Jammeh accuses UDP of tribalism and a front for American and UK interests

The protests by Gambian dissidents in New York against Yaya Jammeh and his United Nations 68th General Assembly delegation continues to reverberate.  First, he announced that The Gambia has decided to withdraw the country's membership from the Commonwealth, and now he despatched his Secretary General and Minister of Presidential Affairs to read a statement on national television accusing the United Democratic Party (UDP), the country's the single biggest opposition party, of being a front for U.S. oil interests.

 Yaya Jammeh's incoherent and rambling statement is full of unsubstantiated claims. For example, the statement claims that the online papers dedicated to opposition politics, and operated by exiled Gambians in the U.K. and U.S. are financed by their respective governments.  The statement further claimed that negotiations between government and foreign oil companies broke down after the government refused to agree to terms unfavorable to the Gambia resulting in the formation of the UDP with the help of the UK and US governments as a retaliatory measure.

According to the government statement, the UDP is to represent foreign oil interests should it gain political power.  What could be seen as a desperate move to stoke the fires of tribalism, the statement labeled the UDP as a Mandingo group that's out to seize power and to re-impose its political dominance.  Jammeh assures Gambians that the Mandingo tribe will never rule the Gambia again.  The problem with Jammeh's statement is that (a) he's from the smallest tribe in the Gambia and (b) the Mandingos form the single biggest voting block for his party.  Gambians and opposition parties are too smart to take the bait.

These provocative and highly incendiary statements, as silly as they may appear, are designed to instill fear in the population following Jammeh's humiliating treatment in the hands of a handful but determined group of Gambian dissidents that forced him to be a captive in his hotel suite for 48 hours, missing his official meetings in the process. It is also a calculated move by Jammeh to tie what they refer to as the "asylum scam" involving the UDP Treasurer accused of providing attestation to UDP supporters seeking asylum abroad to the entire UDP structure.  This is an attempt to discredit and possibly to decimate the UDP as a viable opposition.  All indications are that the accused was tortured to extract confessions before he was paraded before a national television audience.

Jammeh returned home last week to a political environment drastically different from the one he left just a few days before.   He cut his trip short only to be met at the airport by a small group of supporters which, according to sources, devastated the man who used to being greeted by large crowds while basking in pomp and pageantry of the ceremonial armed forces band interspersed with traditional dancers. All of this were missing for the first time in 19 years when he landed at Yundum from his flight from New York.  This was a reversal in political fortune that Jammeh is still unable to process much less accept.

Yaya Jammeh's rapidly dwindling political support has visibly transformed the once confident and pompous dictator into a confused and highly insecure individual.  It has finally dawned on him that power is slipping with few people, including members of the security forces ready and willing to lay their lives for a selfish and divisive figure like Jammeh .  This realization will lead him to more irrational behavior which will mark the end of his rule.  It is now only a matter of time.

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The floating coffin saga continues

We've been told by the Jammeh regime that Taiwan has bought four replacement engines for our decrepit ferries that pose the single most clear, and imminent, yet preventable, danger to the public.  These ferries are operated by the Gambia Ports Authority (GPA), a quasi-government agency that is expected to operate like any private enterprise despite the fact that it is heavily subsidized already by the passengers who use the 'services' daily.

The solution to these dangerous vessels is not the replacement of existing engines with second-hand, reconditioned engines which amounts to a temporary solution to a problem begging for a permanent solution. The regime continues to ferry humans, livestock and heavy trucks daily on the treacherous seven nautical miles journey across the mouth of the River Gambia.  The once pleasurable and scenic 30-minute journey has turned into a nightmarish minimum 4 hours adventure.  The journey is so dangerous that all foreign governments have advised their nationals not to venture into them.  Senegal had to hire boats to rescue members of its sporting team stranded in one of these floating coffins. 

The problem with these ferries go beyond engine malfunction.  Therefore, this regime is still not getting it. They are missing the point entirely. The structural integrity of these ferries pose far more serious and life-threatening problems than the engines themselves.  There are holes in the hulls of these vessels rendering them unfit to navigate.  They are scrap and should be mothballed.  Fitting them with reconditioned engines is a temporary stop-gap measure, and therefore not the answer.  Permanent solutions must be found before it is too late.   

