My Dear Hamjatta,

I must say that I have always looked forward to your contributions to this maelstrom, but I am dissappointed at the unnecessary complexity in both comprehension and syntax with which you presented this response to Halifa. I began reading with excitement. The zeal quickly turned into disgust because I regret to say that you were not communicating. What little time I invested in reading your treatise was a sheer waste of my valuable time. I hope the response was meant only for Halifa's consumption and not the audience of this forum. If so, can you please save such garbaldigook for his private mail-unless I'm the only one who believes that contributions to this maelstrom must always take into account the value of the audience's time, and the efficiency of the material in communication.

This is not to say that your mail is not valuable. I actually thought it was but unnecessarily long-winded and therefore inefficient in achieving the ultimate goal of communicating with your audience. It more resembles a working paper of a policy group and therefore would be better suited elsewhere. You could have let Friedman's quotation stand on its own.

I would welcome brevity and more clarity in treating the same subject coupled with your analytical skills. Otherwise, I'm utterly disgusted and you will have lost one member of your audience.

Brevity and clarity should be guiding principles in more effectively communicating in such a valuable vehicle as this maelstrom.

>From: Hamjatta Kanteh <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Response to Halifa: The Liberal Alternative and Agenda Part [ii]
>Date: Sat, 23 Jun 2001 18:28:35 EDT
>
>Halifa,
>
>In our last slot, we formulated the theoretical prerequisite of key
>institutional frameworks as appurtenances of the secular Liberal State to
>replace the mercantilist State without which the liberal and Capitalist order
>cannot subsist. To refresh our minds on the salient points of that slot, i
>shall briefly recap three major points that hold together the edifice i
>attempted to erect in the last slot. First, we pointed out that whatever it
>is that prevails in Africa and the Gambia, is not Capitalist and most
>certainly doesn't resemble anything liberal. Second, we noted that the
>fundamental problem in African economies is primarily that of what we
>contended to be the desultory machinations of the colonial heritage of the
>mercantilist State and its almost inextricable connections with commerce and
>industry at the expense of economic and individual freedom and efficiency.
>Third, we posited that in correcting such a status-quo, a liberal would first
>of all dismantle the mercantilist State in all its manifestations and replace
>it with a secular Liberal State whose appurtenances would be liberal
>democratic politics buoyed by free institutions like a robustly independent
>and free judiciary; that exist primarily to safe-guard the liberal order and
>Rule Of Law without which the liberal order eventually gets decimated by the
>likely renewal of political reactionaries and renegades who are opposed to
>the liberal order and ultimately inimical to individual liberties.
>
>To the aforementioned delineation, we now add the philosophical subtext: the
>apotheosis of the secular Liberal State vis-a-vis its relationship with the
>economic, social and political direction of a polity is to primordially act
>as an enabler, mechanism and facilitator that organically evolves - as the
>polity goes through similar evolution - from the Big to the Limited; as
>opposed to an all-giver, guarantor, all-powerful, be-all and end-all in the
>polity's economic, political and social life. In short, the apotheosis of the
>role of the secular Liberal State in a polity's economic, social and
>political life is the gratification of responsible, methodological and
>critical individualism.
>
>Of course, as a matter of both political and economic expediency, it makes no
>sense to be wedded to a theory that practical realities of a polity would
>undermine if such inimical practical realities of the said polity are not
>brought around to help the subsistence of such a theory. A liberal
>prescription of the African plight will begin life by first recommending a
>programme of substantial radical modification of social, economic and
>political structures without which the Liberal and Capitalist order cannot
>subsist and would be another failure in the attempt to make Africa better. To
>the extent that this is true, an African renewal would require a substantial
>transitionary phase which will in principle and indeed, grudgingly use the
>State as vehicle to re-write the rules of engagement on a radical scale such
>that there is clear demarcation of what ought to be private or what is best
>kept privately; and what can acceptably be public or best left to public
>ownership or direction. The ramifications of such a transition programme
>would be a complete evolution of economic, political and social ownership in
>the polity. The duration of such a transition is debatable; i.e., it's
>life-span will primarily depend on the extent to which the unique-ness and
>depth of each of the polity's economic, social and political infrastructures'
>degeneration, and how empirical truth determines the scale to which
>public-driven regeneration can conceivably be maintained without crowding-out
>private investment or initiatives. In short, the liberal renewal would
>initiatially take the form of cautious and empirically determined economic
>incubation of all public companies and or micro-economies until such a time -
>again empirically determined according to the unique-ness of each public
>company and or micro-economy - when they are ready to be hatched for private
>ownership.
>
>Let us now proceed to give the skeleton some flesh. As an example of how we
>ought to proceed, especially within the Gambian context, i shall recall the
>Gamtel example. Here, we emphasise that because of lack Gambian material that
>fulfils the task at hand, we resort to Gamtel as an example - that is to say
>that Gamtel happens to be the best illustration, within the Gambian context,
>of what we mean to say. That Gamtel, once upon a time, was the most
>important, successful and efficient corporation in the Gambia, is not in
>doubt. This to a extent is understandable; Gamtel was very unique from other
>public corporations in its ownership: the corporation was the making of a
>very ingenious public-private initiative in the form of technological and
>financial investments from a French company and the government of the Gambia
>undertaking some odd-ball investment responsibility. This was a very delicate
>arrangement and the fine line that had to be walked was walked with the
