From The Gambia -- Old News already

Here are two bulletins I wrote a couple of weeks ago from The Gambia, where events were unspooling rapidly. Since then, Jammeh has fled to Equatorial Guinea, ECOWAS troops have peacefully occupied the country, and there is a climate of happiness and optimism in a new, free Gambia.

The country still has huge obstacles to overcome: a very, very shaky economy, a national treasury that's been raped, a legacy of oppression and corruption that has led to a constant brain drain, high unemployment, etc., etc., etc.

But the people are hopeful.

Wednesday, 18 January

I am reminded of the old Chinese curse: May you live in interesting times!

I am playing host to a tribe of Gambian refugees, six adults and two small children, all from my Gambian family. It is delightful to have them here even if there are rough spots in getting them used to “mod cons” like a gas cooking range.

Events are rapidly forming in The Gambia. It all comes down at midnight tonight when President Jammeh's term in office ends. The inauguration of the new president is supposed to happen tomorrow, the 19th, but, as the world knows, Jammeh is refusing to step down.

The UN, all major embassies, the African Union, and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) have all condemned his refusal to step down, have advised him to respect constitutionality. ECOWAS is prepared to take military action. Britain has offered logistical support and France has offered air cover for any military action.

The Gambia's army only numbers a thousand. They may have a tank – stationed at the president's home village, Kanilai – but little else in the way of heavy weaponry. There are no helicopters; no air force; a few small patrol boats.

But, I'm told Jammeh has imported mercenaries from Sierra Leone and Liberia, hard, brutal men who were actors in the civil wars there. Logical if one doesn't trust one's army.

The overseas ambassadors have almost all endorsed Barrow, the president-elect. Nine government ministers have resigned and fled. At least one of the ministers appointed as a replacement two days ago has already resigned. (I was just informed that Omar Sy, the Minister of Health, a man I know personally, has just resigned.)Yesterday, Jammeh declared a state of emergency and closed the borders.

A number of ranking army officers have been arrested (or spirited away) because they have either refused to back Jammeh or actively advised him to step down.

I went to The Gambia two days ago to buy some medication I can't get here in Senegal. The border post on the Senegalese side was thronged with people leaving The Gambia. Cars and vans were lined up awaiting entry, and extra Senegalese army personnel were there directing traffic and keeping order, but there was no sign of any army mobilization or heavy weaponry at the border.

I had expected an atmosphere of tension across the border in The Gambia. I was surprised to find things pretty much business as usual aside from lighter traffic on the roads. There weren't any more army or police checkpoints than usual and I wasn't stopped and searched even once. There's a new bunker at the major intersection coming from the border, but I saw only three soldiers there with light weapons.

Any military incursion by ECOWAS will have to be at least partially amphibious, unless helicopters are used. The Gambia is divided, north and south, by the impressive barrier of the River Gambia. Banjul, the capitol, is at the mouth of the river on the south bank. The president's residence, the State House, overlooks the beach and is fortified, but likely nothing heavier than light anti-aircraft guns, heavy machine guns and RPGs. No match for the Senegalese army. Any force entering from northern Senegal will have to contend with a major river crossing, but that can be done.

No one knows what will happen. It remains to be seen what portion of the army is willing to die for Yahya Jammeh.

Interesting times!

Later.

The BBC reports major military build-up along the Casamance border. That's only 35km from hear but we don't see any evidence of it. According to the BBC interview of the Nigerian foreign minister, ECOWAS forces are ready to invade come midnight.

Jammeh is still maneuvering. He supposedly has only 300 soldiers loyal and willing to defend him. How this is known is beyond my ken.

The Mauritanian president is supposedly in Banjul trying to convince Jammeh to accede to the election results.

Nigeria offered him asylum but he turned them down. The last African dictator to take refuge in Nigeria was turned over to the World Court in The Hague. That's one of the last things Jammeh wants.

