The thriving days of Gambia and the lost hopes of our people

Dear Editor,
How many of us remember the song, “Gone are the days when my heart was young and gay?” How many of us remember preparing for our exams under the shadows of a candle and a gas lamp?

We have taken significant steps to sustain and consolidate our political independence, but many things have gone abysmally wrong. If we are looking for things to blame, the first people to blame are ourselves.

Dictatorship hijacked our confidence, our thoughts, and our determination to thrive in a free and accepting manner.

Our first president overstayed his term due to bad advice and the selfish politicians around him. Dictatorship then became one of the most traumatic periods in our people’s lives. The loss of life alone was enough to frighten us all.

How many young people fled the country during the dictatorship? How many families were affected, directly or indirectly, by dictatorship? The loss to the country and its people from the effects of dictatorship is far too great and almost impossible to quantify.

What many people perceived to be the healing government of Adama Barrow in 2016 turned out to be a huge disappointment. The failures are far too many to elaborate on.

Turning the page towards positive thinking and paving the way forward, I hereby propose ten game changers that can help deliver a new Gambia — a Gambia for all:
1. Invest seriously in quality education and skills training so that young Gambians are prepared for the modern world, not trapped in outdated systems and memorisation.

2. Rebuild the healthcare system with better hospitals, stronger public health services, affordable medicines, and proper support for mental health. Train and sustain a disciplined and ambitious workforce.

3. Create meaningful youth employment and enterprise opportunities to reduce poverty, hopelessness, crime, and the dangerous backway journey. Build estates for young people with future payments linked to new employment opportunities.

4. Make agriculture a national economic priority by investing in food production, irrigation, storage, processing, and fair markets for farmers. The new vision for agriculture is for every Gambian family to feel secure nutritionally.

5. Fight corruption with real accountability by strengthening institutions, protecting public funds, and ensuring that no public official is above the law. The National Assembly must escalate its national and constitutional goals and requirements.

6. Reform our politics and leadership culture so that public office becomes a place of service, not personal enrichment—no 3rd term for any incumbent, including Barrow.

7. Build strong and independent institutions, including the National Assembly, judiciary, police, civil service, and electoral bodies. Create a regulatory body to scrutinise aspects of good governance and executive failures.

8. Empower women and young people as central actors in national development, decision-making, business, education, and community leadership.

9. Use the diaspora as a serious development partner by giving Gambians abroad a stronger voice in national affairs and investment opportunities.

10. Promote a new national mindset based on discipline, critical thinking, unity, hard work, patriotism, and belief in ourselves as a people.

We must not feel sorry for ourselves. It is time for us all to act collectively and responsibly by voting Barrow and his administration out of power come the 2026 Presidential elections, In Shaa Allah.

Salifu Manneh
USA