By Omar Bah
The administrative secretary of the ruling National People’s Party (NPP) has expressed his desire to push for a more robust relationship between his party and the opposition to end the endless hostilities.
Seedy Ceesay, accompanied by the party’s 2nd vice president, Suku Singhateh, political adviser Saihou Mballow and his deputy, Dodou Sanno, women’s wing secretary Musu Drammeh, youth president Kebba Madi Bojang, and deputy admin secretary Saikou Bah, yesterday completed a countrywide tour of the NPP regional establishments.
Speaking to The Standard during the tour, Ceesay said the NPP, under its reform agenda, will prioritise engaging its opponents to foster a more robust relationship that is based on respect and mutual understanding in the interest of the country’s peace and stability.
“We will be engaging our opponents to make them understand that we are not enemies but just opponents who have the same intention of building a better Gambia for all. We want to start a discussion around how to foster a more cordial relationship because if you find yourself in opposition you are a government in waiting,” Ceesay said.
He said he has lined up a series of programmess for the next six months to ensure that the party executives and supporters are active at all times.
“We are at the beginning of a new NPP era with direction and progressive thinking,” he said.
Nationwide tour
Commenting on the tour, Ceesay said the party felt that it needed to go and have that interface with the people and talk to them to understand their problems and those of the party, if there are any.
“We have visited all the party’s regional structures across the country and had meetings with all the grassroots structures to give us firsthand information as far as NPP structures and politics are concerned. I have assured all of them that my doors are open for NPP supporters and sympathisers. It is clear that the NPP is the most popular party in this country, so we are working very hard to consolidate the support of the party,” he said.
Ceesay said the tour has given them the opportunity to see the beautiful buildings built by the party leader.
“I am very impressed with the structures, and we want to thank him for his steadfastness and foresight in ensuring that the NPP becomes the first party to establish structures across the country and invest in them. They are formable structures, and the commitment of the people taking care of these structures is awesome.
“Now, we understand what the setbacks are, and we will address them. We will now make it a habit to go around the country from time to time to talk to our people, and once we do that, we will be able to address the misinformation and disinformation going around,” he said.
Media
Commenting on how the NPP intends to build its relationship with the Gambian media, Seedy, himself a trained journalist, said: “As part of our reforms, we want to continue improving our engagements with the media, and I think we will be having breakfast or lunch meetings with the media every three months. The media is very important, and the more we interact with them and give them the required information, there will be no breakdown of communication, so moving forward we will be having engagements with the media.”
He said it is important for the media houses in The Gambia to understand that their position is very important and they should consider political actors as partners.