I'd like to see him pay for his crimes.

Edward Gomez, a slimy Gambian lawyer and former Minister of Justice I had some unfortunate dealings with, agreed to represent Jammeh in his appeal to the Gambian Supreme Court to rule on the election. We heard today that Gomez has fled to Guinea-Bissau. It is my sincere wish that he rots there. I heard him argue a case in court once. His excessively flowery language recalled “Wormtongue”, the character from Lord of the Rings. I hope he has to scramble for his existence.

Many good people are leaving The Gambia. So are many rats.

Thursday, 19 January

There was an unsubstantiated report early this morning, that Nigerian forces had invaded Farafenni, on the North Bank, where there is one of the largest army garrisons, but that seems to have been false.

We've had little verifiable news today, but one important item. Things are still quiet, from all we can determine.

ECOWAS forces are massing at the both north and south (Casamance) borders, awaiting authorization from the UN Security Council to proceed.

Ebrima Barrow, the president-elect, will be inaugurated at the Gambian Embassy in Dakar, not nearly as satisfying as an installation in the capitol, but technically legal. An embassy is technically the territory of the country authorizing the embassy, so it is Gambian territory in Senegal on which he will be inaugurated.

The big news is that the Gambian Army chief stated that they would not oppose ECOWAS troops. That is big news. I had heard that many soldiers were wearing civilian clothes under their uniforms and, if worse came to worse, would shed their uniforms and walk away come midnight. They have families, too, and Jammeh isn't worth dying for.

Many Gambians say that they want ECOWAS to occupy the country to insure that Jammeh and all his henchpersons are secured and no longer pose a threat. They are concerned that Jammeh's APRC party apparatus will allow Barrow to take office, then stage a coup d'etat after a few months. It is rumored that he Jammeh has bunkers scattered around the country as well as large caches of arms in bunkers in Kanilai.

Kanilai, his home village, is near the border with Casamance, in a heavily forested and comparatively inaccessible area. If Jammeh formed a guerrilla force, they could easily melt across the Senegalese border then stage raids or attempt a coup from there. Just how the logistics of this would work is questionable, though.

Are any of the Gambian military officer corps reliable? Few, most likely.

The Gambian Army is not professional. Officers don't work their way up through the ranks. There is no officer college. Enlisted personnel don't become officers. The officers are simply appointed by Jammeh. “Yesterday you were a clerk. Today, you are a lieutenant-colonel!”

A few days before Jammeh rejected the election results he appointed 120 brand-new officers, gave each a brand, new Mitsubishi Pajero (Montero, in the US), and 1,000,000 dalasis (almost $21,000, a king's ransom in The Gambia). The man knows how to create sycophants, but I suspect their loyalty is as reliable as their ethics.

Everyone is thankful peace has reigned so far. Jammeh is finished. It is only a matter of time.

20 January 2017

ECOWAS forces in The Gambia have halted to allow Jammeh a breathing space and time to exit. There has been film on line of Gambians celebrating in the streets yesterday and today, waving and welcoming the ECOWAS troops as they forged by in their vehicles. HUMVEES and armored vehicles mounting heavy machine guns. The vehicles maintain disciplined distance between them. Very professional.

The UN chief for Africa has arrived and is waiting for the presidents of Mauritania and Guinea Conakry to arrive. They will try to convince Jammeh to exit peacefully.

The man's mind is beyond me! Yesterday he announced via Gambian television that he was forming a new cabinet. Who he would use is a matter of conjecture. No one except his official spokesman and his State Guards remain. Perhaps he will appoint some cows, sheep and goats.

He is supposedly still in a bunker under the State House, but who knows? Does he want to go out like Hitler, or perhaps in a fiery Armageddon? That is seemingly the only alternative to leaving peacefully for exile elsewhere.