Gambians are among the highest taxed humans on earth.  They, therefore, deserve new ferries and better service from the GPA. They demand new ferries in certifiably mint condition, using their tax and fare proceeds respectively collected by government and the Gambia Ports Authority.  This regime must stop utilizing the client-state relations with countries like Taiwan, Venezuela and Cuba to fund the day-to-day running  of the government government.  The piecemeal approach to economic development is not the answer to our problems as a sovereign country.

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Jammeh's Commonwealth threat ignored at home

Threats by Yaya Jammeh to withdraw Gambia's membership in the Commonwealth is not getting as much traction within The Gambia, as it is getting from the international press.  The reason for the lack of traction at home is because the dictator's stock has recently lost significant value in the eyes of ordinary Gambians, and his treatment at the hands of Gambian dissidents in New York only devalued his stock further.

Yaya Jammeh's New York sojourn was the worst experience he has had in his 19-year rule.  The Gambian exile communities in the United Stated converged on the city that was host to the 68th General Assembly of the United Nations to protest against the regime in Banjul causing disruptions to his entire delegation.  A handful but determined protesters trapped Jammeh in his hotel suite for 48 hours unable or afraid to venture outside to attend to official meetings and social functions.  Out of frustration of being holed up for two days, Mrs. Zeinab Jammeh decided to leave the hotel to attend a social function only to discover the hard way that the only exit available to her was through the hotel's back door entrance which serves as access for food delivery.  The humiliation of Jammeh and his delegation was captured on video and posted on youtube which was the topic of discussion in the streets of Banjul, Mansa Konko, all the way up to Basse.  The dictatorship that has succeeded in suppressing the will of the people with threats of imprisonment, torture and even death for almost two decades had been revealed as headed by a cowardly leader who could be denied his freedom by a handful of Gambian protesters with cardboard signs.

The local population was gleeful of the humiliating treatment of Jammeh and his delegation, which in turn, emboldened them, even if passively. When Jammeh was forced to shorten his trip and returned home, he was greeted at the airport by a handful of personalities.  The mood was described at somber.  Arriving in Banjul, his motorcade was met by a handful of him "Green Boys" ( mimicking Colonel Gaddafi's youth enforcers ) in their green uniforms, and the Scout Band.  This was not the typical reception Jammeh had been used to in his nearly two decades.  The Gambian population seemed to have had enough of the suppression as well as the buffoonery of His Excellency Sheikh Professor Alhaji Dr. Yahya Abdul-Aziz Junkung Jammeh.

When Jammeh finally broke from the Ritz-Carlton prison to make it to the United Nations Building to deliver his address before an empty hall, he wasted no time in attacking the United States, the imperialists, the United Nations Security Council before launching a vicious attack on gays and lesbians causing the US Ambassador to the United Nations, Ms. Samantha Power, to tweet that Jammeh should stop delivering hate speeches.  After 30 years of enjoying freedom, democracy, the rule of law and a high degree of civility under Sir Dawda Jawara, the buffoonery displayed under Jammeh is a stark contrast from years gone by, and a constant source of embarrassment for Gambians and friends of the Gambia, including the Commonwealth organization - an organization that Jammeh now considers is to be a neo-colonial organization that is exploitative of The Gambia and other former British colonies.

Gambia took its rightful place within the comity of nations under Sir Dawda Jawara and was recognized as one of the three most democratic countries in Africa behind Mauritius and Botswana.  The international recognition and respectability were all squandered under Jammeh who oversees one of the most repressive and corrupt regime.  Gambians have been embarrassed enough by the current government to show open disdain of a regime that has obviously overstayed its welcome.

The unexpected announcement on state-run television that The Gambia has "left the Commonwealth of Nations with immediate effect" was received in Banjul with an uncharacteristic air of resignation.  This is not the reaction Jammeh was hoping for.  He thought by picking the Commonwealth to express his disdain at "The West", the damage would be minimal, while extracting maximum international attention comparable to say withdrawing its membership from the United Nations.  The deafening silence from the local population, some of whom have little knowledge of the Commonwealth, and its importance to their lives, after the announcement, is a worrying development in the eyes of Jammeh but an important signal about the level of frustration about the attitude of an increasingly isolated dictator.

