Meritocracy: Giving jobs and positions to the best among the best based on merit. But in The Gambia, some very important jobs are given to the worst of the worst.
Pragmatism: Pulling the best ideas that work from capitalism, communism, socialism or any other …ism! Utilizing those ideas from every system as long as they work to solve our problems and bring about prosperity!
Honesty: Being honest as a public or civil servant, president, cabinet minister, national assembly member…etc! And this is the toughest!
These three principles were what propelled Singapore to where it is today. And shortly before the 1994 coup, Sir Dawda Jawara announced he saw a dream where Gambia became the next Singapore!
But why am I writing this? Around 2002 when I was new in the United States, I had no drivers’ license, let alone a car. Some college friends were teaching me how to drive. Later, I bought a car when I still had no driver’s license.
Americans Travis, Victor, Gary, Jessica, Sonya, Brandon…thank you all for teaching this “poor and dumb African” how to drive a machine put together by other humans! But before I bought my first car, Xavier, a classmate was giving me a ride to Walmart when his phone rang.
I couldn’t speak Spanish or “Mexican”, but I knew Xavier had to give reasons to the speaker at the other end of the line as to why he was driving to Walmart that hour. Perhaps he explained he was helping a collegemate out.
And the speaker at the other end of the line was really helping me understand Spanish better. And I could hear Xavier say, “He’s from Africa,” meaning I Ebrima “Poor Dumb African” Papa Colley, of course should have been the only one on campus without a drivers’ license or a car.
Later, I rented a small room off-campus belonging to a classmate’s family. The room was a laundry room—I’m not joking, and I wasn’t pissed. What pissed me was when the family dog left everyone’s room to climb atop my bed and sleep there while I was away. Do even dogs feel Africans deserve less?
Later I did all kinds of jobs in America to survive. But there was simply one common denominator: Very few humans respect Africans! Even some African Americans look seriously low upon us! WHY?
Because there has been a market fire in Brikama repeatedly! And our gov’t, our people in leadership couldn’t solve similar problems elsewhere—in Kanifing, Serrekunda Market, Basse, Bakau, etc. But reader, they could afford per diems of €250 to $300 a night. And that’s before salary, hotel cost, and plane ticket.
Because only in Africa, Gambia in particular would you see a gov’t that spends a fortune on two water cannon trucks only to prolong its stay in power while its people have slum-structured market stalls with extremely dangerous electrical wirings.
How far could the money spent on those water cannon trucks go in eliminating slum market stalls and replacing them with brick and concrete structures throughout Serrekunda market, Brikama, Basse, etc?
How many jobs would be created by empowering our youths through GTTI in electrical engineering—the same youths who would be market and public building electrical safety inspectors? And Gambia can’t replace the Gorgui Mboobs with educated, honest, well-trained and equipped crime hunters?
And each time we publish about market fires or the trucks over-turning at the Bwiam military checkpoint, we guarantee that very soon a similar one would occur. And time has always proven us right! We have problems we can fix. But we refuse to fix them! Only in Africa and Gambia in particular!
The first thing Barrow did was to increase his own salary when floods repeatedly demolish homes of the very poor who sang and clapped for him before elections.
Later, he built lavish structures for himself in Mankamang Kunda. He even added a police station from a money he extorted from Gambia Ports Authority.
His cabinet ministers are buying property in Dakar, knowing fully that only their gross ineptitude would deny Gambia a prosperity where even its leadership leaves home soil for a neighboring country. This is the reason the world looks low upon Africans.
We have very filthy leaders who are too corrupt to feel sorry for the poor. And when we can’t feel sorry for the poor, we can’t think of solutions to their basic problems such as the Brikama fires, Serrekunda Market fires, Kanifing gas storage fire where cars were burnt, Basse fire, Bakau fire, etc.