Here, in Kafountine, the morning market is thronged with people who have fled from the potential violence. Lots of folks from other West African countries live in The Gambia, so there are not only Gambians but Ivorians, Guineans, Ghanaians, Liberians, and Nigerians, adding to the locals.

It's a bonanza for Senegal but an economic disaster for The Gambia. So many people have been inconvenienced and displaced. Mind you, this is no Aleppo. There has been no violence, no starvation, bombed-out buildings. But so many Gambians live in poverty that the precipice is not far. To have to pick up and flee is a severe hardship.

And it will take years for tourists to feel comfortable returning. Tourism is a major source of foreign income for the entire country. It will hurt service people and the providers of food and the tour guides and the artisans and shop keepers and...and...and... The Gambia has few exportable resources, mostly agricultural and badly needs foreign capital to even approach a balance of payment.

All this for the inexplicable, unfathomable, unimaginable ego of one man! I can only shake my head in wonder how someone can be so selfish, so egotistical, to think himself more important than all the citizens he claims to care for. He has to be unbalanced. But how he has gotten other people to buy into his mania? Are they equally crazy? Or just greedy? Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Nero, Caligula. Sadly, it is not the first time nor will it be the last. And it is always men.

I think it would be different if women ran things.

Later

My jaw dropped when Ebrima told me what was happening. He has been following the news on his smart phone. Yes, there's smart phone internet even here in a rural African village. (“These are the days of lasers in the jungle/Lasers in the jungle somewhere.)

The Mauretanian president is supposedly closeted with Jammeh and Jammeh is trying to negotiate a settlement! It apparently includes some sort of pension!! Is the man delusional? He is a dust-mote away from annihilation and he thinks he has a negotiating position?

It is frustrating to wait for such negotiations, but ECOWAS appears to want to avoid bloodshed. It is obvious the other side doesn't give a rip.

I certainly hope no one is humoring Jammeh. I hope someone is able to penetrate his fog of brain and convince him that his decisions are simple: surrender or die.

These are tragic times in The Gambia. I lived in Dakar for 2 years 1983-84 when the wonderful Abdou Diouf was president. This was during the Senegambian Confederation years. I visited Banjul many times and was saddened by its terribly poverty that seems to continue to this day.

My time there is history now and I haven't had the chance to return since then but I will always admire the brilliant Senegalese for their free press and multiparty politics and their secular Constitution.

You could always come visit! Gambians are optimistic about the future.

The Senegalese are, in general, a good example of democratic institutions. However, they do have some constraints on the press that I was unaware of until recently. They have laws on the books limiting press freedom in a rather vague manner and have jailed several journalists for "irresponsible criticism" of the government. That was during the Wade years. I'm not aware of whether that's been the case with the current president. They also prosecute journalists for publishing "untruths" about the government. How that is interpreted is, of course, up for grabs.

Nonetheless, they have been an example of pretty good governance and peaceful, democratic turnover of governments.

Things are moving rapidly in The Gambia. New ministers have been appointed and they seem to be, on the whole, a good lot.

The State Guards, the blue-beret-wearing elite troops who were tasked with protecting the State House and former president Jammeh, are going to be relieved of that duty and returned to barracks along with the mass of troops. Protection of the State House is to be demilitarized and turned over to the police.

The EU and several countries have pledged economic support for the new government to try to get things on some sort of positive track.

In the capitol, the ECOWAS troops are ubiquitous and relaxed, browsing in the local markets and schmoozing with the locals. These guys are Senegalese and all speak Wolof as well as French, so discourse with the Gambians, who also speak Wolof, is easy.

I don't know anything about the situation in Gambia, but I am curious why this thread doesn't violate the "No Politics" rule.

Another post:23 January

The man was a penniless army lieutenant on taking power in the 1994 coup. Saturday night, he flew out of The Gambia for Equatorial Guinea with $11 million in cash, a Bentley, and four limousines. There is nothing left in the national treasury. Apparently ECOWAS allowed all this in order to avoid bloodshed.

