For the last 22 years Gambia has never had a better time and opportunity to challenge Yahya Jammeh’s dictatorship and tyranny on the people of the Gambia than now. One can safely argue that Yahya Jammeh has never felt vulnerable in the past four presidential elections than he did at the moment. Not least the enthusiasm and genuine interest from all the opposition party members and their leaders to bring an end to 22 years of Jammeh’s hell on earth. As well as the disappointing campaign Jammeh is so far embarking on.
It’s evidence that Jammeh has no strategy to combat the efforts of the opposition as the coalition was the least he expected to happen. Now that the oppositions are united and everyone in the country can see and feel the ambiance behind the opposition coalition, Jammeh is forced to embark on the campaign trail, which he openly refused to do in the past two presidential elections. The tone of Yahya Jammeh’s campaign says to everyone who once heard him speak to Gambians that he is seriously worried about losing this election. Jammeh knows the oppositions had never created or campaign for violence, but the fact Jammeh is going on the campaign to ask his supporters not to be violent is also an indication that the man has lost it.
My fellow Gambians, this is once in a lifetime opportunity for us all to come together just as the oppositions did and end the sufferings of ourselves once and for all. We should not fall trap of Jammeh’s desperation to hold on to power by any means, as he has begun firing and hiring his auxiliary lieutenants such as Governors, Chiefs and Alkalolos. This is one of Jammeh’s strategies to appease and intimidate the local populace at the same time. We should all reject him and see the future of our country as the most important than the future of one selfish, divisive and shameless individual like Jammeh.
All these past elections, Jammeh’s message was, either you vote for me or not, I will still win until Allah decides otherwise, and that has played to his advantage to some degree. Another mean Jammeh use is religion to manipulate and play with people’s faith, not least why he declared the Gambia as an Islamic State. However, these are no longer the case as he has realised that Gambians can no more be fooled by such nonsenses. So people should understand that power resides with them and when casting your vote, it’s only you who can decide who becomes the next president of the country.
One thing we should all keep in mind is, Jammeh is the incumbent and in African politics we all know what that means, they have all the resources at their disposal to take advantage of. We should never be complacent and take the crowd as the final results. Each and everyone of us has a duty and a role to play to sensitise and inform the electorates to come out in their large numbers on election day and vote out Jammeh and his gang. Complacency is one of the easiest ways to lose an election, you only have to take the Briexit or Donald Trump’s election as a typical examples of such. To avoid that, we should be relentless in our efforts to continually support and vote for Adama Barrow come December 1st.
It’s a good time to believe, but it’s not a good time to relent!
Gambia Voices 