Jabou and Yus, thanks for your responses and we shall tell the truth for it will set us free.  I am really dumb founded by the utterances of Ebou Colley.  This is really disappointing, but who am I to be disappointed?  I am just one of those idiots from Sere-Kunda.  I will not be surprised if the chorus come in full support and defend every insult he lobbed at the very people he claimed to be in support of.  Brother, you have erred gravely and I hope you will reconsider some of your statements and apologize to your readers.  This mightier than though attitude is not the best course for your efforts. 

Why are we so thin skinned?  Are we so full of ourselves that we can't accept fallibility?  How come we have a group of individuals who agree with everything that a member of the group says, even if the idea is the most backward?  Talk about not thinking for one's self.  Folks, it's normal to say you do not know when you do not know.  It's normal to disagree with your friends and agree with your opponents when your opponents have a point and your friends don't.  It's abnormal to agree with someone ALL the time and disagree with others all the time.  I see the group members struggle to address a member for misstatements even though they know we all know what they are doing.  Let's learn to tell the truth regardless of who is affected and stop the hypocrisy.  This is really becoming standard practice for some in this forum.  You cannot disagree with anything they say and they are willing to throw at you all they got including the kitchen sink to have the last word on anything.  This madness needs to stop and people need to realize that they cannot control anybody or insult them to submission.  There is nothing you can say to anybody that they cannot haul back at you and then some.  No one has all the answers all the time and you can agree to disagree with your oponents or divergent views. Just a thought from a knucklehead from Sere-Kunda.

Chi Jaama

Joe Sambou

>From: Jabou Joh <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: THE BIGGER PICTURE/hint of arrogance?
>Date: Sun, 15 Jul 2001 22:30:53 EDT
>
>In a message dated 7/15/2001 3:52:55 PM Central Daylight Time,
>[log in to unmask] writes:
>
>
> > "That is what we should be
> > focusing our attention on Mr. Chongan and not on
> > meaningless remarks made by meaningless creatures from
> > meaningless streets of Half-Die, Soldier-Town,
> >
>
>ebou colley. I have said here numerous times that you are to be commended for
>coming forward to relay the information you have on the atorcities committed
>by this regime, and that this is one of the authentic sources of evidence
>that the Gambian people have against this regime.
>
>I and many others on this forum recognize that to get information such as you
>are furnishing requires someone who was in the know such as yourself, and i
>hope others follow suit in this endeavour. To me, this is an indication of
>courage as I have said before, but it also indicates to me that you love and
>care for the Gambian people as a whole, not just some of them who happen to
>agree with your viewpoints.
>
>Therefore, it is with a heavy heart that I have to tell you that your
>comments above anger me to no end. You see, you should not relegate people to
>"non-entities" just because they hold a differing view from yours. Or perhaps
>you know something that sets some Gambians above others that the rest of us
>do not know.
>
>This reeks of an arrogance that is more synonimous with Yaya Jammeh and his
>cohorts. These "non-entities" each and everyone of them, one by one, are the
>Gambian people. These non-entities form a nation that you say you love. it is
>not a nation of "intelligent people"whose opinion matters, and "non-entities"
>whose opinion is to be dismissed. That kind of attitude is what has given us
>the Yaya Jammehs of this World and those who support and think like them.
>Together, they translate into a nightmare for Gambia as well as Africa.
>You say that a soldier of your calibre speaking out is a revolutionary idea
>that will benefit Africa and is a marked departure from the actions of
>soldiers involved in coups etc on the continent. I agree and again, commend
>you.
>
>However, the accompanying arrogance that your above statement reveals is not
>consistent with this love, dedication and desire for truth that will uplift
>the people that you say you represent. Remember that the nations these
>soldiers serve is made up of individuals, most of whom are poor people from
>neighbourhoods similar to the ones you desvcribe with such disdain.
>
>I am from Half die, one of the "meaningless neighbourhoods" you mention.
>Perhaps my origins and those of other Gambians who come from similar
>neighbourhoods makes us non-entities whose opinions do not matter, and whom
>you can brush off with disdain.
>
>This makes me shudder and pray that we do not continue to have the likes of
>Yaya Jammeh emerge in our midst because it is people like that who have these
>kinds of opinions of the people, and that is why they are able to treat them
>with such disrespect and disdain, and heap all sorts of abuse on them since
>they do not see them as people.
>
>To me, I see absolutely nothing that differentiates any Gambin from the
>other. What is there that you can see that separates Gambians into a group
>that sees themselves as superior and a group of non-entities?
>
>I urge you to please remember that the justice we seek takes all opinions
>into consideration, and dismissing people as non-entities is not part of this.
>
>Without implying that yourself and Mr Chongan do not deserve assylum, I also
>want to point out that if investigations prior to granting asylum were as
>thorough and influential in granting asylum to political exiles as you think,
>then the likes of Mobutu Sese Seko, the Shah of Iran and others who have
>wrecked havoc with the lives of people in the countries they governed, or the
>economies they plundered, would never have found refuge in the West.
>
>On the contrary, more often than not, these rogues find refuge in the West
>all too easily and this is because the West simply does not concern itself
>much with those who kill and maim people in the so-called third World, and
>plunder our economies. These rogues deposit their loot into Western banks,
>and embellish their bottom lines, and that is all that matters to them.
>
>Again, i am dissappointed and sickened by your choice of words, and most
>especially because it came from you of all people.
>
>Jabou Joh
>
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