On Jul 27, 2011 9:56 AM, "Y Jallow" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
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> Mawdo Baba,
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> It is sad that the one being addressed does not possess any ears to listen or eyes to see light. Given that he was a good listener, he would not have allowed so much injustices to define his presidency within such a lengthy period of time. Personally, I think the man has been fooled and inspired by the devil. I am yet to be convinced that a serpent that thinks and does things like Jammeh does fit under the human category. Certainly with humanity comes humility, compassion, intelligence, being considerate and respectful. The killer-instinct in him is number one trait. Just when you think he is healed, you will soon be awakened to another bigger hit. I honestly don’t have hate but I despise this masquerade of fellow called Jammeh. A leader is supposed to represent its people. NOT THIS MASQUERADE!
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> Thanks once again for opening the dialogue. Keep them coming…& we yearn for more.
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> Yero
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> There is no god but Allah (SWT) and Muhammad (SAW) is His messenger. Fear and Worship only Allah alone!
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> Date: Tue, 26 Jul 2011 14:19:37 -0700
> From: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: [G_L] Discourse with Dr. Jammeh: Welcome to Gambianism
> To: [log in to unmask]
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> LJD,
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> Thanks for the kind words. Hopefully, it will strike a cord somewhere, especially among the LJDs of this world. I can live with His Pious Excellency's Doctor title. As for Fropessor, No Way. He would have to earn that to merit it. As things stand, I'm afraid he would just have to live with Doctor. And I don't think Brother Fankung will have any problem with that.
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> Baba
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> On Tue, Jul 26, 2011 at 10:44 AM, Lamin Darbo <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
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> Baba
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> Great material, and I hope it generates appropriate reaction vis-a-vis Gambian public life.
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> I do not like your attempt to downgrade His Excellency's status from Professor, to Doctor. This may likely aggravate your friend FFG
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> LJDarbo
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> --- On Mon, 25/7/11, Baba Jallow <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
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> From: Baba Jallow <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: [G_L] Discourse with Dr. Jammeh: Welcome to Gambianism
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Date: Monday, 25 July, 2011, 7:08
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> Discourse with Dr. Jammeh: Welcome to Gambianism
> By Baba Galleh Jallow
> Dear Dr. Jammeh, on this seventeenth anniversary of your coup of July 22, 1994, we propose to engage you in a discourse on matters of crucial importance to our country. We propose to conduct this discourse within the framework of what we term Gambianism. We recognize, of course, that this is no mean undertaking for it requires that we keep you engaged in the discourse. We only hope from the onset that you will read this series with an open mind because what motivates it above everything else is a healthy desire to assist in the advancement of the Gambian nation. Of course, keeping an open mind means being ready to hear and digest opinions and views that may be totally opposed, hostile even, to yours. It means leaving room for the possibility of human error on all sides, and that where error is recognized, the requisite effort is made to correct it. This is what animates the framework of Gambianism within which we engage you in discourse.
> We must also say at the onset that we do not lay claim to any specialist knowledge or to anything more than mundane tit-bits of ordinary everyday wisdom. What we do lay claim to is a healthy desire to transform our nation into the best it can be through a healthy regime of discourse in which the greatest number of Gambians are encouraged to engage. In addition to being a form of discourse, Gambianism modestly aspires to a form of political philosophy and practice, as well as a developmental approach – an approach to development that especially questions postcolonial notions of nation-building and recognizes the individual as the true object of national development. We also propose Gambianism as an alternative to your government’s way of handling the affairs of our country. In this first session of our conversation, we beg to briefly elaborate on these individual but interconnected features of Gambianism. I use “we” throughout this conversation because I believe that my views are shared by a reasonable number of our Gambian compatriots, especially those in Gambian civil society.
> As discourse, Gambianism is inspired by a solid belief that there is simply no alternative to answering all those unpleasant questions that litter the landscape of Gambian history since 1994. Questions like why you broke your 1994 promises to the Gambian people, what happened on November 11, 1994 at Yundum Barracks, what is the true story behind the death of Finance Minister Ousman Koro Ceesay, who exactly gave the orders to shoot the demonstrating school children in April 2000? These and many other similar questions, raised innumerable times in the past, are raised here again because they simply will not go away without resolution. In fact, Dr. Jammeh, it is not that answers have not been proffered for some of the questions we raise in this conversation or that the answers are unknown to anyone within the Gambian community. It is that the proffered answers are unsatisfactory; and that where they are known, the real answers are guarded as ironclad secrets. We have been raising most of these questions since 1994, and getting repeatedly slapped down for our pains. And since we are still to get such satisfactory answers from those who know, we have since resorted to adding two and two together, and getting a four that we will keep in our library of national history for future generations. Sometimes this four appears thin and malnourished, with signs of vitamin C deficiency at the corners of its mouth. Sometimes it comes fat and bloated, still clutching some oily chicken bones in both hands and wearing an arrogant sneer on its dark, shiny face. Thin or fat, we are always happy to keep our fours until such a time that better explanations are given and accepted.
