Special presidential adviser for politics, Saihou Mballow, yesterday told The Standard that the backlash from President Barrow’s comments about opposition leader Ousainu Darboe is a lesson learnt in the president’s future political speeches.
The president is widely condemned for saying that he intends to stay in power until Mr Darboe dies, with many urging him to retract the comments.
But according to Mballow, it is unfortunate that the political comments turned out to cause a huge controversy even though they were political statements delivered in the ‘spirit of jokes.’
The presidential adviser said he does not think there is a need for an apology since Barrow is sure that he does not mean any harm to Darboe.
“These statements were made on political platforms imbued with jokes with no serious bad intentions as responses to previous statements by opponents. Barrow has no intention to harm Darboe,” Mballow said.
Asked if the president’s comments are not expensive jokes likely to raise tensions, Mr Mballow said the two leaders have so much respect and history between them only that politics often brings out strong statements but all in the spirit of jokes.
“Just imagine, does it make sense at all that the president would base his affairs on government policy on when Darboe dies? Does anyone know who among the two will die first? That can tell you that the president was joking,” Mballow said.
He said from this incident now, the president would learn that his jokes about UDP or Darboe can cause controversy. Mr Mballow suggested that incident also presents a perfect window for the Inter-Party Committee to explore and work towards diffusing the issue.
