At forGambia News, we have not only been calling for a unified opposition to face Barrow, but spending our own money to bring every credible opposition under one umbrella. But since our editorials on UDP months ago, we are now tired.

The UDP will neither learn, nor respond to reason. And we are really tired of reasoning with them or spending money on them. We will reach out to Lamin J. Darboe and the NUP, insha Allaah. Gambia’s opposition needs a UDP antidote and a ‘Barrow-lytic’ charisma.

When Jammeh was in power, we used to write the “Jammeh Soothsayer” series with some Shakespearean inspiration on all the online papers. One of our biggest fans was Lamin J. Darboe, always giving us support and encouragement.

That history isn’t why we will put our little weight behind him. One day, we wrote an article about a possible successor to Yahya Jammeh around 2015. When we forgot to add Lamin J. Darboe’s name, a reader reminded us.

We immediately told the reader it was such a huge mistake on our part. We are not saying NUP will win in 2026. But we can sense a solution to the chokehold the UDP has had on opposition unity for years.

In July and August 2025, another party reached out to us. Here is something really bizarre about that encounter. We spent almost two hours trying to convince this party to rally behind the UDP for a formidable opposition force.

The new party’s leader strongly condemned the UDP and made it clear to us that they would never form any coalition with the UDP. The conversation couldn’t proceed after two hours. We have been secretly taking beatings for the UDP.

That new party’s leader told us the UDP would be destroyed in 2025. He told us wait and see. This was before Talib, Yankuba, and Rohey Lowe showed the party’s great schism. We doubled down on our support and warnings to the UDP for a heads up.

We never come out in the open to tell Ousainou Darboe what we have been doing for the UDP. And when the death of Abdoulie Jammeh was announced, we felt really down because his folks tried to connect him to us back in 2021.

If the UDP think they will win West Coast again with a comfortable majority, please think again. Of course, a fragmented opposition will only help Barrow. We have been decrying that for ages. But listen Gambia:

We don’t do predictions. But we are clearly seeing an augmented demise of the UDP. If Darboe couldn’t bring his party together in a charismatic conflict resolution, what do you think would happen if Darboe loses 2026?

There may be a bigger power struggle in the UDP when Darboe isn’t there anymore, further speeding up the party’s death. Lamin J. Darboe has a higher IQ and he won’t be engaging in any mudslinging with the UDP, God-willing.

We warned the UDP that Talib would siphon from the UDP base in KMC. But they hallucinate that no, Talib would mainly draw from Barrow’s NPP base—a task not even Ousainou Darboe could do. See what low-level thinking does?

And now, they may say Lamin J. Darboe and his NUP would only pull from Barrow’s base. Hell no! He will take away from the UDP, like it or not! While we hope that Lamin J. Darboe will maintain his measured demeanor, we humbly advise that he avoids the UDP style of politics.

And we humbly advise that he continues to focus on the suffering of the poor just like Zohran Mamdani did to surprise the rich and powerful not just in New York City, but the entire United States of America!

Mr. Lamin J. Darboe, please focus your speeches on the suffering of the poor—in our markets, hospitals, on our sea and marine artisans and vendors, our poor women who never ask Barrow to split the atom or build a spacecraft, but only an affordable cost of living.

Please don’t forget our soldiers who have been discarded and marginalized; our cement crisis that continues to make builders miserable; our Dalasi’s nose-dive and unprecedented depreciation and the dizzying height of corruption.

Please don’t forget our local women who rise early every morning for the subsistence gardens from Gunjur, Kembujeh, Bafuloto, Lamin, Bakau to Jarra Soma and Basse! Please don’t forget the ever-rising cost of a bag of rice and the painful plight of our farmers!

Please, be the Gambian Zohran Mamdani and speak for the poor—rise, lion! Fight for the weak and down-trodden! Charge, tiger, at those corrupt behemoths ever bent on sucking the blood of the helpless! Rise a knight; restore the Dalasi’s image to put a smile back on the faces of the country’s needy! Rise, history’s own Lamin J. Darboe!