> Gambianism seeks to prove the hypothesis that the nation can only find true peace and prosperity through a disciplined regime of honest dialogue that makes room for all shades of opinion, and that actively promotes the sharing of views and opinions, hypotheses, thesis and theories on all matters of national importance. We seek to engage every Gambian in dialogue and are ready and willing to accept and incorporate all progressive ideas regardless of their origin. We believe that only by openly and honestly discussing and resolving the thorniest issues in our national experience can we create the space requisite for the articulation of that which is truly best for our nation. And since the honest often encapsulates both the pleasant and the unpleasant, we must anticipate that our discourse will inevitably touch on some rather unpleasant issues – issues that some of us would rather not raise or even think about; but issues that cannot but be raised, thought about, talked about and resolved. In the truly honest discourse with which we engage you, Dr. Jammeh, there are no sleeping dogs. No awake dogs either. No dogs at all. Just plain old Gambian society and its challenging realities.
> As Political Philosophy, Gambianism is an evolving body of knowledge that will continually seek to improve itself by drawing from the rich fund of the universal marketplace of ideas. In all matters, our overall guiding principle is “no voice left behind.” All views and opinions, especially of the national variety, deserve to be heard, if not accepted. We believe that ideas are the building blocks of healthy civilization and social advancement. For this reason, we place maximum premium on the primacy of free expression. We strongly believe that only through a healthy regime of robust discourse can a nation express itself into a coherent, functional whole that actively seeks and sincerely promotes everybody’s wellbeing within the nation-space. A nation-space that positively nurtures those unique characteristics that make it stand out as a special unit within the comity of nations, that retains its unique historical and national fund of traditions and experiences, and that will function with distinction on the world stage. Gambianism believes that what really matters is the size of the national imagination, the wealth of the mind, not necessarily the size of the country, its material resources, or its security forces although these too, occupy important positions in the order of national priorities. We therefore advocate actively nurturing and broadening the nation-mind as a matter of regular daily life through a continuous regime of healthy national discourse.
> Of course, Dr. Jammeh, a healthy national discourse may mean different things to different people. A Brahmin may believe that a healthy national discourse is one which situates the source of national wellbeing within the Brahmanian conception of the sacred realm. A political doctor may believe that a healthy national discourse must inevitably be held within the confines of their political medicine. A Communist will see the healthy national discourse as one that carries through the great proletarian revolution, purges the nation of capitalist influences and their neocolonialist stooges, and brings about the attainment of a socialist utopia. An Idi Amin, of course, will see the healthy national discourse as one that confirms his status as the unquestioned Lord of Uganda, King of Scotland, and Emperor of the British Empire before whom Queen Elizabeth must kneel and whose speech the crocodiles in the lagoon could understand and respond to. For Gambianism, a healthy national discourse is one that allows us to honestly talk about our national problems in no uncertain terms with the primary objective of understanding the events and issues of our recent past and our present, and armed with such understanding, to chart a realistic path to a future in which a healthy Gambian nationhood will be actualized.
> Needless to say, our version of honest and healthy national discourse cannot be all cozy beds and fragrant roses. Since painting a cozy and rosy picture of Gambian history since 1994 will be quite an unrealistic undertaking, our discourse is going to be rather rough and thorny sometimes, funny sometimes, and sometimes just plain blunt. Among other things, we will be using both historical and hypothetical anecdotes to make some points with the understanding that metaphorically speaking, it is in the nature of national discourses that they contain both sugar and pepper. Anecdotes will appear in the form of famous African leaders if only for the lessons that their mistakes teach us. They will also appear in the form of such neo-traditional rulers such as Chief Nak of numerous police units fame, and Chief Nyammeh Alador, who continually sneezed and insisted that everybody said bless you, thank you. Nyammeh Alador’s story is of particular interest to us because it represents a worst case scenario of the neo-traditional rulership that we so adamantly oppose: when he grew tired of sneezing, Nyammeh Alador would simply touch his nose and insist that everybody said bless you, thank you all morning, all afternoon, or all evening long. Sometimes on moonlit nights when he suffered his normal insomnia, Nyammeh Alador would wake and summon all the people to the village square and would sneeze or touch his nose a thousand times or more and have the people say bless you, thank you every single time. It was his way of showing them that he was their chief, whether they liked it or not. A way of telling them that he would be their chief for a thousand years if he so desired! And then there is the story of Colonial District Officer Curt Clark – DOCC, as he loved to be called - under whom both Nak and Nyammeh served as neo-traditional rulers. We will be citing these anecdotes at the points in our conversation where we state our case against neo-traditional rulership of the sort existing in our country.
