for you to acknowledge that PDOIS is a party in The Gambia. It is your prerogative to support it or oppose it. It is your right to make suggestions of tactical alliances, but it would be unfair to pass the type of judgment that you have passed on PDOIS before assessing the verdict of the people. In fact, taking what you have said that there is no need for even assessment to know that PDOIS cannot have majority, it would be suicidal for PDOIS not to assess its numerical support among the people. In short, if it is put in a coalition, when will people know again how much support PDOIS has? What will prevent people like you to even continue saying when PDOIS wants to stand for elections tomorrow that PDOIS is an insignificant party and was an insignificant part of a coalition? This is the point, my sister. We need to understand the true political weight of PDOIS so as to shatter the myths which are based on PDOIS' own mode of growth as a party within a political environment which has always been unfavourable. Everybody knows that nothing is more difficult than to root your political evolution on informing, enlightening and persuading people whilst others are inducing and intimidating them. However, the fact that despite inducement and intimidation, we could take the Wuli seat and had more votes than the UDP in Serrekunda East confirm to us that with more organisation and more material resources from people who are convinced of PDOIS' politics, PDOIS' numerical strength among the voters will grow quantitatively and qualitatively. I hope my message is clear this time. Greetings, Halifa. ----- Original Message ----- From: Fatou Darboe <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Wednesday, August 16, 2000 3:43 AM Subject: Re: Mr. Sallah>> Attn: Mr. Halifa Sallah > Yes Halifa we indeed met in washington. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html You may also send subscription requests to [log in to unmask] if you have problems accessing the web interface ----------------------------------------------------------------------------