Dear Editor,
“Bro, I pay 1 million, six hundred and seventy thousand Dalasis on rent this year. I can’t even afford it, so APS, the Islamic Microfinance helped me to pay. I’ll not be able to pay staff, and pay rent for the five different compounds we operate from. Even my staff don’t understand why I do not own a car. I haven’t owned one in years!
Who is more deserving of land? The one who is teaching 700+ Gambian kids from rented houses or the billionaires? My cry is only unto Allah.”
The above was a comment on a post I shared on Facebook. It made me feel sad, ashamed, and angry! If a stranger arrives in The Gambia on Friday around Juma prayers, there will be no need to tell them that we are a nation of “Muslims.” On Sundays, our churches bear their own witness to devotion. Yet I find myself asking what measures our faith: The diligence with which we observe its rituals, or the restraint we exercise when self-interest tempts us to betray the teachings of Islam and Christianity? You would think that praying five times a day and going to Church every Sunday would do more than reassure us of our goodness. You would think the sermons and khutbahs we listen to would somehow confront us with the wrong we are willing to excuse when it benefits us. Apparently, that is not the case.
Neither Islam nor Christianity permits us to take what is not ours, excuse corruption, or make greed the master of our conduct. Yet when I called those who already had land, and went on to take state land, greedy, someone took offense. They claimed they had done nothing illegal. I noted that he never addressed the charge of greed. He was more concerned by the legality of his actions, as if I had pronounced a legal verdict on his greed. Here is the thing: calling an allocation lawful does not establish that it serves the public good. Where land has been wrongfully taken (we know this has happened and continues to happen), a subsequent allocation cannot erase the original injustice. Where land is legitimately held by the state, its distribution still demands justification: why this recipient rather than another applicant, or a school, a clinic, or some other public purpose? Public resources must not be used to enlarge the holdings of the wealthy and well-connected. Public wealth must never be given away as private privilege. And those of you who think taking more than you need somehow makes you smarter than the rest of us, you are wrong. You are only showcasing your avarice.
Let me ask a second question: when someone who already owns land receives another publicly allocated plot, what public purpose does that additional benefit serve, beyond satisfying the greed of the greedy? The wealth disparity in The Gambia is already gaping enough, and adding to an existing advantage while others remain without only lays the groundwork for conflict. A public allocation must answer a public need, not merely satisfy a private appetite. To those who already have land and continue seeking more through these schemes, would you take offense at being called greedy? Before rejecting the word, consider the person whose unmet need weighs less in the decision than your desire for another plot. Greed is not simply wanting more. It is treating that desire as sufficient reason for the public to provide it, without asking who must continue to go without. We are quick to recognize this failing in people we dislike. The harder test is whether we can recognise it in those whose success we celebrate, and in ourselves.
Taking more than one needs is not necessarily unlawful if you do it using your own resources. But when you take what does not rightfully belong to you, you are nothing but a sophisticated and greedy thief. To those of you claiming you did nothing wrong, legality is simply a floor, not necessarily a measure of virtue. That you obtained state land lawfully does not mean your actions were right. It only means that you are greedy. If we believe in the faiths we profess, we must scrutinize both the hand that gives and the hand that takes. However, that scrutiny means little if it stops at the boundaries of family, friendship, or political loyalty. We cannot call Luntang’s appetite greed while praising Ebrima’s as ambition. The test of our integrity is not how fiercely we condemn an allocation that excludes us, but whether we can question one that benefits our own. Until we can tell those we love and support, “You have enough; this opportunity should go to someone else,” our condemnation of greed will remain a dispute over who gets the benefit rather than a genuine commitment to ending it. May Daarmanso spare us from our own greed and the greed of our family and friends!
Alagie Saidy-Barrow
USA
