By Tabora Bojang
The diaspora public relations officer of the opposition Gambia Democratic Congress, Dodou Ndow, has accused President Adama Barrow and his advisers of sinking the country into a precarious social, political and economic abyss with no solutions to fix them, four years into the country’s post-totalitarian democracy.
“We are in a sinking ship and the captain of the ship has no idea how and where he is taking us with all the people in the ship going the wrong direction,” Ndow a political scientist and public administrator, told The Standard in an exclusive yesterday.
“I did not expect Mr Barrow to be a master’s or even bachelor’s degree holder, he only needs to make decisions in most cases advised by technical assistants and good people. We have to separate governance and politics but when you look at his advisers in Dodou Sano, Saihou Mballow and others, it is pathetic. These are advisers who go to the villages and dance and sing with people to vote for the president. It’s just like having a blind man leading a blind man,” he chided.
According to Mr Ndow who is also the secretary general and chairman of the GDC UK chapter, post-totalitarian democracies across the world are mostly polarised and plagued by several challenges “because people come from a very different system to a new system where everyone is trying to restructure himself or herself”.
“But that polarisation and fragmentation should not be used to make the country sink and sink further and what we are seeing today will come to haunt us, and Gambians must not sit and allow Barrow to derail the country. Jammeh was not right to be killing Gambians and rule with an iron fist but also we do not deserve what is going on now. It’s all about poor governance, grave mistakes and more clandestine activities underground,” he added.
Barrow and Kandeh
During his nationwide Meet the People Tour last December President Barrow said he feels personally embarrassed as a native of Jimara that some of his main political opponents are natives of Jimara, one of them being Mamma Kandeh, GDC leader.
But Mr Ndow who described most of the people who decamped to NPP from GDC as “hungry”, said it is illogical for the president to expect the GDC leader to join NPP merely because they are from Jimara.
“President Barrow and Mamma Kandeh are not from the same mother or father, so it does not really matter that they come from the same district. GDC will not align itself with President Barrow because he did not have the love for country at heart which is why we are in all this mess. President Jawara did very well and Jammeh too did apart from the killings but for Barrow, there is no single achievement that he can boast off. Even if he is being spoon-fed he finds it difficult to digest. So you cannot compare Barrow to Kandeh. It is like comparing apples to oranges. Barrow is nowhere near Kandeh when it comes to experience, leadership, personality and charisma,” Mr Ndow waxed.
