By Mohammed Jallow
On December 16, 2025, the United States government issued a proclamation that will forever stain the archives of diplomatic history. A proclamation presented under the guise of national security but executed with the texture of exclusion, discrimination, and collective punishment. The US government declared, without ambiguity, that the entry of Gambian nationals into the United States both as immigrants and nonimmigrants holding B1, B2, B1/B2, F, M, and J visas shall be suspended. Furthermore, consular officers are instructed to reduce the validity of any other nonimmigrant visas issued to Gambian citizens, to the fullest extent permitted by law. This is not just an immigration directive; it is a geopolitical earthquake, a moral rupture, and a diplomatic affront aimed at one of the smallest yet most peaceful nations on Earth.
Let us be candid. Let us be honest. Let us be bold. The Gambia has never threatened the national security of the United States. It has never launched an attack, never sponsored terror, never exported instability, and never declared hostility toward any global power. The Gambia is a nation built on tolerance, peace, communal coexistence, and unrelenting hospitality. The crime, it appears, is not misconduct, not violence, not criminal enterprise, not subversion, but simply the possession of a Gambian passport. A passport that now, in the corridors of US consulates, is treated as a document of suspicion rather than identity.
The US claims unmatched technological prowess, a security architecture fortified by artificial intelligence, biometric vetting, satellite intelligence, digital tracking, integrated immigration databases, and border surveillance systems unrivaled in sophistication. A nation that can track the smallest digital footprint, intercept encrypted communications, monitor global financial flows, analyze human behavior through predictive algorithms, and deploy drone surveillance across continents, now claims that it cannot manage, vet, or deport Gambians without resorting to a blanket suspension. How does this paradox hold intellectual or moral weight? If the US possesses the capacity to detect and expel any individual who violates immigration laws, why then must it suspend the rights of an entire nationality? If security is truly the issue, why not deploy the tools they so proudly boast of, identify those who overstay, and deport them efficiently to their homeland? Why not send them home with the same efficiency they send peace volunteers to our villages, fintech companies to our markets, cultural envoys to our institutions, and investors to our shores?
The narrative underpinning this proclamation rests heavily on visa overstays. The argument is that Gambians issued B1 and B2 visas have overstayed their welcome, violated their time, and created an immigration imbalance. But overstays are not unique to Gambians. Overstays are a global immigration challenge, recorded among citizens of Asia, Europe, South America, the Middle East, and even nations allied closely to Washington. Overstays do not define a people. They define a problem of enforcement. A problem that cannot be resolved through xenophobic decrees but through smart policy, humane diplomacy, and equitable law enforcement. The Gambia’s government, its embassies in North Africa, and its diaspora networks have cooperated where possible to engage in diplomatic discourse on repatriation challenges. Yet the proclamation scapegoats an entire population rather than addressing enforcement failures or negotiating fair migration compacts.
This policy shatters families before it shatters statistics. Imagine a Gambian mother separated from her children who study in American universities, now left stranded in emotional limbo. Imagine a Gambian father who cannot attend his daughter’s graduation in Washington, though he has obeyed every law in his life. Imagine a brother who cannot visit a sister receiving medical care in Minnesota, a cousin who cannot attend a family burial in Atlanta, or a wife unable to reunite with her husband working legally in Baltimore. These are not numbers. These are not files. These are not security cases. These are human beings. Bonds of blood, lineage, love, obligation, memory, and belonging. The proclamation, cold in its legal phrasing, carries a blade sharp enough to sever generational ties. It reduces people into liabilities and treats relationships as collateral damage.
America’s history in The Gambia is one of shared humanity. The Gambia has welcomed thousands of Peace Corps volunteers for decades. Young Americans, eager to learn, serve, and explore, have lived in our homes, eaten from our communal bowls, danced to our rhythms, learned Mandinka and Wolof greetings, understood our reverence for elders, studied our governance systems, participated in our cultural festivals, taught in our schools, worked in our villages, and carried back to the US stories of a nation whose heart exceeds its geographic size. They returned home not with fear but admiration, not with suspicion but affection, not with disdain but respect. This relationship has been one of exchange, goodwill, cooperation, cultural immersion, mutual philosophy, and peaceful coexistence. Yet today, America travels freely into The Gambia without a visa, walks into our hotels without interrogation, conducts business in our capital without bureaucratic obstruction, receives warmth without condition, and enjoys hospitality without hesitation. Reciprocity is the heartbeat of diplomacy. But reciprocity has died under this proclamation.
The Gambia, small in landmass but vast in spirit, could fit into the smallest U.S. state without the demographic needle moving a millimeter. With a population under three million, The Gambia could be absorbed into Rhode Island, Delaware, or Vermont without anyone noticing a strain on public services, housing, or population density. The United States has 400 million people. Nigeria alone carries 200 million souls. America speaks of population pressure, yet a country the size of The Gambia is demographically insignificant in American spatial arithmetic. So why then is the Gambian treated as though their arrival alone is enough to overwhelm a nation built on skyscrapers, vast road networks, digital infrastructure, expansive housing grids, and high population absorption capacity? The logic is not demographic. It is psychological. The suspension is not a response to overcrowding but a response to power. The kind of power that forgets humility.
