Abdoulie Tambadou's record at GPA in figures

Just as we have done in the case of Muhammed Manjang, Managing Director of the Social Security Housing and Finance Corporation (SSHFC), encapsulating his one and half short tenure at the helm, we will try to do likewise for Abdoulie Tambadou, the Managing Director of Gambia Ports Authority until this morning when he was redeployed to the Gambia Public Procurement Agency.  His new position at GPPA or the name of his replacement at GPA were both unknown at the time of going to press.

Mr. Abdoulie Tambedou held the post of Managing Director of the Gambia Ports Authority from 7th March 2017 to 29th August 2018.  Prior to his stint, he served the GPA from Accounts Clerk in 1989 and rose through the ranks  to the position of Managing Director from April 2011 to August 2012.

In the intervening period, Mr. Tambedou served as Finance Analyst in the UNDP Gambia Country Office from March 2016 to March 2017 and Deputy Controller of Senegambia Beach Hotel from November to March 2016.  He also served as Financial Management Specialist as part of the Canada Pacific Consultancy Services Limited team in a World Bank Port Sector Reform Project at the Liberia Port Authority, Monrovia.

Mr. Tambadou graduated as a Member of the Chartered Accountants (ACCA) in 1994 and an Masters in Business Administration in Strategic Management and Finance from the University of Wales, Cardiff Business School in 1997. He graduated also from the Institute of Chartered Bankers of Nigeria in 2016 where he awarded the highest mark as the Best Student in Banking Law. Regulation and Corporate Governance.  Mr. Tambadou has also undergone various courses in Procurement, Strategy and Risk Management among others.  He is currently serving on the Boards of the GPA, Gamtel/GAmcel and the Gam Petroleum Storage Company Limited.

Like Muhammed Manjang who have since been sent on a one-month leave for returning the SSHFC into profitability, Abdoulie Tambadou record at GPA was even more phenomenal.  In 2015, GPA's registered a loss after tax of negative D805,000 from a pretax profit of D before tax was D38 million. In 2016, the profit before tax was  D53 million for an operating profit after tax of D13 million.   In 2017, profit before tax was D271 million and a profit after tax was D198 million.

Net cash flows in 2015 was D327 million, in 2016 the figure was D353 million and in 2017 the figure increased to D455 million. 

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Pensioners and contributing employers are victims of a mismanaged SSHFC and not the staff

Mohammed Manjang, Managing Director SSHFC

For the past several months, while the government allowed what was a purely  personnel matter has been allowed to morph into an industrial dispute, threatening the financial integrity of the Social Security and Housing Finance Corporation (SSHFC) and, by extension, the welfare of pensioners and employers who contributors to the Provident and Consolidated Pensions Funds.

Pensioners who have worked for 30 - 40 years with employers contributing towards their retirement have been experiencing hardships not of their own making.  Proceeds from employers' contribution were misapplied, misused and abused by the previous regime with the active participation of some past and current members of staff. 

Some of these very same staff currently engaged in illegal acts of public disorder by blocking access to a public building are now feigning victimhood.  What about those pensioners who cannot access their monthly benefits because the kitty is empty.  They have to wait for months so that their funds committed to short-term instruments yield dividends for the corporation to meet their monthly obligations to pensioners. 

Pensioners are the real victims and not a bunch of privileged staff oozing with the aura of self entitlement.  These disgruntled staff would like to continue enjoying more housing loans and other facilities and perks on the backs of hard working Gambians that have proven to be bad investments that threatens the solvency for the corporation.

The Social Security and Housing Finance Corporation was built with the sweat and tears of pensioners, prospective pensioners and particularly private sector employers, with little or zero financial stake from central government.  It is time that these unheralded and forgotten Gambians take a more active role in the management of the SSHFC by organizing themselves to protect what belongs to them. 

These category of Gambians are beginning to organize themselves to protect their interests and their pension benefits - both actual and anticipated - since the government appears to be interested in the welfare of a handful of disgruntled staff members with obvious support from State House and the Ministry of Finance. 

The Managing Director of SSHFC, management, staff and Board deserve the full support of the Barrow government

Staff of the Social Security and Housing Finance Corporation (SSHFC) were denied access to the office premises by padlocking the gates to the building - an illegal act for which disciplinary action must be taken. 

