Joe,

You have raised some interesting points concerning forward planning and the prioritisation of projects. As far as the ferry problem and river transport in general are concerned, I believe more should be done in that area.

Another problem that is hampering  development in this country also has to do with our understanding and use of preventative maintenance. In the past, we are sometimes advised by Nawec of an impending routine maintenance on such and such a machine only for it to end up needing a major corrective maintenance. The same can be said of road maintenance also. Small potholes emerge, they are watched as they grow and soon they start getting married and producing more potholes. I am of the opinion that we don't sometimes intervene early enough thereby resulting in very expensive corrective procedures. 

Coming back to the Ferry problem, last year the GPTC bought one ferry from Holland and if I remember rightly it is due here before May. The de-commissioning of both the Banjul and Niumi ferries has really added a lot of pressure on the Barra Ferry.

The issue of overloading the ferries also needs to be looked at very seriously. In fact a few years back a fully laden truck had to be pushed overboard to safe the ferry and its passengers from going down. The same applies to the smaller boats too.

Another serious problem, particularly in the Banjul - Barra route, is the persistent silting. Silting is a major problem and it is only the skills of the captains of these ferries that "normal" crossings still take place relatively without much hitch.

Recently there have been attempts at trying to make people aware of certain procedures to follow in the event of a potential ferry disaster. On a number of occasions mock recues were practised whose main aims were to see how the general public, the emergency services, the medical services, the Gambia navy, the Red Cross and commercial taxi drivers would cope in the event of an emergency such as the ferry being in trouble.

There have been workshops also to sensitize people about the use of life belts, life jackets and emergency rafts. Fishermen have been issued with a number of life belts following many disasters at sea. I am not very certain of this, but if my memory serves me right I believe I once heard a senior fisheries official saying that after a transition period, government would make it compulsory for fishermen to have lifebelts or life jackets. I do not know how they would go about it as I believe that their scarcity in the country would be a major stumbling block.

Turning to the issue of the gift of a commercial FM station to GRTS, I believe that is not a bad idea at all. At the moment I believe that GRTS is being supported by a subvention from central government with the parastatals chipping in plus additional revenue that they generate from advertisements. If this additional FM radio is run strickly as a commercial station, particularly with the promised maintenance support of 13,000 Euros a year and training of GRTS staff, it would only be good for the public. These are my views concerning the ferries and radio stations for now.