We must speak of law. The US prides itself on constitutional order, yet its proclamations increasingly bypass international frameworks. It violates the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which rejects discrimination based on national origin. It undermines the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which enshrines fairness, dignity, and freedom from collective punishment. It disregards the African Union’s principle of mutual respect among global partners. It dilutes global trust in US immigration governance. It weaponises immigration policy to send diplomatic messages of displeasure rather than engaging in structured bilateral negotiations. It ignores proportionality. It ignores humanity. It ignores equality. It ignores history.
America occupies every luxury life can afford. From artificial intelligence laboratories to Silicon Valley’s digital fortresses, from Wall Street’s financial engines to NASA’s celestial observatories, from Hollywood’s global narrative influence to Pentagon defense networks, from social media dominance to global digital payment architecture, from medical research hubs to academic innovation capitals, America has enjoyed every advantage possible under modern civilisation. But advantage is not permission to demean. Strength is not license to disrespect. Technology is not justification for tyranny. Prosperity is not an excuse for exclusion.
The proclamation has discredited the Africa-US relationship. It has eroded trust in US diplomacy. It has dismantled the illusion that America stands for equal treatment. It has exposed contradictions between America’s anthem, its rhetoric, and its policies. “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free” was once the promise inscribed in America’s immigration identity. Today, that promise is selective, conditional, and geographically biased. America speaks liberty in melody but exclusion in statute.
Let Africa awaken. Let Africa analyse itself beyond Western validation. Let Africa build its own economic corridors, educational exchanges, continental mobility pacts, intra-African opportunity networks, migration incentive systems, enforcement frameworks, and bilateral cooperation mechanisms. Let Africa build a reality where no citizen must risk death in the Sahara or humiliation at a consulate to find dignity. Let Africa invest in what nature already endowed us with: arable land, mineral wealth, cultural capital, demographic youth strength, linguistic diversity, economic expansion capacity, and continental scale. Let Africa stop seeking luxury abroad when luxury exists at home in its natural form. No Gambian dreams of overstaying because they wish to insult America. They overstay because Africa has not yet built enough opportunities to retain them. But that is not the fault of a child born in Farafenni, Brikama, Banjul, or Basse. That is the fault of systems, not souls.
The proclamation presumes punitive suspension is the solution. It is not. The solution is smart deportation, bilateral enforcement cooperation, migration education, domestic economic expansion, consular fairness, targeted screening, and diplomatic reciprocity. If deportation is the aim, deport. If overstay is the concern, enforce. If acceptance of removables is the challenge, negotiate. But do not criminalise nationality.
Let it be known. We will not forget December 16, 2025. Not as a day of fear, but a day of awakening. A day of reflection. A day of warning. A day that reminds every superpower that humility is greater than hegemony. That fairness is stronger than firewalls. That humanity cannot be replaced by algorithms. That dignity is not granted by size but by existence. That hospitality is not weakness. That Africa is not inferior. That passports do not equal crimes. That nations are not threats simply because they are small. That equality is not charity. That justice is not optional.
And here lies the warning: if the day ever arrives when The Gambia, or Africa collectively, chooses to apply personal vetting, visa restrictions, or entry suspensions against American officials, envoys, investors, and travelers, let no American pretend surprise. Let no American forget this day. Let no American ask why reciprocity finally woke. Let no American assume hospitality is permanent when fairness is absent. Let no American claim innocence when they pioneered exclusion. Let no American seek refuge in African warmth when they engineered African humiliation. Let no American expect access when they denied access. Let no American seek equality when they rejected equality.
The Gambia is not a footnote in world diplomacy. It is a statement in peace. It is a thesis in tolerance. It is an essay in hospitality. It is a hymn of coexistence. It is Africa’s smile facing the Atlantic. It is a nation whose gentleness hides no weakness, whose size carries no shame, whose people carry no hostility, whose culture is not intimidated by power, whose land embraces foreigners without condition, whose youth dream of prosperity without malice, and whose dignity does not require America’s approval to exist.
We are Africans. We are people. We deserve respect.
We deserve equal treatment. We deserve dignity.
And we will demand it not with violence, not with terror, not with hostility, but with the one force stronger than weapons: truth spoken boldly, loudly, globally, and without apology.
Let the world hear it. Let Washington reflect on it.
Let Africa build beyond it. Let The Gambia rise above it. Let fairness return to diplomacy. Let nationality cease to be a crime. Let deportation replace discrimination. Let enforcement replace insult.
Let dialogue replace decrees. Let dignity replace suspension.
For a small nation insulted today may rise in influence tomorrow, not by size, but by the moral legitimacy of its voice.