The group of disgruntled staff led by one Mr. Camara has been agitating for months now to have the new Managing Director removed from office because of reasons that could only be characterized as flimsy when compared to the myriad of problems facing the near-insolvent state owned enterprise. 

Gambians are treated, nearly daily, to the financial malpractices - including abuse of pensioner's funds - by the former dictator, his business partners and senior officials that threatened the financial integrity of the corporation.  It is such abuses that the new Managing Director, the new Board Chairman and his colleagues on the Board are set to arrest so that the finances of the corporation can be restored to good health and profitability.

Managing Director Manjang has been on the job for approximately two year and some of his achievement, however modest, can be found here; a subject we covered in our penultimate blog post.  He was able to turn a D1.6 million loss in 2016 into a D82 million profit which was achieved despite very strong income headwinds.  [The D83.5 million was a misstatement on our part.] When last year's operating profit figure is compared to profits in 2013 [D26M], 2014 [D13M] and 2015 [D15M], one begins to appreciate even more the efforts that Board, Management and staff of the SSHFC have put in.

We will reiterate here what we've stated on our Facebook page and that is these favorable numbers are a far cry from what obtained before the new Managing Director came onboard.  It is these favorable figures that the noise-makers and those urging them on are trying to obscure - to divert our attention away from the new management team at the SSHFC. 

Needless to say that there is still a lot of work to be done and new milestones to reach.  It is evident from the cost management measures implemented in 2017 have yielded dividends because total costs were down by D88 million in 2017 - a figure that is expected to improve further and significantly at the end of 2018.

The Government of Adama Barrow must not let a few disgruntled staffers who are obviously trying to maintain the old system that benefits them at the expense of the over 130,000 (one hundred and thirty thousand) individual accounts operated and managed by SSHFC comprising of pensioners and active employees who currently contribute to the National Provident Fund and the Federated Pensions Funds.  The government must lend full and unequivocal support to the Managing Director, management, Board and staff who are committed to ushering in a new era and a new management culture at the Social Security and Housing Finance Corporation.

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First Lady's Foundation may, or may not, share the results of the Board's investigation of the missing $752,544, says a FaBB Board member

Gambia's First Lady, Mrs. Fatoumatta Bah-Barrow

The recent case of a mysterious bank transaction amounting to a little over $750,000 that originated from Hong Kong via the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Chinese to Guaranty Trust Bank, London Branch to Novo Banko in Lisbon before being lodged into the account of the First Lady's Fatoumata Bah Barrow's Foundation (FaBB) at the Guaranty Trust Bank in Banjul.

Although the transaction took place last December, it was not until last week that the public became aware.  It has since raised more questions than the officials of the Foundations can provide answers to an increasingly frustrated public that should be a cause for concern, not only to Gambia's First Lady and officials of the FaBB but to the Barrow government.

A Board member of the Foundation recently provided a glimpse at what their strategy will be.  The Foundation representative immediately claimed ignorance of who deposited the money and for what purpose the over $750,000 was meant for.  In fact, the representative while denying that the money belongs to the First Lady's Foundation, she announced that the matter will be investigated, not by an outside independent arbiter but by members of the Board of the Foundation.

Further inquiries by the online press further revealed that when the monies were deposited at the Guaranty Bank, the amount was transferred to an account operated by White Airways, a Portuguese charter airline company but was returned soon thereafter to the Foundations account with the Guaranty Trust Bank in Banjul. 

Speaking to a local newspaper, the Foundation representative revealed that FaBB reserves the right to share the finding of the investigations by members of the Foundation with the public because they are a private and not a public entity that is entirely funded by private donations.  Of course this sweeping claim fails to take cognisance of the fact that the First Lady is the First Lady of The Gambia with a fully-funded Office of The First Lady, serviced by Gambian civil servants, all paid by Gambian civil servants.  Her ability to raise all those humongous sums is not by being citizen Fatoumata Bah Barrow but as the wife of the President of The Republic.   

However, since the announcement more details came to light as revealed by the FatuNetwork, an online online television outlet that the transfer was made by a Chinese energy company named TBEA that is currently bidding, and has been declared a leading contender, for a transmission and distribution project under NAWEC, Gambia's public utility company.  It just so happens that the Foundation representative who assured Gambians that the Foundation will get to the bottom of the mysterious transfer also happens to be a member of the Board of NAWEC.

