By Tabora Bojang
Tallinding NAM Fatoumatta Jawara over the weekend used one of her campaign rallies to respond to criticisms of her “poor English” arguing “we [lawmakers] are not representing people from the UK in the assembly but Gambians.”
Jawara, a former UDP NAM now running for re-election on President Adama Barrow’s NPP ticket, is among members who often struggle to contribute in English. But addressing a rally over the weekend, Jawara accused her opponents of coming with unfair and unimportant criticisms as part of their motive to distract attention from her positive achievements in the assembly.
“I made a lot of contributions in the Assembly that influenced the initiation of several projects to this [Tallinding] community and most of those videos are available at the National Assembly’s website for anyone to see. They would not talk about that but all that they say is NAM so and so does not speak good English. But does being in parliament require that much education? This is in fact an insult to the uneducated Gambians who are the majority of our electorate. What is important for me is that I am not there [in parliament] to represent the British people but Gambians and we are able to express ourselves and speak out on issues affecting our people and also address their concerns in the parliament. That is why I care less if they say Fatoumatta Jawara or so and so does not speak good English in parliament. The people making these remarks are themselves represented by NAMs who were caught sleeping in parliament on many occasions. I used to spend three nights in parliament and have never slept or dosed off,” Jawara said.