The country is bankrupt and unable to even pay salaries.

And Yahya Jammeh scoots with a vast fortune. He has mansions in Guinea Conakry, Europe, and other locations. But he went to Equatorial Guinea because it is ruled by long-time dictator. Theodor Obiang Nguema, who happens to be his friend, and no one can extradite him there.

Meanwhile, ECOWAS forces are in Banjul and will remain to ensure there is no coup d'etat by Jammeh loyalists in the armed forces.

There are rumors that his mercenaries have been instructed to fade away briefly then launch guerrilla warfare, which would presumably be in Fonyi, his Jola tribal heartland, and implemented with arms caches that he supposedly has there. All speculative, mind you.

The ECOWAS troops – from five counties: Senegal, Nigeria, Ghana, Togo, and Cote d'Ivoire – plan to stay for at least two months to ensure stability. Hopefully, they will seek out any arms caches and dismantle Jammeh's fortifications in his native village.

In his televised farewell speech to the nation on Friday day night, Jammeh pontificated about his selfless dedication to the nation and its people. He crowed about the transfer of power “without a shot being fired”. No, the killing happened while he was running the country, not when he is running from it. Smug, fatuous, and self-congratulatory, he, as long as he remains a free man, is a danger to The Gambia. Even from afar he can be a nexus of destabilization. It is my fervent hope his assets can be located, seized and returned to the Gambian people, and that he himself, can eventually be extradited to stand trial at the ICC in The Hague for his crimes.

Meanwhile, Adama Barrow, the new president, may still be in Dakar, awaiting word from ECOWAS and Gambian Army commanders that it is secure for him to come to the country. I'd love to be there to see him enter Banjul. That will be a historic day.

Ebrima pointed out that everyone welcomed Jammeh back in '94 and he turned into a monster. I agree with him that the people must remain optimistically skeptical. All politicians need oversight!

This morning, I awoke to the sound of the two little girls singing. The family is looking forward to returning peacefully to The Gambia tomorrow morning. I will miss them. It has really been a treat for me to have them here.

Tues., 24 January

Loaded them all on the van for The Gambia this morning. No more little girls singing.

And another:

Thurs, 26 January

Africans dance their joy. Tonight, thousands upon thousands of Gambians danced, sang, waved, clapped, marched up and down, overloaded cars and trucks and vans and drove up and down. They wore T-shirts with the “#Gambia Has Decided” hashtag, an act that just a week ago could land you in jail. They waved flags and held up posters and greeted each other. Where I was standing with Essa and Ebrima, a loudspeaker blasted popular songs. The one everyone joined in on was a piece written by my friend, Pa Bobo Jobarteh, with the chorus in Mandinka, “This is a sweet day.” And smiled and smiled.

While two Nigerian fighter jets circled and pirouetted protectively, the new Gambian president's plane, landed at Banjul International Airport at about 4:30 this afternoon,. It is only 20 miles of excellent, 4-lane divided highway from the airport to Westfield but it took his motorcade until nearly 10 PM to make the trip. I was told crowds lined the route all the way.

No one seemed to know where Barrow will be staying for the time being. One thing is for certain, he will not be occupying the State House in Banjul as of yet. Experts are carefully going through the grounds and all the buildings of the complex, looking for booby traps. It is a good thing. Poison gas was discovered in the air conditioning system of the State House itself. Whoever turned the air conditioning on would have been killed. The whole system will have to be scrapped and re-done. Hard to imagine the mind of the diabolically vengeful man who authorized it.

ECOWAS troops are less in evidence than I'd expected. There are Senegalese armored vehicles at the entrance to the State House and Gambians stop to schmooze with the soldiers. The Senegalese are just a bit stand-offish. They are here to do a job and they are very professional and still on very much on guard. This evening, the ECOWAS vehicles in the president's convoy were mobbed by Gambians wanting to shake hands with the soldiers.