There are indications that key members of the security forces are equally frustrated that Jammeh has gone way on the deep end, and some have started to express their frustrations at an increasingly erratic megalomaniac which could spell trouble for him.  Meanwhile, Jammeh is being challenged by ordinary Gambians to formally submit its official notification to the Commonwealth Secretariat, a notice that has not been received as at the time of this writing.  It appears that ordinary Gambians are calling Jammeh's bluff. How things have changed in so short a period of time.

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Gambia's withdrawal from the Commonwealth : Another dark chapter in the country's history

The decision to withdraw Gambia's membership from the Commonwealth by Yaya Jammeh is arbitrary, capricious and totally devoid of reason.  It also marks another dark chapter in the country's history since the military takeover in 1994.  The Gambia has been a Member of the body since independence from Britain in 1965.  The Commonwealth is a collection of 54 countries made up largely of former British colonies.  The Gambian regime did not advance any reason for the abrupt withdrawal except to say that Gambia "will never be a member of any neo-colonial institution."

The Gambia's economy is dominated by two sectors of agriculture and tourism with roughly 22% and 10% of GDP respectively.  Tourism is also the second largest foreign exchange earner in the Gambian economy after agriculture, and British tourists form the largest single group to visit this sliver of a country surrounded almost entirely by Senegal.  This abrupt and senseless decision to withdraw will undoubtedly impact negatively on the number of British tourists to visit Gambia in the years to come.  

The impact of the decision on the struggling economy will extend far beyond tourism because it will signal and further reinforce the negative image of The Gambia as a hostile destination for foreign investment.  Of course, if there are any Co-operation Agreements between The Gambia and The Commonwealth Fund for Technical Cooperation (CFTC) which is the technical assistance arm of the organization, these will be terminated, or summarily suspended until further notice.  Traditionally, CFTC has been very active in capacity-building in the judiciary by providing The Gambia with judges of high caliber and integrity from other Commonwealth countries, and has also been a source of financing of legal training to numerous Gambians in the past.  

The Gambia  has one of the worst human rights record of any country in Africa and the Commonwealth. The abrupt execution of nine death-row inmates in August of last year drove this pariah state further into diplomatic isolation.  Britain and other European Union members jointly and individually criticized the extra-judicial executions and the over-all human rights condition in the country which to the issuance of a 17-point check list of governance issues that the EU demanded the government to address and provide mitigating measures with timeline acceptable to the organization.   There has not been satisfactory response to the EU demands resulting in the withholding of critically needed development assistance from Gambia's single biggest donor.      

The decision to withdraw membership from the Commonwealth will come both as a surprise to ordinary Gambians as well as the high echelons of government.  It also signals worse things to come for a country that has been reduced to a narco-state status with a crumbling economy based on the cocaine trade.  With increased international and diplomatic isolation comes less external pressure to a government that has become increasingly repressive and erratic, posing greater danger to a population has has been, and continues to be, abused by government that is not accountable to neither the citizenry nor to the Comity of Nations.  Rough times ahead for Gambians living under the government of Professor Yaya Jammeh. 

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Some aspects of the World Bank and The Gambia

Bretton Woods Institutions borrowed their name from the town of Bretton Woods, New Hampshire where the conference leading to the founding of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) was held in 1944.

The IBRD is the formal name of what is commonly called The World Bank which is different from The World Bank Group comprising of these specialized agencies: International Development Association (IDA), International Finance Corporation (IFC), Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) and International Center for Settlement of Investment Dispute (ICSID). All of these institutions represent the financial arm of the United Nations system created to bring financial stability to the World's financial system.

For our purposes, however, we will limit the focus on the International Development Association or IDA which is the soft-loan or concessionary window of the World Bank relevant to the discussion.  In The Gambia, as in most countries, what we refer to as the World Bank is actually the IDA.  The IBRD is the World Bank.  IDA offers loans, otherwise referred to as credits, to members on terms so low that it is usually referred to as 'free money'  The rates charged are appropriately referred to 'service charge' and not interest on loan. By contrast, the World Bank or IBRD issues loans as a higher interest rate - but still subsidized - for middle and higher income countries.   The Gambia is not eligible for IDRB loans and so are all sub-Saharan African countries with the exception of a few high GDP countries like South Africa, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea.

