Saul,
    Frankly I had to snort out with laughter when Halifa tried to feed us
with that claptrap about the Farafenni attack. Blatantly it exposes holes in
Halifa's lack of evidence on the juxtaposition of the Gambia with rotten
cases like Sierra Leone and Rwanda.
    We all know that the Gambia had just had elections that were unfair and
in which the whole process was designed to get ONLY one person elected. The
aftermath of the elections had rankles amongst the people yet Gambians with
1981 still freshly imprinted in their memories had no desire or intent to
descend to a Rwandan type situation. The opportunity had given itself through
the Farafenni attack yet no civilian took the weapons that was offered to
them to continue the onslaught towards a wider a picture of civil strife. The
Farafenni attack was designed strategically because the town is an opposition
stronghold and it was calculated then that given the opportunity the people
will take up arms against Jammeh. We all saw later that it was primarily
because of the needed and much anticipated local support that the Farafenni
attackers were defeated by the GNA back up that later arrived on the scene.
Had civilians taken the opportunity to manifest their misgivings and
grievances against the Jammeh government we will be talking of something
totally different. There was never at any point in time the desire to take up
arms against Jammeh despite all he has done. Gambians resorted to what we are
best known for putting our trust in Allah, that everything will be fine. It
is our stoicism in the face of tyranny that helped pulled us towards
dialogue, peace and equanimity.
    There is no evidence to give credence to Halifa's spurious claims that we
were descending towards a Sierra Leone/Rwanda situation. Halifa give us
something better. Not this bunkum about the Farafenni attackers.
Good Morning.
Cordially,
HAMJATTA KANTEH

hkanteh

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L
Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html

----------------------------------------------------------------------------