>delicacy required of it and the result was a complete revolution of the
>Gambia's telecom industry and ranking her amongst the best of the best in
>world telecom indices - perhaps, only South Africa besting the Gambia in
>telecom performance on the African continent. The tragedy that befell Gamtel
>was that when it reached its hatching period for the public ownership of the
>corporation to be completely phased out, the political climate of the country
>had changed. It is now a matter of historical speculation as to the fate
>Gamtel would have undergone, had the PPP remained in power. Doubtless,
>though, that the privatisation of Gamtel handled as the corporation's affairs
>were delicately handled during its early life, had all the prospects or
>ingredients of successful privatisation and - why not? - an
>international/regional outlook in corporate expansion. Yet, it is also
>debatable that even under the PPP, with Gamtel reaching maturity for
>privatisation, such a state of affairs would never have chanced: for the PPP
>also was presiding over a mercantilist State and enjoyed all its trappings at
>the expense of economic efficiency.
>
>As the Gamtel case showed, public corporations under the tutelage of
>experienced private investment are far more efficient and profitable than
>those that are run by inept politicians and their political appointees.
>Certainly, the experience is also that public corporations that started life
>out on what i shall call here "the Gamtel principle" - that is a public
>corporation nurtured under the tutelage of both public and private led
>initiatives with the ultimate intention of shelving public ownership as soon
>as it is economically feasible - are easier to transfer to private ownership.
>Against such backdrop, the liberal renewal in the Gambia, would invoke the
>"Gamtel principle" in the drive towards market liberalism of the economy.
>Ditto, all Gambian public corporations and or micro-economies that the
>cumbersome and grubby hands of the State still holds sway - from GPTC to
>NAWEC - would pass through the economic incubation phase we have given the
>local buzz phrase of "the Gamtel principle". The only possible exception that
>comes to mind is the SSHFC; which economic imperative and logic dictates that
>the farthest public control can be wrested from the corporation is to let it
>remain a public-private venture - even if it reached a period where it is
>fattened enough to be privatised. With the SSHFC, we will radically advocate
>for a demerger of the corporation by privatising its Housing and Finance
>divisions whilst Social Security retains a modicum of public tutelage without
>completely crowding-out private investments and initiatives.
>
>For the transition to translate into genuine free market liberalism, "the
>Gamtel principle" cannot be decoupled from the dismantling of the
>mercantilist State. The two processes ought to go in tandem together or else
>each would turn out to be an exercise in futility. In short, economic
>liberalism is political liberalism. I take note they are not exactly blood
>brothers. Yet, few would doubt that an individual that is politically
>liberated, is - all things being equal - on his way to translating his
>political liberties into economic liberties and vice versa. Let Milton
>Friedman explain:
>
> "Viewed as a means to the end of political freedom, economic arrangements
>are important because of their effect on the concentration or dispersion of
>power. The kind of economic organisation that provides economic freedom
>directly, namely, competitive capitalism, also promotes political freedom
>because it seperates economic power from political power and in this way
>enables the one to offset the other. Historical evidence speaks with a single
>voice on the relation between political freedom and a free market. I know of
>no example in time or place of society that has been marked by a large
>measure of political freedom, and that has not also used something comparable
>to a free market to organize the bulk of economic activity.
>.........The relation between political and economic freedom is complex and
>by no means unilateral. In the early nineteenth century, Bentham and the
>Philosophical Radicals were inclined to regard political freedom as a means
>to economic freedom. They believed that the masses were being hampered by the
>restrictions that were being imposed upon them, they would do what was good
>for them, which was to vote for laissez faire. In retrospect, one cannot say
>they were wrong. There was a large measure of political reform that was
>accompanied by economic reform in the direction of a great deal of laissez
>faire. An enormous increase in the well-being of the masses followed this
>change in economic arrangements." [Milton Friedman, Capitalism and Freedom,
>pp 9-10, The University of Chicago Press, 1982]
>
>Overall, the extent to which the proposed transition phase can be declared a
>success or said to have reach maturity would be determined by the gloss on
>the polity's index of political and economic freedoms; i.e., the gradual
>withdrawal of the State from ALL economic spheres that are best left to
>individual initiatives and private investors; the decentralisation and
>dispersion of political power from the centre; the entrenchment of free
>institutions; the wedding of the polity to Karl Popper's concept of the "Open
>Society" of responsible individuals and a critical public; the entrenchment
>of individual and civil liberties. Hereunder, trade policy, price and wage
>rules, labour market structures, intellectual and property rights, foreign
>investment rules, taxation, government expenditure and intervention,
>regulation policy, banking system, monetary and fiscal policy etc, etc, shall
>all reflect political and economic liberalism.
>
>I will, however, grant that regeneration of the farming crisis can
>demonstrably be difficult to pigeonhole into industrial and commercial market
>liberalism. For this reason, i shall shelve the liberal regeneration of the
>farming crisis for the next slot, where i will do a critique of PDOIS'
>Economic Programme. Yet that concession doesn't corrode my conviction that in
>the long run, and after radical dismantling of all forms of economic
>impediments and substantial structural modifications, farming fits
>beautifully every jot and tittle of market and free trade liberalism.
>
>All the best,
>
>Hamjatta Kanteh
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>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 and remember to write your full name and e-mail address.
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 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 and remember to write your full name and e-mail address. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------