By Mathew K Jallow, Associate Editor

In 1921, the Irish Poet, W.B.Yeats, wrote in The Second Coming:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot bear the falconer

Things fall apart, the center cannot hold

Mere anarchy is loosed upon this world

W. B. Yeats may not have known this, but he could well have been predicting the dire situation we find ourselves in as a nation. From the insane claims of supernatural powers, to the wild and outlandish practices of voodoo to supposedly cure HIV/Aids and Asthma, to the unprovoked expulsion of the U.N. Representative Ms. Fadzai Gwaradzimba, The Gambia is increasingly staking out a claim in the international limelight for all the wrong reasons. We have witnessed our country’s sad descend into a regional pariah over the past dozen years, and the antics of Yahya Jammeh are now becoming a drain on our goodwill, and in the process, causing a schism to develop between our country and the international community. The Gambia is descending from a poor but well respected and respectable nation under President Jawara, to one where we are developing a notoriety that is marginalizing our country and reducing us to the “bad boy” image that Jammeh is so passionately intent on projecting on our behalf. But, the recent expulsion of a United Nations diplomat is a new development that is bound to put added pressure on Gambians to do something to remove the cancer of Yahya Jammeh. Right now, with so much blood on the hands of this regime, we have more than enough reasons to justify Jammeh’s forced removal, and the latest gaffe with the U.N. will only create sympathy and add legitimacy to our cause. With the expulsion of the U.N. diplomat, Jammeh is proving to the wider global community that he is not inhibited by any international decorum nor by the laws which most of the rest of the world tries so hard to live by. Jammeh’s biggest test now is after rendering our Gambian laws meaningless, and our own Constitution a worthless stinking document, how much longer will he survive before graduating from a local notoriety to that of international buffoon. Jammeh’s recent actions could have far reaching consequences for his regime, as the U.N. body commands respect and can exert pressure on other countries to isolate this Mafia outfit that we call our government. What is certain is that after disrespecting and disregarding our laws, the removal without cause of the United Nations diplomat may put Jammeh and his government on the spot. This may not be a good thing for Jammeh and his band of Mafia thugs. As W. B. Yeats wrote with such grace and eloquence; “the center cannot hold and mere anarchy is loosed upon this world.” Our agony shows no sign of letting up, not until we decide to do something about this evil person Yahya Jammeh.

It is unconscionable that The Daily Observer is not only continuing to propagate the idea that there is indeed a cure for HIV/Aids, and that Jammeh discovered it, but adding insult to injury, the paper is blaming the international backlash to this preposterous claim on Dr. Coumba Toure-Kane, a Senegalese doctor. The Daily Observer’s continued support of Jammeh’s HIV/Aids cure claims defies logic, but more importantly, tarnishing good the characters of Dr. Coumba Toure-Kane and the U.N. Representative Ms. Fadzai Gwaradzimba, shows how far lost in the wilderness of journalism the paper is. The Observer has been reduced to nothing more than the mouth piece and echo chamber of Yahya Jammeh, his government, griots like Fatou Jahumpa-Ceesay, her older brother Bala Jahumpa, and others with similar orientation towards material wealth. But, the Observer’s dispute with Dr. Toure-Kane came after the paper published a letter supposedly written by the doctor, allegedly vouching in testimony to the effectiveness of Jammeh’s aid cure. But, the paper did not stop at merely castigating the doctor; it is also shouting accusations of Senegal’s jealousy of The Gambia’s discovery of the HIV/Aids cure. This cheap nationalism and conflict baiting will only exacerbate the already volatile situation that has existed between Senegal and us. While it is true that as a people, Gambians aspire only for good relations with our Senegalese brothers and neighbors, the policies that Jammeh and his government pursue, are going to be identified with the rest of our population. Jammeh has aligned our foreign and regional policy objectives with the goals and aspirations of the small band of rebels in Cassamance fighting to cede from the rest of Senegal. But, there is no political interest in the Cassamance for us other than to see that peace and stability has returned to the provinces of Ziguinchor and Bingona where rebel activity is concentrated. The sad thing is that whether we like it or not, what Jammeh does will be pinned on the rest of us irrespective of the fact that by a wide majority, Gambians want to see him gone. Until then, with The Daily Observer playing the role of an apologist and echo chamber for Yahya Jammeh, he will not likely shut his mouth just yet, nor is he ready to grow out of the infantile “bad boy” mentality.