As at the time of writing this blog post, the entire (and precise) amount of $752,544.42 is still unaccounted for.  Of course, Gambians are asking the same questions as any reasonable person would:  Where's the money, who was it transferred to and for what purpose?  It must be noted that this transfer occurred last December but it was not until last week when the matter became public that the Fatoumata Bah Barrow Foundation officials offered to investigate the matter, the results of which they will not necessarily share with Gambians. 

We will not do justice to this story without bringing in sharper focus the role the Guaranty Trust Bank has played during the Jammeh era and they continue to play in the financial sector of The Gambia's economy.  In the banking business, the initials KYC stands for Know Your Customer - a mantra that GTBank appears to ignore, if not flout regularly as evidenced by the revelations in the Commission of Inquiry looking into the financial affairs of the former dictator. 

One would have thought with the vigilance of the international financial authorities and national treasuries across the world regarding illicit transfers, money laundering activities of traffickers in drugs, humans and small arms, banks operating in The Gambia, including Guaranty Trust Bank would be more hawk-eyed by conducting extra vigilant due diligence.  We hope more care will be taken in future.  We intend to examine this and related matters relating to the banking sector in subsequent posts.


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Social Security in figures: Is SSHFC turning the corner?

SSHFC MD, Manjang

Many Gambians were introduced to Social Security and Housing Finance Corporation (SSHFC) through intermittent sessions of the Commission of Inquiry into the financial dealings of former president Jammeh that has been sitting for well over a year now.

While many Gambians were introduced to what amounted to financial horror stories, SSHC has, under new leadership, including a Chairman of the Board, a retired international civil servant and a former employee of NAWEC, have started to make some progress.

While it might be a little too early to be excited about turn of events, there are a couple of signs to indicate the corporation is turning the corner.  The preliminary audited 2017 results show material improvement over 2016.  According to audited figures, 2017 Operating Profit is D83.5 million compared to 2016's loss of D26 million.

The Operating Profit of D83.5 million is higher than the total sum of corporation's Operating Profits of the previous four years 2013 - 2016.  This result was achieved despite strong income headwinds.

Investment income or recurring income in 2017 is D23 million better than in 2016.  The corporation cost management strategy implemented in 2017 seems to be working with total cost down by D88 million.  It is anticipated that the cost containment strategy will continue to the implemented in the years ahead, according to management sources.

What is satisfying also, according to management, is that "every single fund was profitable in 2017 compared to 2016 when only the Pension and Injuries Fund were profitable." 

The prospects for a complete turnaround are bright provided that the management strategies and policies already in place and in the pipeline are implemented with minimal distractions designed to impede progress in one of the country's most important institution.

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DISCLOSURE: My spouse is a retiree who's former employer contributed in SSHFC

R2K welcomes Minister of Justice's promise to investigate the pardoning of Mr. Sandaker

The Right to Know (R2K) Gambia welcomes the commitment made to the country, by the Minister of Justice,  Tambadou, to investigate the pardoning of Mr. Sandaker.  In a statement released 25th August, 2018, the Minister pledged to clear up the controversial decision by the President to pardon Mr. Svein Sandaker, a Norwegian, who was convicted by Gambian courts for paedophilia.

Minister Tambadou said: "I will to the bottom of the matter and find out how the MoJ came to be associated with the purported conflicting statements released on our twitter page."    

Although the statement of the Minister is a positive undertaking, R2K still remains gravely concerned about this unfortunate incident.  We demand answers to fundamental questions, as to how any person could be pardoned without the knowledge of the Justice Minister who chairs the Prerogative of Mercy Committee.

We find it curious that the announcement of the pardons were done through the twitter handle of the MoJ, yet the Minister has vehemently denied having any prior knowledge of these developments.  We find this to be very concerning, as it does not bode well for the principles of law and good governance in our new found democracy.

We look forward to receiving further information as to when this investigation will commence, who will be leading it, and whether it will be an open and transparent process. 

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The Justice Minister must step down or be dismissed

Ba Tambadou, Attorney General and Minister of Justice 

Paradise TV, an online television station, is reporting that the Justice Ministry is investigating the circumstance that led to the pardoning of one Svein Aage Sandaker, a Norwegian national and a convicted pedophile.  

He was serving a prison sentence at Mile II for sexually assaulting young Gambian children (both boys and girls) including a young male child aged 4.  The convicted pedophile is also wanted in Norway for similar offenses, according to sources.