“We are free!”, one man exclaimed to me. “We don't have to look over our shoulders before we open our mouths any more. Democracy is wonderful!”

After 22 years of dictatorship; of torture, of extrajudicial killings, of arrests and imprisonment without charges or trial, sometimes for years, Gambians have elected themselves free, and they are declaring that dictatorship will never happen here again. It will not be an easy road. Jammeh reportedly fled with $11 million, leaving the treasury empty. They will need help and the economy will need some creative thinking to get this tiny, agricultural country back on its feet.

The first tourist flights, suspended during the state of emergency, are due to land tomorrow. That will be a beginning. And Gambians need to be alert to make sure their governments stay democratic. Africans tend to breed “Big Men”. They need to make sure their leaders stay humble.

Tonight it was enough just seeing Gambians dance their long-awaited freedom.

Fri, 27 January

Discovered this morning that my pockets had been picked. Crowd situations are prime for pickpockets and I was being extra careful. Nonetheless, they got me...in spades! Wallet, drivers license, credit cards, information, emergency cash (more than $300), my reading glasses and glasses case. What a hassle!

They don't just target “rich” toubabs. Poor Gambians are victimized, as well. For a guy living on a grand a month in Social Security, losing that cash is a blow.

Damn!

(My wallet was returned by a very nice woman whose children found it. Money gone but documents, credit cards, etc., intact. I am grateful!

I have posted extensively on all this on my Facebook page (David Levine Kafountine) along with lots of photos.

Thank you so much for taking the time to write these posts, Doc. Very informative. I need constant reminders that there is so much of interest happening "out there."

While liberties concerning the "political" slant may have been taken, we should all read this and wonder about how hard it is to be free. What it took to get where WE are, and keeping it that way. Sometimes we need to see what is wrong, as well as right, in the rest of the world lest we forget. History if full of societies that forgot those lessons.

Amen!

One thing I have noted from living here is the superficiality of US news reporting. The top TV news shows seem to be far more comprehensive than TV news reporting in the US. Euronews, France 24, Al Jazeera English, and the BBC cover far more subjects and in much greater depth.

American TV news seems to be convinced that Americans have very limited attention spans coupled to parochial interests. MTV-style sound- and picture-bytes are US style.

My brother, Essa, with his high-school level education, is more aware of world events than anyone I know in America.

In The Gambia, things have quieted down. There is a lot of healthy debate and controversy. I even saw a parade of young people with signs that read "Never Again Dictatorship" and "No Imprisonment Without Trial". The new president traveled to Senegal (the previous regime never did!) and forged a strategic alliance. Very promising!

Among the things they agreed was the construction of a long-postponed bridge over the River Gambia, which will tremendously ease the difficulties of communication between Senegal and the Casamance, south of The Gambia but still part of Senegal. Dictator Jammeh had been using the idea of the bridge as a political tool to manipulate relations with Senegal, but never allowed the bridge to be constructed. The necessity of using ferries to cross the river has been a major hindrance, with truckers sometimes queuing for up to a week to get across the river. You could see them camped out next to their lorries, cooking over camp fires. (And you thought truck-stop food was bad?)

Parliamentary elections are scheduled for next month.

One thing I have noted from living here is the superficiality of US news reporting.

Amen to that too. I watched BBC's coverage of the '88 Olympics while living in England. I seem to recall making a snarky remark to a friend "What are all of these OTHER countries doing in the Olympics?!!"

Since then I watch/listen to BBC whenever I can - it's grounding.

Love you Doc, keep up the great work.

Same w/CBC and the '80 Olympics.

Was in Detroit and got Canadia OTA.

Keep us posted Doc, good news is always welcome.

Thanks, Tim and Jake!

Jake, I'm still using those boots! Busted zipper on one, soles starting to separate, but still going!!

Send me your address, I'll send the other pair I swapped 'em with that I never wear. Is there a UPS store at the corner?