> As Political Practice, Gambianism advocates both unity in diversity and diversity in unity. We envision a Gambian political culture that actively encourages civic participation by all viable political groups that are not based on tribal or religious ideologies inimical to the wellbeing of the nation. Where such tribal and religious ideologies emerge, our response will not be to clamp down upon them and force them underground. Our response will be to persuade them within the limits of human reason that it is in nobody’s interest to break the nation-body into tribal and/or religious factions. Gambianism advocates promoting the political enlightenment of all citizens through a sustained regime of civic education by eminent and incorruptible professional scholars in as many fields as feasible. We believe that the key obstacle to the progress of the African peoples since independence has been the continued predominance of a civic culture with little or no relevance to the civic institutions directing the affairs of their nations. We believe that unless and until certain pre-colonial and colonial political traditions and habits that have survived the colonial encounter and persist to the present are radically altered to suit the realities of postcolonial African political institutions and practices, true government accountability to the governed can never be attained. It shall be a cardinal objective of our political practice to help transform our political culture through a sustained and comprehensive regime of political education that will neither be dogmatic nor partisan – or that will be partisan only to the nation – and that will put in the hands of the people the knowledge-power they need to make informed political choices and to hold their governments accountable. Gambianism, in short, works for the informed transformation of Gambian society into one large, informed, traditional Gambian Family Nation in which the people are the parents, the leaders the children. We propose to do this through the actualization of the nation as school, the Nation School.
> Gambianism will seek the solutions to our national problems and the enhancement of our national wellbeing through deliberate study, reflection, questioning, debating, and flexible experimentation with new ideas and innovations. Like the Gambian nation itself, Gambianism stands in critical need of perpetual education, growth, evolution, analysis, and improvement as a discourse, as a body of knowledge, as political philosophy and practice, and as developmental approach - a well thought-out regime of practical measures whose primary objective is the attainment of a healthy Gambian nationhood. The extent of what we claim to know will always be measured and tempered by the extent of what we wish to know. To Gambianism, all ideas are innocent and may only be challenged, agreed with, or disagreed with in a civil manner; never arbitrarily shouted down or shoved under the carpet of self-righteous indignation or authoritarianism. We are always happy to agree to disagree on all the relevant issues. May the best idea win!
> As Developmental Approach, Gambianism registers strong mistrust of the contemporary notion of nation-building as the idea of a state building a nation. We say nation-building is a relic of the colonial project and has no place within the space of independent nation-hood. During the colonial period, one of the colonial state’s declared aims was to make African society ready for self rule. To this end, colonialism needed to build certain institutions associated with the western nation-state model and to inculcate certain values with which the nation state was identified in its European proto-type. And so emerged the idea of nation-building from the top, even though it may have not been so called back then. As fate would have it, that nation-building project was doomed to failure for two reasons: One, there was really no firm commitment to the idea of building viable “nations” under colonial rule in Africa. Colonial domination was premised upon what has been called “the rule of colonial difference” which meant that if a nation-state was to be built for the colonized peoples, it was not going to be like the European nation-state because colonized peoples were inherently different and less “civilized” than European peoples. Two, African nationalist agitation for self rule gathered significant momentum after the Second World War which, combined with what might be called “Empire fatigue”, among other factors, made it impossible for colonial domination to be extended indefinitely. And so came independence. With independence, the nation assumed responsibility for building itself. Unfortunately, this responsibility was lost to the new rulers who rather constituted themselves into a powerful, all knowing state that, having taken over power from the colonial authorities, now uncritically assumed responsibility for the colonial project of nation-building. Hence, the nation remains stuck in colonial state-space. Do we wonder why we never hear “nation-building” in Europe or America?
> Gambianism seeks to reverse this tragic political miscalculation (among many others) committed by postcolonial African “leaders” of almost all generations so far. We believe that it is the nation that builds the state; not the state that builds the nation. Thus, we privilege state-building over nation-building. Of course, we recognize that the state is the vehicle for the realization of the nation’s historical mission. But we believe that the state should be subjected to the nation and not the nation to the state. Because it is embedded within the paradigm of the nation-body, the state can never build the nation in the sense in which the term is generally understood, much like a workman creating coherent form from a mass of incoherent matter. We believe that the key function of the postcolonial state is to empower the nation enough that it can build the kind of state that is subservient to it and that serves its interests. Gambianism advocates the kind of government that will be honest enough to say to the people, “we enjoy no divine right to rule; in fact, we are not your rulers; we are your servants; we are a constitutional government that is beholden to your will and power. We are your children as much as we are the children of our biological parents.” We believe that such a state is feasible within the paradigm of the Family Nation that we envision and to which we will return later.
> Finally, Dr. Jammeh, we wish to point out that as an idea for national advancement, Gambianism draws primary inspiration from Gandhi’s concept of swaraj, Hindi for self rule. As India clamored for independence, Gandhi taught that like any other people, Indians must first learn to rule themselves as individuals and as a people before they could successfully rule themselves as an independent country. He pointed to a certain individual and collective capacity for disciplined self-control in the absence of which a people can never govern themselves in a proper manner. The responsible conduct of politics is always premised upon the individual citizen’s capacity for responsible action born of a genuine sense of self-discipline. Gambianism aims to help nurture into being this nation of disciplined, responsible citizens who will properly govern themselves as both individuals and as a Family Nation. A Family Nation steeped in its rich cultural heritage and whose motto shall be: “Our People are our Diamonds, Our Minds our Petroleum!”
> We hope that your government and future governments of The Gambia, as well as all Gambian citizens, of all shades of political opinion, will find something that is of interest and perhaps useful in our ideas. Meanwhile Dr Jammeh, Welcome to Gambianism. We hope to continue our discourse in the next few days.
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