In a Facebook posting, Paradise TV is quoting a source in the Justice Ministry who prefers to remain anonymous that the “ministry has not been aware of the decision to grant Svein Aage Sandaker a presidential pardon as part of the observance of the Muslim feast of Tabaski.”

If the news as reported is true, it makes no sense whatsoever because on Monday 20^th August 2018, the Ministry of Justice, under the hand of the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, issued a public notice informing Gambians that President Barrow, in exercising his constitutional powers of prerogative of mercy has decided to grant pardon to seven convicted felons.

Among the seven who benefited was notorious Norwegian pedophile who was first sentenced to 3 years in prison and fined D600,000 in 2012 in default to serve an additional 3 years.  It is reported that he was in default back in 2015 and had to serve an additional 3 years to be due for release this year – when specifically, we cannot determine for lack of information.  

The news that he was to receive presidential pardon immediately kicked up a dust storm, both in social media, on the ground and in the diaspora so loud and furious that the ministry found the need to offer a clarification that government intention was not to release Svein Aage Sandaker but to extradite him to Norway – a clarification that was immediately dispelled for being a highly implausible occurrence because it contradicted the official government announcement that clearly states that the seven prisoners were being granted a presidential pardon and not an extradition.  

It was also unclear if there is an extradition treaty between The Gambia and Norway, and if there is, there appears to have been no discernable signs of bilateral negotiations between the two countries.  Either the Gambia or Norway or both would have made public pronouncements to that effect.

According to reports, including from sources close to the Justice Minister, who is currently in Mecca, was totally unaware that the Norwegian was on the list.  Regardless of who was responsible for inserting Svein Aage Sandaker’s name in the  list, if that’s what happened – which raises even more damning issues – the legal kerfuffle demonstrates, once more, that the Justice Minister lacks the competence and wherewithal to perform his functions in a non-partisan and impartial manner. 

In a nutshell, Ba Tambadou lacks the professional (courtroom) experience to be an effective Attorney General and too conflicted and partisan to be impartial in his role as the chief legal adviser to the President of the Republic.

With these facts before the Gambian people, his mishandling of the SEMLEX affair - which is now being investigated by a Parliamentary Committee and simultaneously being litigated in the courts -  and the eyebrow-raising case that involved the minister’s brother and the wife of the former Director General of the National Intelligence Agency (renamed the State Intelligence Agency) that can only be interpreted as interfering in an ongoing case he was involved that led to his recusal, the Justice Minister must take full responsibility and resign honorably or be dismissed summarily.  

Gambians have been treated recently by this government with one disastrous and confidence shattering scandals after another, accompanied in each case with implausible and clumsy explanations and clarifications that succeeded only in exposing the lack of candor and downright subterfuge.   These prevarications have shaken the confidence Gambians to the core.

Mr. Jeggan Grey-Johnson of the Open Society Foundation based in Johannesburg on a phone interview to solicit his views on recent developments concluded that “the system has broken – as principles of governance and rule of law were flouted in totality,” referring to the case of the convicted pedophile whose presidential pardon is now in limbo.

The fact that the Ministry was unaware of Mr. Svein Aage Sandaker being on the list of felons to be pardoned was equally perplexing to Jeggan Grey-Johnson for a ministry that “is an integral part of the prerogative of mercy process, precisely because this is a case of legality and justice.”     

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Let Mr. Sanna Camara go, the problem is elsewhere - REPUBLICATION

Journalist - Sanna Camara

Here's a July 2nd 2014 blog post about one of Gambia's premier reporter, especially in the areas of human trafficking and the out migration.  He reported extensively on the Back Way and has collaborated with international news agencies.  He has been one of 'my go' journalists. 

Mr. Camara has since joined a host of other Gambian journalists who have opted to join the State House press corps which is a loss to Gambian journalism at the critical juncture of the country's political transition.  We wish him and his other colleagues, including MK, in their new positions. 
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Sanna Camara, a local journalist working for a Banjul newspaper called The Standard, was detained by the police for accurately quoting the Police Public Relations Officer (PRO).  He was detained overnight in police cells when he refused to prepare and signed a cautionary statement in the absence of his lawyer in exercise of his right under law.

PRO - David Kujabi

Sanna Camara's problems started when he interviewed PRO David Kujabi about the problems of human trafficking that has become a topic of concern for Gambian parents, as it is for the United States Department of State.