Last week, it was reported that The Board of Directors of the World Bank (read IDA Board) approved a $5 million grant to support The Gambia's public sector financial management's ability to gather statistical data, and upgrades it national energy policy.  This announcement prompted questions as to why if The Gambia is doing so poorly in managing its economy as claimed by me and others why is the World Bank continuing to extend assistance to The Gambia.  They, therefore, deducted or reasoned that if financial support is still forthcoming then The Gambia and Jammeh's regime is doing fine on the economic management front.  Not necessarily, and I will explain why.

The World Bank and the International Development Association essentially and for all practical purposes operate like regular commercial banks with a couple of significant differences (i) you can bank with your local commercial bank and not be a shareholder, and with the World Bank and IDA you must be a shareholder to bank with them and (ii) IDA is not profit-driven but economic development-driven.  The Gambia is a shareholder, however small the shareholding. Gambia is a member of a constituency that has a representative on its Board of Directors on a rotational basis.  America is the single biggest shareholder and thus has a bigger say and influence on the Boards that govern these institutions.  The IBRD operates profitably and subsidies the IDA which, in turn, is not set up to generate profit but to help countries like The Gambia move up the economic development ladder from low to middle income.  The idea being the more developed its economy, the better a provider it will be to its citizenry, and a better bank customer Gambia especially when it becomes IBRD eligible when Gambia will have to pay interest on its loans. 

Unlike the IBRD, the IDA was not meant to be a profit generating organization ( but not a revenue loser either).  Its resources are contributed entirely by developed world, with the US, Japan and Western Europe contributing the lion's share during Replenishments which occur every three years or so.  Like every bank, your loan repayment record or creditworthiness is your passport to access to more loans.  Therefore, as long as The Gambia meets it loan obligations, it can count on fiancial support - either credit/loan or grant - from the IDA and other donors. Even when The Gambia is in default, as member and shareholder, it cannot be denied financial support to help it back to being a member in good standing.  The particular World Bank story that triggered the discussion was not a credit ( loan ) but an outright grant which means it will not be repaid.  But look at what the grant is for; to help the public sector management arm of government improve its data collection capabilities, and also to help government updates its energy policy.  If you will recall,  the regime came under heavy criticism from the sister organization of the Bank, the IMF, for the continued weakness in its data collection abilities.  The grant, even it was not in direct response to the Fund's recent observation, its approval will certainly help address this critical issue facing the public sector.

The IDA, as well as the AfDB, has emergency assistance grant funds earmarked for not only natural disasters like drought, floods, insect invasions etc. but also for countries that have defaulted and are in arrears on their loans/credits.  Even at the height of the Liberian and Sierra Leone civil wars, these external agencies continued to help the local population using unorthodox methods of getting assistance to where it is most needed.  I am citing these instances only to illustrate that financial assistance can take place in the absence of poor governance conditions and in most austere and hostile environments.  And the receipt of grants, and even loans and/or credits is not necessarily a true barometer of the human rights record and/or the economic management performance of a shareholder - the main reason I am an avoid critic of both the Fund and the Bank for not realigning these factors to reflect more closely to what obtains on the ground, especially in the areas of democracy, human rights and the rule of law.

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The week that was in review

While the entire week belonged to Professor Yaya Jammeh, Mrs. Zeinab Suma Jammeh, and the Gambian delegation to the UN General Assembly, the events were driven entirely by a handful of Gambian dissidents and exiles. Kudos to all of them.

When the official mouthpiece of the dictatorship, The Daily Observer, ran a cover story that can only be described as provocative, announcing the arrival of Jammeh and The Gambian delegation at JFK to attend the United Nations General Assembly meeting, it was acting on instructions of Jammeh specifically to provoke and taunt his opponent.  The front page story also included Jammeh's New York address and detailed scheduled of his meetings while in New York.  The editors wished they never did because no sooner than the online edition was published than the Gambian dissident community realigned their protest schedule in response to being dared to challenge the authority of Jammeh.   The rest, as they say, is history.