It is funny and ridiculous the ease with which the Jammeh government speaks of Vision 20/20 as if it was in sight. There is nothing wrong with aspiring and having an ambition to be like Singapore, but when the goals to be achieved are impossible, it is called hope. For the past ten years, Jammeh in his cunning and deceitful moments has tried to deflect our attention from the serious economic and political failure in the country, to the not yet possible or attainable visions of grandeur and opulence swirling in his big, delusional head. The utter and miserable failure of this government is reflected in the demographic distribution of the population as reflected in the last two elections. For the first time in our history, nearly half of our population now lives in an area almost a fifth the size of the country. With the concentration of our population in the Western Division and the greater Banjul area, the very heavy rural to urban population drift that began in the early 1960s, has picked up unprecedented momentum over the past ten years. Added to this challenge, Vision 20/20 as envisaged by Jammeh and his government, will mature in only thirteen short years, yet our literacy level still remain at a low 15% literacy. Besides, the minds and the brains that can make the 20/20 dream a reality are scattered all across the U.S, Europe and countries as far away as Japan. To achieve the level of development Singapore had before it turned into a global economic phenomenon, there must be a solid foundation on which to build our future successes, and chief among them is education. But, our demographic shifts also carry another ominous message; a message of neglect throughout the length and breadth of our country. From Sutukoba to Kerewan in the North Bank, and from Koina to Jiffarong, the rural countryside is crumbling as villagers move in droves to the Kombo and St. Mary’s regions. Farming and agriculture is in sharp decline, and recent returnees to the U.S. from The Gambia tell of stories that touch the heart. Sambang Village in Niamina West, once a sprawling and bubbling town is now almost reduced to a ghost town as residents move to the Kombos, in pursuit of better living conditions. There is no incentive to stay in the villages to eke out a living from the land with farmers not being paid for their crops and the price of their produce going downhill. As more and more people move to the Kombos, villages from Wuli and Sandu to Nuimi and Kiang are falling apart. In Sambang, my relative told me of donkeys and other animals overtaking grass houses where families once lived. Broken fences and falling mud and grass houses stand abandoned and isolated between the ever decreasing numbers of compounds that still remain intact, albeit with reduced residents. In the village of Mansajang Kunda in Basse, two hundred miles to the east of Sambang, the story is the same. Aging homes, which are abandoned or falling into disrepair, are everywhere, but more poignant, is the absence of people from this once-upon-a-time Mecca that attracted the big and the mighty to it. In village after village, the story of abandonment is the same, as the rural countryside becomes desolate and forsaken, but this gradual transformation taking place before our eyes is not progress, rather, it is a movement backwards; a retrogression. The challenge in the years ahead is how to repopulate our countryside once again by making agriculture a worthy enterprise for our farming community displaced around the Kombos. Meanwhile, as the Kombos expand and modernize, the untold story is that Diaspora Gambians are fuelling the building boom in the country with their hard earned Dollars, Pounds, Francs, Marks, kronas and Pesos to name a few, yet Jammeh is wrongfully claiming credit for the boom in the construction industry. But, despite the increasing bright streetlights in the Kombos, our south bank has no roads, with cars taking the same amount of time to drive from Banjul to Choya village in Niamina, as it would take to fly from New York’s J. F. Kennedy to Banjul Airport. While our major road is in complete disrepair, Jammeh’s government is pumping its chest and bragging about their achievements. But, the reality is that not only are we drowning in debt, but that for every dollar of our money Jammeh spends on a public project, he and his corrupt thugs and officials take two for themselves and their families. Soon, one by one, beginning with Gamtel/Gamcel, the public agencies will go under bankruptcy if Yahya Jammeh does not stop using them as his piggy bank to take money when and how he wants. Like all other African leaders, Jammeh is unable to distinguish between what belongs to the public and what belongs to him personally. And so the nightmare of Gambia’s growing agony continues, but maybe this time not for long.