Barrow’s understanding of governance is questionable

Dear Editor,
Barrow’s understanding of government is severely limited and this usually shows whenever he talks government infrastructural projects. He always makes it look like it’s because of his kindness and benevolence that we’re getting roads and other national infrastructures. And that Gambians should be eternally grateful to him for these projects.

This poor understanding of government causes Barrow to get very angry whenever citizens criticise his government, because in his head, he has already gifted us roads and hospitals and we should be kissing his shoes instead of criticising him. This is where the problem lies for Barrow. He simply doesn’t get it, and no one around him dares educate him on the basic tenets of government.

The fact is, 10yrs ago, when civilian Adama Barrow was selling 20×20 plots and collecting rent for rich Sarahule landlords, walking around town with plastics bags as his briefcase, he never built a brick for Gambians. He never spent a Dalasi for the benefit of Gambian people. He had no money to do so.

Come January 2017, Gambians, through our kindness and benevolence decided to give Adama Barrow the keys to our Treasury and the signatory executive Pen to manage and judiciously spend our money, contract new loans, grants and enter into partnerships on our behalf. From that day, Adama became our employee, and we tasked him to do a specific job for us, improve our lives and invest in our future.

And for this, we set aside a very lucrative salary compensation package for him, as well as paying for his food, clothes, housing, family medical care, kids school fees, fuel, electricity, vehicles for mobility and the best personal security. I think this is a very attractive and generous compensation package that deserves praise and respect from Adama Barrow, instead of the constant childish chest beatings about what he did for us.

Adama Barrow is doing no one a favour but himself. Because what is the alternative?

Refuse to do any development work? Well that simply means he will have to explain to the Gambian people what exactly he did with our money at the end of his contract in office. Most likely through a commission of inquiry or a court of law. It’s his choice. Do the work we’re paying you for, or explain to your employer, the Gambians where you spent our money.

So Barrow telling Gambians that criticise his low quality roads to go use other bush roads instead and avoid using “his” roads is a clear indication of his level of understanding when it comes to government.

Babouca r Sidi Jammeh

Politics of ethnicity and classroom language policy

Dear Editor,
The importance of language to any grouping can hardly be underestimated. Simply put, language is a mirror by which people see themselves, in their cultures, traditions and values. The preservation of a language requires that it be spoken, and used for learning, scientific research etc.

According to Unesco, 40% of the world’s 7000 languages risk extinction as one language dies every fortnight. This is a scary reality facing humanity. It’s all the reason why governments have to make the right moves in protecting indigenous languages, especially in developing countries of the global south.

It’s pertinent to ask what viable plans are in the offing, in programs and policies in ensuring that all our languages are not only solidly preserved but done so in a manner that reflects ethnic demographics, and safeguarding national cohesion and unity. For instance, identification of a minority language for instructions in schools, will most definitely not sit well with the rest of the population. Gambia Bureau of Statistics has the numbers, for anyone interested in figures.

When Dr Lamin Kebba Saho, of blessed memory, as the then Minister of Information intervened in putting the records straight, I believe he had done so in the best of intentions at the time. Up until the 1980s, the official language Policy at Radio Gambia, in order of precedence, was

English, Wolof, Mandinka, Fula, Jola, Sarahule. When Saho came, he made slight amends to this by placing Mandinka right after English. Tangible and justifiable to many, the situation remains so to this day. But as my former colleague Samsudeen Sarr described the late Dr Saho as a “tribalist minister”, I wonder if he Sam, shouldn’t sit up and examine his views on such sensitive issues!

Sam also wrote, ” if we want progress, we must teach languages that connect us to the world, not languages that divide us inside the compound. Otherwise our children will be fluent in seven tongues… and underdeveloped in all of them”.

I for one, can’t wrap my head around what Sam Sarr is saying. Which languages must we teach in schools and which ones not, if we want progress? Does he believe that the only languages progress can be achieved in are Wolof and Aku, because Banjul was arguably built by them? Banjul is not Gambia; rather, it’s in the Gambia, like Gunjur, Soma or Basse.

Once upon a time two Gambians applied for position of Director of Non- Formal Education. They were both Kinteh by surname. As the vetting process intensified, one of them claimed he was born in Banjul, the capital city, thinking that was sufficient to boost his chances of clenching the position. Although the Banjul- born finally got appointed to the position, thanks to the withdrawal of the other candidate, the story highlights a deepseated notion that privilege was more deserved when one is born in the urban area.

Sam, you unfortunately remind me of anarcronisms of that mentality and what has become of us more thn six decades after Independence. We need to stay above narrow nationalism and focus on building bridges of national unity.

Alhagie Kanteh