At a time when conscientious political leaders and honest pragmatic technocrats around the world are moving their nations towards democracy, good governance and accountable leadership, in the Gambia it is the opposite. The Barrow Papers 2024 is the blueprint of the country’s political leaders and their technocrats who, in their wisdom, think that the Gambia should rather go the opposite direction by building a corrupt autocratic dispensation. Now that they have issued their Explanatory Notes, their true intentions for the ‘Mission to Dictator Land’ have become jaharang!
I have gone through the Explanatory Notes and could not find any explanation or justification therein that is geared towards building and strengthening democracy and ensuring accountable leadership in this country. Rather, I find only poor quality justifications that only confirm that the Minister of Justice cannot even defend these Papers.
The justifications they provide flout basic democratic norms while violating international human rights laws and standards. I can state without any fear of exaggeration that the Barrow Papers is purposely and squarely intended to legalize dictatorship and entrench corruption in the Gambia.
For example, the Barrow Papers 2024 deleted Section 47(5) in the 2020 Draft Constitution which states that “the State shall not penalize any person for any opinion or view or the content of any broadcast, publication or dissemination.” The explanation given in the Barrow Papers for deleting this safeguard is that freedom of expression should be balanced with the need to protect individuals and prevent hate, incitement or cause disinformation.
But this is a misinterpretation of freedom of expression hence the Explanatory Notes is not responding to the deleted provision. No one limits, in fact threatens freedom of expression as the Barrow Papers is doing in the name of preventing hate speech.
By deleting that provision, the Barrow Papers is rather effectively empowering the State to suppress freedom of expression. It means if a citizen says anything that the State does not like, it could penalize that citizen or the media outlet which broadcasts that speech when there is no element of hate speech, disinformation or threats to public morality in that speech. Hence the only reason the Barrow Papers deleted that protection for free speech is to silence the media and citizens from holding the Government accountable.
To further clampdown on rights, the Barrow Papers removed from Section 50 of the 2020 Draft the right to picket and petition public and private institutions. The meaningless explanation provided is that they want to “balance the protection of rights with public interests”. Denying citizens to assemble in front of public or private institutions and submit a petition is the heart of the right to the freedom of assembly without which a protest becomes totally meaningless and ineffective, hence shielding public institutions and private businesses from accountability.
In its General Comment 37, the UN Human Rights Council which oversees the monitoring of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) states that Article 21 of the Covenant on freedom of assembly includes the right to picket. Similarly, the right to petition is recognized as a fundamental human right.
Hence, to remove picketing and petition out of the right to freedom of assembly is a violation of international law, not to mention the fact it denies citizens to express their grievances as they should in a democracy. Protecting public interests cannot in any way mean that picketing and petition cannot take place at the same time.
Picketing and petitioning are in themselves public interest tools. Hence to deny Gambians to picket and petition can only mean denying them from holding the State accountable, defend democracy and demand quality goods and services, etc.
The deletions, additions and modifications made to the provisions of the 2020 Draft Constitution severely lower the bar for democratic governance and human rights. While immense powers have been bestowed on the President and public institutions at the same time necessary checks and balances were curtailed as major fundamental rights and freedoms were taken away. This means significant reductions in state obligations thereby limiting their duty to protect and fulfil human rights, hence the creation of an autocratic dispensation.
For example, the explanation provided for the removal of free secondary education on the basis that the Government does not have enough resources is the most outrageous. If the Government can buy a vehicle for D12 million just to carry a minister from home to office, how can it justify that it does not have money to provide free secondary education? One only needs to look at the various Auditor General’s reports or Janneh Commission Report to see how public wealth is being pillaged by public officials, yet the Government now says they do not have enough resources!
The most urgent and necessary investment any government should make is in the education of its citizens. Every advanced society in history has prioritized education as the most consequential investment because the present and future of society depend on it. Thus, to disregard secondary education, which is a critical bridge between primary to tertiary education, is to abandon the very survival and development of citizens and country.
The Barrow Papers 2024 also deleted the entire Section 65 of the 2020 Draft dealing with consumer protection with the explanation that there is already a “Consumer Protection Act and an established Commission to enforce consumer rights”. Constitutionalizing consumer rights only serves to strengthen both the Act and the commission. There are several laws and established institutions which are also constitutionalized such as elections and IEC hence the explanation given for the deletion of consumer protection is frivolous.
The 2020 Draft provides that a state of emergency can be extended by parliament for 60 days. But the Barrow Papers pushed it up to 90 days just as it is in the 1997 Constitution without providing any explanation. A state of emergency is a difficult situation where human rights are under severe threats. Hence a democratic state is interested in limiting the extension of a state of emergency to protect rights. Since there is the possibility of periodic extensions, the shorter the extension the better as it provides for greater protection of rights, and accountability of the state.
Furthermore, to expose how Barrow Papers is not interested in the protection of rights, it has removed ‘forced labour’ from the list of non-derogable rights that should not be limited or taken away but to be protected in full even during a state of emergency. There are a set of rights which are non-derogable in international law even during a state of emergency. Forced labour is one of them which the Barrow Papers now removed.
