By Mathew K. Jallow, Associate Editor

I was flabbergasted by Alieu Mboge’s very demeaning letter to Yahya Jammeh. It is similar to Bala Musa Gaye’s letter more than a year ago and Lamin Sanyang’s letter more recently last year. I was unable to react to Bala Gaye’s letter, but I am taking the liberty to respond to Alieu Mboge’s pathetic and humiliating letter to the animal; Yahya Jammeh. Below is Alieu Mboge’s letter and my response to him.

Alieu Mboge:

I could not have been more honored, as I was, when I came out of retirement and for the next years, you entrusted to me, with quiet confidence, one assignment after another, and always providing the support, either by giving funds or by showing the lead, as good leadership must, in our national push towards greater prosperity.  (Alieu Mboge)

Mathew K. Jallow:

Certainly, Mr. Mboge, because you are such a greedy and corrupt individual, you are bound to praise Jammeh for the money that he gave you while he was ruining our economy. Money is all you have ever cared about, but the money you got from him, was our money too; we The Gambian people. You are still greedy, after your disastrous contributions to bankrupting and destructing so many of Jawara era projects. Besides, the only people you cared about are some of the (Wollofs here meaning Banjulians) people who live within the four corners of the walls of our capital Banjul.

Dear Alieu (Khakatarr) Mboge, you have no shame, no class and no dignity. For you to write such a demeaning letter to an idiot like Jammeh, who is still causing so much misery in our country, is beyond belief.

And you said also that Jammeh showed you how to lead. Really? I thought you prided in your experience, but to even dare to attach the word “good” to Jammeh’s name is to commit sacrilege. Jammeh is a good leader to you, because, throughout your life, you never really cared about the welfare of our country. Everything you did was done to satisfy your own greed. Mr. Mboge, let me ask you this. Are you happy that so many Gambians have been murdered by Jammeh’s regime? Does it not bother you that every day, day in day out, Gambians are being fired from their jobs, arrested and sent to prison, some for years;  without ever being charged with any crime. Image that the man who sat in detention for nine years, someone who even the justice department forgot about, was you blood relative, how would it feel? Mr. Mboge, I know you do not care, but hundreds of Gambian families are hurting, all because of Jammeh, the person to who you ascribe “good leadership.”

Alieu Mboge:

To call me back at the time that you did, when I had retired, bespoke of the confidence and trust you had in me; and I was absolutely thrilled at the opportunity to have a late innings in my career, to have an Indian summer, as the expression goes, not for vainglorious reasons, but to offer, without putting too fine a point on it, my experiences and knowledge in the service of the people.

Mathew K. Jallow:

Jammeh will certainly be attracted to people like you, because uncaring, corrupt and heartless as you are, you and Jammeh have a lot in common. Mr. Mboge. Gambia does not need your experience and knowledge. You experience and knowledge already brought us economic ruin and social instability. It is because of people like that we have an ignorant like Jammeh sitting at the State House right now. Mr. Alieu Mboge, your last act was to deliver our National Trading Corporation (NTC) to one of your protégés Charbell Nachief for pennies on the dollar. It was a windfall for Mr. Nachief, who soon closed shop after pocketing the millions in profit from your deal with him. You were too arrogant to recognize that NTC was a public enterprise belonging to the Gambian people, and too stupid to realize that you were depriving the Gambian people of what was rightfully theirs. And to describe the culmination of your work under Jawara and Jammeh “in service to the people” is the biggest joke in Gambia’s public service history. Furthermore, I would advice you to stick to Wollof, if I may. Don’t try to be poetic or bombastic. It ain’t working.

 
Alieu Mboge:

Gratitude, like history, casts her shadow backwards, and having my eyes similarly cast, I am delighted to acknowledge my gratitude to you for sincere confidence you had in me, of which I had done my utmost, with each assignment, from the Committee for Peace Reconciliation of Banjul, the Banjul City Council, the Gambia Tourism authority and the Gambia Groundnut Corporation, to make myself worthy.

Mathew K. Jallow:

There is nothing to be bragged about with regards to the number of capacities you slaved under Yahya Jammeh. In case you did not know, by now everyone walking the streets from Banjul to Brikama, has either been a Minister, Director, Permanent Secretary, or Army Colonel in Jammeh’s regime. You have followed the footsteps of many, and many will replace you. You all share one thing; you are intellectually dim.

Alieu Mboge:

Development is always a work in progress, requiring an inter-play of settled experience and a searching, explorative youth; if in the end of yields to the other, it is yielding that is as natural as sons succeeding their fathers: for after grey experience had conferred its riches, it ought to stand back and let the brimming, green energy of youth, carry forth the goods into the future.

