By Olimatou Coker
The National Peoples Party has won two out of the four council seats on offer in Saturday’s by-elections in Brikama and Kanifng administrative areas. According to the IEC, the London Corner ward was won by Ajie Saptieu Jaye of the NPP as well as the Marakissa ward by Seedy Nyassi. Abubacarr Sillah of PDOIS won the Bundung Six Junction ward while Boto Bojang of the UDP won the Sanyang ward.
Speaking to The Standard, Sulayman Jammeh, the former occupant of the Bundung Six Junction councillorship and now NAM for APRC, said his former seat was lost to PDOIS because people now vote for their own candidates and not necessarily party candidates.
“I only feel that the voters decided based on their choice; that’s why we lost the seat over to PDOIS”, he lamented.
“I think the advantage he has is that the community knew him as he had worked closely with me even though we were political opponents and to be frank, he has been doing a lot in the development aspect of Bundung as a ward. So that gave him more advantage over our own candidate,” NAM Jammeh said.
He called on all the contestants to come together as one family to develop Bundung and the entire country as a whole.
Meanwhile, the UDP is celebrating their Sanyang ward with double significance. The former councillor of the ward Momodou Bojang had resigned to join NPP which put him up as a parliamentary candidate for Kombo South but he lost to UDP’s KK Barrow. On Saturday, his former council seat went to UDP’s Boto Bojang who won with a huge majority of 800 votes.
The NPP’s success in the Marakissa ward is another important development because the area is known to be a stronghold of the APRC No-Alliance-Movement. But a supporter of the APRC Fabakary Jatta faction told The Standard that they supported the NPP to secure victory in the ward.
