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Writer's pictureBy: Kebba BAjo

Commentary: A message to the Gambian Electorate and to the youth

Gambians must now stop blind following politicians, upon every five years they will come to us begging to vote for them into our public office, and we the electorate will celebrate thieves as Professor Wole Soyinka once says, "only in Africa will thieves be regrouping to loot again and the youths whose future is being stolen will be celebrating it..."


"Our struggle for dignity, freedom, democracy and good governance..our struggle for justice and equality for all, irrespective of their tribe, ethnic group, race, religion or gender are indication that nobody is anybody's majority, and nobody is anybody's minority." Dr. John Garang De Mabior.


We most now start listening to ideas because politics of the 21st century is politics of ideas and about competition of ideas.

I do not have the monopoly of wisdom and what I do is to share my thought with you and to make suggestion which may not necessarily be true but they constitute my opinions”


I'm amazed that Gambians have appetites for bad leaders but that's not unique for Gambians that's unique for Africans. There's a sense in which Gambians have Insatiable appetite for electing bad people into office, the corrupted, inept, and the mediocre.


My message to Gambians is to go out there and use their vote and ask the question these men and woman you are voting in to office, what is he or she going to do that will improve the quality of your life upon election and being entrusted with the taxes that we paid and is he or she and his government going to use it to make sure that we have good infrastructure? Is he or she going to use my taxes to make sure that there's no power outage? Is he or she going to use my vote to ensure that we have food on our table? Is he or she going to ensure that we have quality education in our schools so that our young men and women can be able to invent an innovate? Is he or she going to use it to ensure that we have jobs for our people? Is he or she going to ensure that we are able to feed ourselves and to stop the western world and the Chinese from exploiting our resources and to use our resources for the benefits of our people?


Is he or she a person who will use his or her office to acquire personal wealth? Thus I would state, we most elect into offices men and women who have demonstrated by words and deeds, that their only agenda in their pursuit of leadership is to ensure that they use that privilege and opportunity to serve and to improve the quality of the life of our people.


It is important because it demonstrates that there is something in our minds that we have yet to liberate ourselves, we have yet to decolonize our minds. It is prerequisite to our total liberation so that we can engage with the world meaningfully.


I hope and pray that we can make a good choice on who we vote for, as we are heading towards this upcoming election. Let us open our hearts and minds and pick leaders with vision, leaders that know that leadership is servanthood because success of a country to a greater extent depends on leadership. As John C Maxwell says, “everything rase and fall on leadership.” God save my country?



Author, Kebba Bajo

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