In the 2014 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report, the US government  singled out Thailand, Malaysia, Venezuela and The Gambia for taking insufficient action against human trafficking.

The United States State department downgraded the four countries to Tier 3, the lowest ranking it gives to countries with the lowest level of responses to the scourge of what tantamount to modern day slavery.

Sanna Camara's story appeared on the Friday edition that quoted PRO David Kujabi as saying 'police admits problems with human trafficking', a byline sufficient to send the young reporter to jail in a country that is increasingly becoming controlling, not only of the physical movements of its citizens but what they think and how they think.

There is no mention anywhere in the reporting that the police PRO disputes the quote ascribed to him by the reporter.  In the absence of such a contention on the part of the police why hold an innocent man for doing his job as a reporter.  Instead, Mr, Camara has been charged with "publishing false information and broadcasting" for accurately quoting an authorized and office police source who has not disputed any portion of the reporting.

Buried in the current fuss over the arrest is the admission of officer David Kujabi that "isolated cases of human trafficking are often brought to their attention," he denied that there are "organized rings" in The Gambia, implying that that may be organized rings operating outside the Gambia.

The police and higher authorities are aware of the existence of a ring that operates out of Lebanon that is engaged in the trafficking of Gambian women using the Gambia-Qatar Employment Agreement ratified into law in June of 2010 as cover to traffic in young Gambian girls in the Gulf.  The TIP cites the laxity in enforcement of human trafficking laws as reason for the downgrade.  The Gambian Ambassador to Qatar in brother to Jammeh with many other family members occupying less conspicuous positions within the enterprise to exploit Gambian women.  It, therefore, makes sense to look the other way because the Jammeh family is involved.

PRO made reference to the plight of Gambian women sold as prostitutes in Lebanon who recently pleaded for help.  He's now blaming the families in The Gambia for refusing to come forward with their complaints or asking the police to drop them altogether.  These people have lost credibility and the trust of Gambians to be taken seriously.  The regime is a criminal enterprise, and the sooner the rest of the world catches up with the majority of Gambians, the better.

Editorial: We prefer civility and goodwill to acrimony and vengeance

Sidi Sanneh 

On 26th December, 2016, we penned this editorial, appealing to the good senses of Gambians everywhere not to give cause for Jammeh to act foolishly.  Thankfully, we transitioned the  political impasse uneventfully, made possible, in part, by the presence of the ECOMIG forces to re-enforce the security cover provided by the Gambian military.

The appeal made a year and a half ago, we believe, is very relevant today as we embark on a national debate about the future of the coalition government of President Adama Barrow - or what's left of it, if anything.  Will it be three as per MOU or five years as per constitution?
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At this critical point in our politics, persons wishing to join the progressive forces of positive political change must be encouraged.  In particular, former APRC officials, supporters and ordinary citizens ready and willing to add their voices to those of us asking Jammeh to step down must be embraced.  We must bring as many of them into the fold as we possibly can prior to the 18th January deadline.  Jammeh's refusal will inevitably lead to the loss of life, as well as destruction of property which we must try to avoid.

Our immediate goal as a country, therefore, should be to do everything humanly possible to avert military intervention that can only set us back even further than necessary.

The 22-year record the Jammeh regime will be bequeathing the next generation of Gambians is a challenge of herculean proportion that will require a conducive business and political environment to successfully address these difficult challenges.  Peaceful and orderly transfer of power must, therefore, be the main preoccupation of not only the incoming administration but of every Gambian.  And Jammeh is the main obstacle to achieving this goal.

We can only measure up to the challenges confronting us in these consequential moments if our parochial and/or partisan instincts are in check to prevent them from clouding our judgment. Jammeh's 22-year presidency has so negatively and profoundly transformed Gambian society that nearly every aspect of the social fabric holding our communities together is fractured and can disentangle, threatening the social cohesion Jammeh inherited when he seized power in 1994.

If we fail, it will be catastrophic for a country that once prides itself of having pulled itself by the bootstrap from the status of an "improbable nation" to one that held great hope and promise among the community of nations.  We must restore our lost national pride by first coming to terms with the magnitude of the problem we will be inheriting from the 22-year dictatorship of Yaya Jammeh.

