When 29-year-old Lieutenant Yahya A.J.J.Jammeh toppled the constitutionally elected government of Sir Dawda Kairaba Jawara on Friday July 22, 1994 he and his Armed Forces Provisional Ruling Council-military junta came up with a gospel based on a Trinity of: Accountability, Transparency & Probity. With this Trinity Chairman Jammeh vowed to fight corruption, promised never to ride on a Mercedes Benz and went on a rigorous campaign to uncover all alleged malpractices for the thirty years that Sir Dawda led the Gambian nation. In the process, he held press conferences, distributed presidential memos and made scurrilous allegations that brought untold embarrassment to the deposed Head of State, his government and family. Today, twelve years later, Jammeh seems to be at odds with these noble ideals as this story reveals.
As promised, here is the photo of Gambian President Rt. Col. Dr. Alhaji Yahya Abdul Azziz Jamus Junkung Jammeh and Mrs. Nene Macdouall Gaye taken at a house party at Kanilai, 48 hours before her appointment as Trade, Industry & Employment Secretary. According to our State House correspondent Kissy Kissy Mansa and our Military Affairs whistle blower Officer “X”(a.k.a OX), this revealing photo is the tip of the iceberg. Reveals OX, “this photo was taken only two days before Mrs.Gaye was appointed Trade Minister while First Lady Zainab Suma Jammeh was abroad on a shopping spree.” “We have never seen Kebba (one of President Jammeh’s unending aliases) so happy. That night, Easter Sunday, March 27, 2005 he told us that he would not hesitate to circumcise any man who refuses his wife to visit Kanilai.” The whole weekend that Mrs. Gaye was at the Kanilai State House, President Jammeh was complaining to her about his Cabinet Ministers; that he would not mind to kick them out because they were not so loyal. As usual Mrs.Gaye would just beam and tell us that H.E-(His Excellency) is a very intelligent patriot even though all of us knew that Kebba is not as smart as the errant journalist thought.
According to a senior official at the President’s office, Nene’s appointment was a fait a compli because not a day passed that she did not talk to HE. She had direct access to the Head of State, both office and mobile phone numbers way before her Cabinet appointment alleges this official. In fact, reveals our source, Nene Macdouall Gaye knew before Vice president Isatou Njie-Saidy and the entire Cabinet that the President was going to demote Sidi Moro Sanneh as Foreign Affairs Minister.Reveals another source at Foreign Affairs, while HE and Nene were enjoying at Kanilai, the newly appointed Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC), Turkish born Professor Dr.Ekmeleddin Ishanoglu
was in Banjul but Jammeh refused to extend to him the requisite diplomatic courtesies. Laments a highly placed source, “Jammeh would rather stay at Kanilai and womanize than meet the OIC Secretary General who in the diplomatic pecking order is right up there with the Heads of State; and you can imagine the enormity of this diplomatic blunder and how The Gambia would be seen within the OIC after refusing to extend diplomatic courtesies to it Secretary General.” According to this source, Sidi Sanneh would call President Jammeh every hour and explain the diplomatic implications of him not meeting this dignitary but Jammeh would either feign illness or tell Foreign Secretary Sidi Sanneh that he was busy attending to an important houseguest. According to OX, after H.E’s last phone conversation with Sanneh, he had confided in Nene that Sidi Sanneh would suffer the consequences of continuously calling him to attend to Dr.Ekmeleddin. Little wonder reveals our sources, that, when Nene Macdouall Gaye returned from Kanilai that Holy weekend of Easter, President Jammeh stunned the whole nation and appointed her Trade, Industry & Employment Secretary. Amazingly, in the President’s usual show of political bravado and blatant lack of stately decorum, that very morning, Tuesday 29 March 2005, Sidi M. Sanneh was moved from Foreign Affairs to the Trade Ministry.
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According to OX, The Gambia had two Trade Ministers on Tuesday March 29, 2005 but later on, Kebba sacked Sanneh and later appointed him Ambassador to Senegal in November, 2005 before he finally sacked him. “How on earth can you replace Sidi Sanneh with Nene Macdouall Gaye ?” laments OX.