Mathew K Jallow:

Hi Alieu, the highlighted middle part of your paragraph above makes no sense. And to correct you, you don’t care about the brimming, energetic youth of our country, and there is no use pretending. You did not care about them before, and I don’t expect that by some miracle you had an epiphany all of a sudden. You cared about the youth from Banjul and your own children, because you wanted to create a permanent under-class in a society where you and other elites of the Jawara regime looted the wealth of our nation to give your children and friends the best education so they will come home and continue the domination over everyone else. But, God works in strange ways. None of the children of the people whose fathers looted the wealth of our country and bankrupted our Jawara era public institutions are politically active today. This is probably because they are ridden by guilt or shame or both, knowing as they now do how they were raised and educated from wealth stolen from our national coffers. But, your children are innocent pawns in the on-going effort to really unravel the truth about what all of you did with our stolen nation’s wealth.

Alieu Mboge:

I have nothing but great admiration for you, for the way you have re-focused energies, of both old and young, along a path that is ready bearing fruit, as well as fertile with promise of the bigger things to come. The fruits are all around us, and there can be little argument that they derive largely from the singular audacity of your vision, sweeping in its ambition, and unapologetic in its aim to transform a tiny, mainly groundnut-dependent and tourist country, such as ours, into a beehive of industry and high tech, and producing enough food for us to feed ourselves. To create a goliath, so to speak, out of a David.

Mathew K. Jallow:

So you admire Jammeh. That is not surprising. You have never been on the side of good. Yours is a history of moral and ethical crookedness from the Ports Authority, Gambia Produce Marketing Board, and National Trading Corporation, to name just a few. Alieu you can see the fruits of Jammeh’s labor, because you benefited from him. When was the last time that your interest in the rest of our country or your simple curiosity took you beyond Brikama to see how everyone else lives? I bet it was a long, long, long time, Alieu. Your are holed up in a twenty square mile conclave of St. Mary’s Island and Kombo North with the bright light and paved roads. If you were as patriotic as you want us to believe, you would have ventured beyond your comfort zone to see for yourself what ordinary Gambians are feeling. You and they are on a different page, Mr. Mboge Khakatarr.
 
Alieu Mboge:

As monumental a task as it is, we can achieve a significant lot, if we believed in our selves. The genius of your leadership is how you have managed to spread a sense of optimism, an Obamaesque sense of "we can", without which no nation can develop beyond the first few steps of civilization.

Mathew K. Jallow:

Obama and Jammeh!!! Uuh. What a ridiculous comparison. You kind of remind me of a former parliamentarian from Kombo Lamin, Babou Sarr’s brother, who on the pages of the Daily Observer, once compared Jawara to Jesus and Mohammed. You are one of a few who are not pessimistic about our future. Look here Alieu; we do believe in ourselves, we just don’t believe in you or Jammeh and what you are espousing. Take your optimism and Jammeh’s and go to hell.
 
Alieu Mboge:

Your patriotism is of the highest distinction, and we as a nation should consider ourselves fortunate to have you at the helm; but in order that we take advantage of this fortune, it behooves us all to rally behind you, and help give flesh to the lofty vision that you have long nursed for this country. The old political injunction still holds away, especially for us, in the developing countries, and we would do well to remind ourselves of its wisdom: ask not what your country can do for you, but ask we the citizens together with the government can do for future prosperity of our country. The challenge must be equalled by the will to prevail.

Mathew K. Jallow:

You cannot be serious, Alieu. We are fortunate to have Jammeh? Really? I mean really, Alieu? I think you live in a different Gambia or else you have lost your mind. Tell that to Deyda Hydara’s family. Tell that to Koro Ceesay’s family or his father who is you age group. Tell that to Daba Marena’s children. Tell that to the children of all those whose fathers are languishing in prison, are murdered by Jammeh or are missing some for years now. You are heartless, Alieu.

You also evoked John F. Kennedy with your…”ask not what…quote”. How nice. But what have you done for our country except plunder and loot our resources for your own benefit and your family.
 
Alieu Mboge:

Once again, I am deeply and inexpressibly delighted to have served in the official capacities I was called upon to do. At all times, I performed my responsibilities with probity and sense. With little could one have repaid the privilege of serving one's country and people. And through I leave office; I remain committed to your political vision, and bind myself anew to your government, to your party and to the entire nation. 

Mathew K. Jallow:

You are committed to Jammeh’s vision, because Jammeh has no vision. Like you, Jammeh is an intellectually challenged moron; a mediocre for all I know. Both of you have no depth and you are both a disgrace to your own families, friends and our country. You are praising Jammeh, because you probably want another position from him so you can plunder our resources once again. You are vainglorious and corrupt.

Alieu Mboge:

Long may you continue to lead this country, taking if from strength to strength, building up a stock of inheritance on which our children, and their children, can stand secured and self-assured, emboldened by the confidence that derives from pride of inheritance, as they negotiate their way through the challenges of their time. 

Author: Daily Observer.

Mathew K. Jallow:

Finally, you pray for Jammeh to remain in power, but the rest of the country begs to differ. We pray that our military will overthrow Yahya Jammeh, yesterday, not even today. You are a clown, Mr. Mboge. You have lost the little credibility you had left and you have no integrity. You have no JUM.