In moving forward, we must do so in civility and goodwill and not in acrimony and vengeance.  We fought Yaya Jammeh to return the rule of law and the reestablishment of our civil liberties guaranteed under law.  These guaranteed rights etched in our Constitution apply to every Gambian and non-Gambian alike, without exemption,

While appealing to our compassionate senses of fair play, we want to make clear that we are not advocating immunity from the law for anyone because no one is above the law and that applies to Amadou Samba and any other Gambian businessman or businesswoman who've had business dealings with Yaya Jammeh.  In an environment where the rule of law prevails, every Gambian is entitled to his or her day in a regular court of law and Mr. Samba is no exception.

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US$ 900M is no '"chicken change", Amadou Samba owes Gambians an explanation

AMASA Holding Ltd. registered in China 

In August 21, 2017 we published this blog post.  We are republishing it here with the same questions we raised then, which we will pursue until answers are provided and justice is done on behalf of the Gambian people. 

The Gambian economy was destroyed and public resources wantonly squandered through illicit transfers using various means, including offshore accounts, by corrupt partners of the former regime.  The new political dispensation deserves better. 
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The Panama Papers listed $ 900 million against the name of a company named AMASA Holding Ltd. owned by Amadou Samba.  Two addresses were shown to be the home of the company -  78 Atlantic Road, Fajara, The Gambia and  No. 103 Ezian, Wanxin Village, Waxi City, in Wuxi City, Jiang Su Province, People's Republic of China.

$ 900 million, almost $1 billion is no 'chicken change' (a favorite Jammeh lingo) by any standard, including American.  By Gambian standard, the amount is obscenely humongous for a country as dirt poor as ours.

Rather than making threatening phone calls, spewing insults and renting "journalists" to defend the indefensible, Amadou Samba owe it to Gambians to explain the origins of the nearly $ 1 billion that pass through his Panama-operated off-shore account , how and to whom were these sums disbursed to.   Renovating and selling properties in Kensington and peddling fishing licenses cannot account for a million dollar, much less a billion.

What we do know, up to this point, that we are in a position to disclose is that both Amasa Holdings Ltd. and the off-shore accounts in Panama are non-operational but not before almost $ 1 billion of bank transactions went through the account in Panama.

Amadou Samba and the man he 'managed' 

What Gambians and authorities around the world would like to know is the origins of these funds and to whom were they disbursed.  All of it cannot be proceeds from companies owned by Amadou Samba.  He never owned and operated companies that generated a billion dollar revenue stream.

We have seen, very early in the Commission sittings, the numerous schemes hatched by Yaya Jammeh and his enablers with the primary aim of siphoning off public funds meant for development assistance.  These funds, once schemed off the top, find their way into local commercial banks and other destinations.

Until the alarm bells were sounded by the former Senegalese Minister of the Environment, Ali El Haidar, Yaya Jammeh was illegally exploiting Senegalese timber from the Casamance region at a rate that, according to experts, Senegalese forest cover may be depleted in two years because of the unsustainable rate of exploitation.  According to estimate,  The Gambia earned $ 238.5 million in timber exports mainly to the People's Republic of China.  Gambia was second only to Nigeria in redwood timber exports when Gambia has approximate 2% of forest cover confirming that these timbers were coming from Casamance.

Gambians demand to know who benefited from these operations and where's the money?  Westwood Company Ltd. has been prominently featured by some Senegalese authorities and identified as an active partner of Jammeh in the exploitation of the redwood.   The petroleum sub-sector demand special attention that requires external (legal) assistance in piecing together the numerous contracts entered into with African Petroleum and others to protect the interest of the Gambian people against unscrupulous con-artists who pose as legitimate businessmen.

There are other known international illicit trade in arms and ammunition, drugs (mainly cocaine) and human trafficking.  The Gambia had become the hub for these illicit trade during Jammeh's 22-year dictatorship.  Illicit and private mining conducted under the cloak of secrecy provides the Commission with a wide range of possibilities to uncover more of Jammeh's secrets that could not have been possible without the active participation of civil servants and businessmen and women of all hue and nationalities.

Shut the Foundations down, Mr. President

Republished August 20th, 2018

Foundations, by definition, are generally nonprofit legal entities, created, typically, to support a good cause by donating funds and support to other organizations or provide the source of funding for its own charitable purposes.

Foundations can also be for wealthy individuals seeking permanence with the preservation of a family legacy. Henry Ford and Bill and Melinda Gates come to mind.  Highly successful businessmen and women, politicians and mega-rich individuals set up foundations, using their own resources exclusively as seed money, or use supplementary funding from various sources to promote a cause.