According to Kissy Kissy Mansa, “the whole period that Nene was at Kanilai, President Jammeh neither touched the holy Quran nor did I see him pray. He only wielded his big walking stick and had a Michael Jordan cap.” “As we brew Ataya (Chinese green tea) he would repeatedly tell us that he was a Ndongo Banjul and he knew how to trick Gambians. He would also reveal to the famous houseguest how he suffered and struggled going to The Gambia High School.” Observes OX, “there was as usual, marked hyperbole in the President’s regurgitation of his formative years and some of us who knew him in the army knew that, most of the stuff was tainted with fibs.”
Reveals Kissy Kissy Mansa, “our presidential trips to South Africa and Libya were most memorable and one day we hope to report on those too. I will reveal the hotel rooms, the hours of operations and all the details. I will also reveal the dress codes and the romantic comments made.” However, according to OX, Janet Muna Lai too has to be exposed because before she too was appointed, numerous scenes had transpired at both State Houses. There is also the case of Fama Tazz Yakarr. Of these two says OX, Janet Muna Lai is more treacherous. She would often call journalists and make press statements just to boost President Jammeh’s dented image. About six months ago, reports OX, Janet told the President that his rights record was impressive and both the radio and TV carried the news.
Be that as it is, we at The Echo are amazed at President Jammeh’s political metamorphosis. Barely a month after the coup, it was the same man then Lieutenant Jammeh, who called a Press conference at State House and distributed to journalists confidential family memoranda of Ex- President Jawara. In that interview Jammeh photocopied a letter purportedly written by famed Nigerian business tycoon, Chief Arthur Zerebe and made scurrilous allegations as to the Chief’s romantic relationships with one of the Ex-President’s wives. He personally gave me (then as BBC correspondent), birthday cards purportedly written by Chief Zerebe and told me to expose the contents in the name of his trinity: Accountability, Transparency and Probity, noble ideals that have since dissipated into thin air. When I called the BBC later that morning to file a report, Robin White told me that Sir Dawda was a highly reputed man and since the allegations were from Chairman Jammeh, let me just allude to it as a mere allegation until it was verified. And I did just that. So when Robin posed the question: “Ebrima what else did Chairman Jammeh had to say?” I replied, “he made very damning allegations about one of the ex-President’s wives in a romantic relations with a Nigerian businessman.”
In fact, the following morning (a Saturday) after President Jammeh conferred with Sierra Leone’s Foreign Affairs Minister Dr. Abbas Cherno Bundu, he invited us to the President’s Drawing room, an impressive red-carpeted room where Ex- President Jawara attended to dignitaries. In his briefing, also attended by a Norwegian TV crew, I asked Jammeh about President Jawara’s household properties. He told me that Jawara’s son; David Jawara Jr. had loaded everything including photographs and jewelry in a truck and taken it to Dakar. He went on to tell us that once a tree is rotten you have to uproot the whole stem from the ground; that cutting the branches would not solve the problem. “Jawara’s regime was corrupt and filthy and I do not want to have the garments of a filthy man in my room lest they poison my Council” said Chairman Jammeh. Paradoxically, what Chairman Jammeh failed to tell us was that he had literally seized the Ex-President’s VCR gadget, a gadget so precious to the old man that he had personally instructed David “never leave my VCR behind.” Now we can confirm that Chairman Jammeh had in fact, told David, “Tell Pa (Sir Dawda) that his own son (Jammeh) has taken the VCR.” Once the truck arrived in Dakar, Sir Dawda’s first enquiry to David was his VCR. When David revealed the story, the old man said emotionally, “If he wants it, let him take it.” Juxtaposed against this backdrop, we are compelled by Jammeh’s trinity: Accountability, Transparency & Probity to publish this photo and the underlying dubious circumstances that it conveys. For what is good for the goose they say, is necessarily good for the gander and what goes around comes around.
Editor's Note: As we went to press, our colleagues on the ground have informed us of a serious campaign by the Information Ministry to block The Gambia Echo's IP address.Should they succeed, please go to Google, enter The Gambia Echo and then read The Echo.