Gambia must make efforts to release and account for political prisoners
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By Mathew K Jallow, Associate Editor
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The United States Senate has proposed withholding financial aid The Gambia desperately needs to keep the government functioning. The proposal is contained in a Foreign Aid Bill for the fiscal year 2010-2011. The funds proposed for withholding form part of a package approved for The Gambia, and earmarked for two aid programs, “International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement” and the “International Military Education and Training.” In the Senate Bill, emanating from the Senate Appropriation Committee, the government directed the U.S Treasury Department to release not more than $120,000.00, for the two government programs. The release of additional funds, the Senate Bill instructs, is to be contingent upon the freeing of Chief Ebrima Manneh and other political prisoners from Gambia’s horrible prisons, detention centers and jails dotted all around the country.
The US government decision could not come at a worst time for the Gambian regime, when drug use by Gambian youth, and re-exportation of narcotics from The Gambia to Europe and the US is escalating at an alarming rate. Some of the poorest countries in the world are places where narcotics use, sale and manufacture have propelled violence and ungovernability. Ten years ago, narcotics were virtually unheard of in The Gambia, and only one relatively small organization, the Youth Front Against Drugs and Alcohol (YFADA), under Saul Sillah, with funding from Sweden, was cooping successfully with the scourge of drugs abuse in the country. Ironically, Jammeh's drug czar, Bun Sanneh, who incredibly is accused of turning the National Drug Enforcement Agency (NDEA) into a drug trading cartel, is an alumni of the Youth Front Against Drugs and Alcohol, trained well under Saul Sillah. The intervening years since my old friend Bun Sanneh turned against his former boss, and my buddy Saul Sillah, and caused the demice of Youth Front, however, Jammeh’s regime become complicit in the drugs trade, as the use of drugs by Gambians increased exponentially. Today, The Gambia needs an entire government agency to contain the drug menace in our country, a clear indication that the regime deliberately took its eyes off the ball, to allow the scourge of drugs to fester.
The US Senate decision, directing the US State Department to satisfy the Appropriations Committees; “that the Government of The Gambia is making significant efforts to release and account for political prisoners, including Ebrimah Manneh.” In addition, the Bill instructs that “ The Secretary of the Treasury shall instruct the United States Executive Directors of the international financial institutions to vote against any loan, agreement, or other financial support for The Gambia, except to meet basic human needs, unless the Secretary of State makes the certification required in paragraph (1).
Unfortunately, for the US and UK, Yahya Jammeh’s regime has the illegal drugs issue to blackmail them with, since the west is adamant in providing funding to counter the ever growing drugs menace in West Africa to protect their citizens from harm. For Yahya Jammeh, it is one more way to force the US and Britain to provide funding for his regime, and Jammeh has found a way to hold the two governments at ransom, otherwise the drug control program too would be affected by the withholding of funding as directed by the US Senate. However, if Yahya Jammeh fails to comply with the Senate directive to release journalist Ebrima Chief Manneh and other political prisoners, the next stage could be the introduction of sanctions against The Gambia at the bilateral, multilateral and international levels at United Nations. With Jammeh loathed, if not hated by most of African Heads of State, it is only a matter of time before The Gambia will be an outcast from the international community of nations. And below is highlighted The Gambia specific section of the Senate Bill.
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Gambia:
(f) The Gambia(1) Of the funds appropriated under the headings ``International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement'' and ``International Military Education and Training'' that are available for assistance for The Gambia, not more than $120,000 may be made available unless the Secretary of State certifies to the Committees on Appropriations that the Government of The Gambia is making significant efforts to release and account for political prisoners, including Ebrimah Manneh.
(2) The Secretary of the Treasury shall instruct the United States Executive Directors of the international financial institutions to vote against any loan, agreement, or other financial support for The Gambia, except to meet basic human needs, unless the Secretary of State makes the certification required in paragraph (1).
Other African countries to be affected by the same Senate Appropriations Committee funds withholding directive includes the “who is who” of Africa’s worst governed countries; Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, Somalia, and Sudan among other countries.