Dear Editor,
This is yet another misleading and defensive statement by the President, aimed at evading responsibility while shifting blame elsewhere.
According to his own government’s data, poverty and hunger have increased in this country. Let him refer to his own National Development Plan 2023 – 2027. Poverty levels were already unacceptably high before 2017, and since then, his government has failed to reduce them. Therefore, it is plainly false to claim that no Gambian goes without a meal.
Many working Gambians including civil servants and security officers are abandoning their jobs to risk the Backway because their incomes are grossly insufficient to sustain themselves and their families. Salary increments alone do not guarantee an affordable and a dignified life. Even “stable inflation” still means a high cost of living. Income inequality remains staggering. Let the President simply compare his salary to that of his driver or a cleaner in any government office.
Youth going on the Backway are not crazy or unreasonable, as the President implies. They are desperate. Poverty, inequality, and lack of opportunity are forcing people to take deadly risks. That desperation is the real issue.
The President should be asking his technocrats hard questions:
How much is government truly spending on youth?
On job creation? What services are available?What institutions and opportunities exist?
How effective and accessible are they?
Instead of deflecting, Barrow should explain why he left the Gambia for Europe in the first place. Like him, many Gambians left in search of better opportunities. Some returned and succeeded, others did not. Today, not only are youths leaving through the Backway, but thousands of educated Gambians are also leaving through the front way for the same reasons: jobs, services, safety, and dignity.
Poverty is a recurring reality in the Gambia. Hunger existed in the past and exists today. The country was a recipient of food aid before from the Americans and remains so now from the Japanese and others. These facts cannot be denied.
There are thousands of hardworking youths who stayed behind working as carpenters, mechanics, drivers, teachers, fishermen, vendors, farmers, engineers yet struggling without or with limited tools, capital, space, or support. They are not lazy. Rather, they are victims of weak laws, poor policies, failing institutions, and corrupt officials. From a human rights perspective, poverty is an injustice.
Therefore, the President must stop listening only to praise singers. He must listen to critics with openness, honesty, and respect. Attacking deprived youths for trying to escape deprivation is unacceptable. When conditions are extreme, people resort to extreme measures.
This is the conversation Adama Barrow must lead if he truly intends to govern for the people. But denying poverty and hunger and creating scapegoats while ignoring the failures and weaknesses of government and leadership will neither solve the Backway nor bring prosperity to the people.
For The Gambia our homeland
Madi Jobarteh
Kembujeh
