By Ebrima G. Sankareh, Editor-In-Chief

According to our most competent State House operative, Kissy Kissy Mansa, a combustible combination of romantic rumours and innuendoes continue to pervade the corridors of state power in Banjul as Tourism Minister, Nancy Njie (a.k.a Madam Jaljali Borom-Nemali) allegedly readies to marry Gambian President, Alhagi Yahya Abdul Aziz Jamus Junkung Jammeh. A quasi-illiterate who could barely read even scripted speeches, this former street vendor at The Gambia Ports Authority has allegedly vowed to marry President Jammeh either by hook or by miracles leaving many to speculate if the country’s bespectacled First Lady, Madam Zeinab Jammeh’s fate is not hanging in the balance.

Madam Jaljali, Alhagi Chachai, Madam Zeinab

“Marrying President Jammeh has been Nancy’s long cherished goal and if the chemistry here is anything to go by, it can be predicted that Nancy may eventually succeed Zeinab as First Lady or probably be a co-wife to Zeinab” our highly placed source hinted.

Reveals Kissy Kissy Mansa, Nancy Njie is now much more powerful than most Cabinet Ministers and definitely wields more political gravitas than even vice President Isatou Njie Saidy herself, a weird madam, veiled in a fake image that betrays candour and magnanimity. Alluding to conversations picked up from the status quo, our sources say, Nancy Njie and President Jammeh are as close as cola nuts, inseparable, seemingly glued together for eternity.

“The Minister and the President are on the phone, off the hook, strategizing and exchanging romantic messages and she is really in love with HE” a highly placed source at the President’s office told The Gambia Echo. According to this source, the Romeos are always at it, be it in the office or outside and Nancy on her part, seizes the opportunity as a bragging right to elbow any potential competitors on her way. She has become the proverbial bulldozer that ferociously sweeps away any political pebbles that stand on its way.

In a related development, The Gambia Echo was reliably informed of how only last week, Nancy Njie succeeded in having the President sack the Director of Gambia’s Tourism Authority (GTA) only to replace him with her niece, Ms. Binta Jobe. According to our competent source, Binta Jobe’s late mother and Nancy are biological sisters. Binta is the daughter to former Magistrate Jobe and only because of the President’s romantic relation with the Minister was it possible for the young girl to rise so fast.

Curiously though, a highly placed source at the President’s office rates Nancy Njie as one of the best cooks ever, describing her culinary skills especially, in Akara and Chepp as gifts from God. According to this source, one reason why the President likes Nancy is the food; it is always good not to talk about the aromatic atmosphere in Nancy’s house.

Our correspondent, Njie Khakatarr reveals that while Nancy may be academically limited, it is her combined culinary skills and romantic agility that mark her out as a darling of the famous, the high and the mighty. According to Khakatarr, “Nancy is reportedly wild and hot and has the romantic wherewithal to make a man go crazy; in sum she is foxy.”  

Nicknamed Madam Jaljali Borom-Nemali, Nancy Njie rose to prominence a year ago when President Jammeh defied physics and appointed her Tourism Minister but even before the dust settled, people began to see the obvious- a complex romantic web masquerading as patriotism. Until her appointment, she was a cook and food vendor by the entrance of the GPA where she was allegedly notorious for spousal snatchings and now that she has met Alhaji Yahya Jammeh a former schoolmate, it remains to be seen if she will succeed in snatching him too from Zeinab, Gambia’s arrogant First Lady. After all, Zeinab too is a spousal snatcher. Let us remember that she snatched Jammeh from Tuti Faal. Did Jammeh also not snatch Tuti Faal from someone else? “What goes around comes around” they say!

While President Jammeh may marry as many wives as he chooses, in our view, it is wrong to appoint Ministers and state functionaries not on the basis of competence but on sheer romance. In all honesty, Nancy Njie is not competent to run an office let alone head a ministry as important as Tourism particularly, recognizing that the poverty stricken West African nation relies on tourism as the backbone of its economy. Appointments on the basis of tribe, romance and friendship are wrong and simply put, constitute utter nonsense and there is evidence aplenty to support our argument.

Today, the Gambian Embassy in Washington, DC is shamefully dysfunctional because President Jammeh deliberately chooses to appoint ignorant fools like Ebrima JT Kujabie, a fellow with no high school diploma as Charge D’Affaires. What diplomatic work can JT Kujabie render? Instead of sending him to read for a high school diploma or at least registering him in a Community College to get an Associate Degree, Kujabie and people like him are sent to Washington to represent a Twenty-First Century sovereign Republic dealing with seasoned diplomats from America’s best Universities who would often be speaking in a sophisticated language nuanced in diplomatic registers that come with age and experience both of which Kujabie and his ilk lack. Therefore, instead of representing The Gambia, they represent themselves and their families and tribe and instead of seeing their job as Gambia’s they see it as personal; culminating in a frantic effort to elicit the services of occult scientists paid for from ill-gotten wealth meant for the poor country. To this category of diplomats, God does not exist, only Yahya Jammeh and their marabout are important and life goes on. However, if the sacking of Lamin Sabi Sanyang reported here last night fails to serve as a good lesson that Marabouts are human beings like all of us and that all else belongs to God, then they are really PITIFUL!!  For despite all the brouhaha, threats and vicious attempts to bury perceived enemies, Lamin Sabi Sanyang is sacked by Yahya Jammeh and the sun still rises and falls as usual to borrow a famous Gambian line. Therefore, my message to Lamin Sabi Sanyang and his colleagues is to take the sacking in good spirit, work harder and aim higher, be honest; always be honest, love your country, treat all people with respect, ask your marabout to pray to God for your protection but do not ask marabouts to destroy your fellow human beings because we all pray to the same God to protect us. Take your sacking in good faith and pray to God so that The Gambia- your country, my country, our country will continue to enjoy eternal peace because our people are peaceful and peace loving but also pray for the peaceful end of Yahya Jammeh’s regime- that should be the endeavour of all your powerful marabouts. If you do and if Jammeh’s regime ends, which will sure end, then one day, all of us and your marabouts will sit down at the Bantaba, rejoice and thank God that the dictator who has divided our nation, separated families, brutally butchered foes and friends alike has finally, finally exited the corridors of state power. God bless The Gambia and her people-Amen!