The DUGA-DC Group led by Coach Pa Samba Jow, immediately headed for the Ritz-Carlton in New York from their Washington DC-base with his team of dissident protesters to join forces with the New York and Rhode Island dissident communities led by Saihou Mballow, and the guy who turned out to be a better boxer than his Senegalese namesake was a wrestler, Falai Baldeh.  Fatou Sagnia, as part of the New York crew, was awesome in verbalising her contempt for Jammeh and his regime.  The Atlanta crew, led by Dr. Amadou Scattred Janneh and assisted by Banka Manneh, also took off and headed North.  The Raleigh folks led by Alkali Conteh were also determined not to miss out on what turned out to be the biggest scheduling and security blunder in Jammeh's 19-year rule - an error in judgement, and an exercise in arrogance that proved to be the turning point in the two-decade old struggle with a tyrannical regime.

The ensuing protests in front of Jammeh's hotel prevented him from attending any of his official engagements, except his scheduled speech which he delivered on Friday, looking more like an Alcatraz escapee than a Professor.  Zeinab will never forget the day she was bundled up and smuggled through the back window for dinner outside the hotel without Yaya.  She will have to do her shopping at some other time.

Jammeh's fear permeated some members of his delegation who, in trying to act otherwise, engaged themselves in spitting matches with protesters that ended in physical altercations.  His security detail, including some members of the notorious NIA, couldn't comprehend why the U.S Secret Service and/or the New York Police Department officers did not shoot the protesters or, at least, haul them off to jail.  They were reminded that this is America where the freedom of speech, assembly and association is respected. The guys from the Home of Bamba Dinka didn't want to entertain any of that from the Americans.  Where they, the NIA come from, that's bad law.

While those in Banjul were cheering for Falai Baldeh, affectionately dubbed 'Uncle Falai", Pa Samba Jow, Alkali Conteh, Amadou Scattred Janneh and others, they were also praying that Jammeh stays in America as the official guests of Uncle Sam.  They were concerned that once he escapes and returns to Banjul, he was going to unleash his frustrations on the local population with vengeance.  My advise to Yaya is he better not because Gambians will not take it lying down any more while warning the regime that the safety and welfare of the families of Omar Bah and Nanama Keita or other families in similar conditions is the responsibility of Yaya Jammeh who must ensure that his killers and torturers are on short leash.

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Yaya Jammeh issues threats to families of protesters

Death threats have started being made against the families of, at least, two of the Gambian dissidents who participated in a protest against the Gambian dictator this week in New York City.  Both victims are also journalists in exile in the United States.

Omar Bah, a former Daily Observer journalist and now a resident of Rhode Island and Editor of American Street News (ASN), and Nanama Keita, a former Sports journalist, also at the Daily Observer who now resides in New York, both reported threats by members of the Jammeh delegation to their families in Banjul.   Mr. Bah was threatened through a Facebook postings from none other than a sitting member of the National Assembly. These direct threats against the parents of the editor of ASN by Assembly member for Lower Saloum, Pa Malick Ceesay, was made in territorial United States using a computer terminal, presumably from the New York area before they were disgracefully shown the door before the end of their planned stay in the U.S.

Nanama Keita, a former Daily Observer sports journalist who escaped to the United States after he was falsely accuse by the regime for being an informer of a dissident online newspaper has also revealed that his family in The Gambia is being threatened.  According to Mr. Keita, he reached his family in The Gambia, most of whom were in tears as he was informed of the threats from members of the Jammeh delegation who have returned to Banjul this morning after escaping from their Ritz-Carlton bunker in the dead of night.  Their humiliating defeat at the hands of a handful of dissidents including the two journalists whose families are now being threatened.

The Jammeh regime is violent and has demonstrated time and time again that it will not hesitate to use violence to keep the population in check.  Now that the underbelly of Yaya Jammeh and his regime has been exposed by these determined Gambian dissidents, he will try to use violence and torture against innocent Gambians whose only crime is their relations to these true Gambian patriots who took to the streets of New York and the grounds of the United Nations to draw international attention to the dictatorship of Yaya Jammeh.  Jammeh's main worry now is that he's been exposed as a coward which is contrary to a carefully crafted person that portrays him as brave and unwavery.  It turns out he's afraid of the sight of a handful of protesters with cardboard signs.

On this note, I am sharing this blog as I share most of my blogs with the United States State Department, through the US Embassy in Banjul, and the European Union Delegation for the record.  The contents of the blog will also be shared with ECOWAS, African Union, Amnesty International and other rights groups in the U.S. and Europe.

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