As the saying goes, the easiest way to fund a cause is to write a personal check.  Setting up of a legal entity requires a structured framework to qualify as a non-profit organization that must conform to the laws, including the tax laws, of the country of incorporation.

The foundation must be appropriately and adequately staffed just like any for-profit entity with executive officers to manage the financial and human resources of the foundation. A foundation and a business enterprise are markedly different in only that the former is a non-profit entity and the latter is not.

Because the foundation requires permanent staff and other recurrent costs, managing it require huge investment outlays in recruitment and retention of professional experts in numerous fields.  In short, to run a foundation is a full time job and thus not an appropriate vocation, especially for a sitting president who is charged with managing an entire country.

If history is a reliable guide, then the country's experience with foundations run by the occupant of State House must serve as a warning to his successors.  The experience has been abysmal, at best, because they served the previous president as a conduit that funnel funds solicited from Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries for the private use of the ex-dictator.

It is this sort of abuse that foundations of the kind being proposed by president Barrow are frown upon because they are subject to abuse.  Foundations in Africa have been used by politicians to divert public funds for private use and to launder money.

President Barrow is head of a transition government elected to serve for a period of three years.  It is our view that he should focus the next two years addressing the structural problems created by the previous regime that impede economic growth and development and not managing foundations at the risk of using public funds to run them.  He should also address the problems posed by an inefficient civil service among other institutional bottlenecks.  You can find a detail list of priority areas in this blog post with the review of our Constitution and electoral law reform being among the most urgent.

In conclusion, the CEO of The Gambia and guardian of the State Constitution that declares The Gambia a Secular State should not be seen promoting a religion by building mosques across the country and not propagating one religion over another.  In either case, it would be unconstitutional.  Allow religious leaders to perform their religious leaders to propagate their respective religions while political leaders tend to the affairs of State.

China's debt-trap diplomacy and Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) under scrutiny in U.S. Senate

Chinese plant flag in Gunjur beach 

A powerful bipartisan group of United States senators has written a letter to the Secretaries of the Treasury and State accusing China of weaponizing capital by luring unsuspecting debt distressed African and Asian countries into contracting infrastructure loans that are, in the eyes of the US lawmakers, predatory.

The alarm bells sounded in the halls of the US Congress when loan bailout requests to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), where the US is the single largest shareholder, started to mount. And the senators would like to know how the Treasury Secretary plans to address the dangers of the Chinese infrastructure financing issue with the IMF, among a host of other concerns that have national security implications. 

Sri Lanka became the first victim of China's predatory lending practices that led to unsustainable levels of debt for the country requiring a $1.5 billion bailout loan from the IMF.

The incoming Pakistan government of Prime Minister Imran Khan is reportedly poised to also request a bailout loan from the IMF because of mounting current account deficit and external debt obligations caused, primarily, by the China - Pakistan Economic Corridor.  It is the expressed view of the sixteen Republican and Democratic senators who signed a letter addressed to the Treasury and State Secretaries that the financial predicament of these countries is as a result of,  what they refer to as "China's debt-trap diplomacy" and its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to developing countries in Asia and Africa.

As countries find themselves trapped in debt at unsustainable levels, and in their attempt to extricate themselves from the burden, the letter states, China always extract "onerous concessions, including equity in strategically important assets."

In country after country, from Djibouti with its increased dependence on China, strategically located on the Horn of Africa, has increased the likelihood of China controlling the country's only Container Terminal in addition to a Chinese military base already in operation, to Sri Lanka where the government's inability to repay over $1 billion of Chinese debt for the construction of the Hambantota Port, granted a Chinese state company a 99-year lease on the facility. 

The aggressive foreign policy posture of the Chinese, coupled with a development assistance program that ignores a country's debt exposure, makes African countries like the Gambia highly susceptible to China's debt-trap diplomacy. 

In the specific case of the Gambia Port Authority's (GPA) Port Expansion Project, given the pattern emerging elsewhere what would prevent the Chinese from demanding equity in the Gambia Ports Authority facilities similar to what they were able to extract from Sri Lanka should GPA finds itself unable to service the Chinese loan, reported to be in the region of $177 million - a country that is already staring in the face of a debt to GDP ratio of 130%.   Some food for thought.

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