The term limit question is no longer an academic debate but a central test of The Gambia’s democratic transition. For years, Gambians have been promised a constitution that will prevent any president from ruling forever. That promise has been diluted and postponed.
President Adama Barrow now says he believes in term limits, but there is “no scientific proof” that term limits are the best systems. He cites Japan, England and Germany.
That comparison is a bit off the mark. Japan, England and Germany do not have presidents with fixed executive terms but prime ministers who can be removed tomorrow by parliament, by their party, or by a vote of no confidence. Power there is checked daily. The Gambia has a powerful executive president, elected for a fixed five-year term, who appoints ministers, controls the security services, and dominates the state. That is precisely why term limits were demanded in the first place.
We lived the alternative. The 1997 Constitution had no term limit and because of that Yahya Jammeh ruled for 22 years. He did not leave because the system removed him. He left because Gambians voted him out in 2016, and even then he tried to refuse. The 2016 coalition did not win on a promise of continuity. It won on a promise of change which includes a three-year transition, a new constitution, and a two-term limit. Adama Barrow was the beneficiary of that promise.
The Constitutional Review Commission delivered a draft in 2020 with a two-term limit, counting from 2017. The National Assembly killed it. Since then, no new constitution has come. The old constitution, the one written to entrench Jammeh, still governs us.
Barrow is now legally entitled to run again under that old constitution. Legally entitled is not the same as morally right. And legally permitted is not the same as democratically healthy.
Afrobarometer and every constitutional consultation since 2016 have shown that Gambians want term limits. Not because they hate Barrow but because they remember what happens when one man stays too long.
Term limits are not about science. They are about power. They prevent dictatorship, curb corruption, force renewal, and give new generations a chance to lead. The Gambia’s West African neighbours, Senegal, Nigeria and Ghana did not become stable despite term limits. They became stable because of them.
Barrow says Gambians will decide his fate. That is true. But democracy is not only about elections. It is about rules that bind winners and losers alike, before the vote, not after. If Barrow truly believes in term limits, as he says, he should do the one thing only a president can do, which is to deliver the new constitution with term limits in it, and submit himself to it. The Gambia does not need another debate about whether term limits are perfect. It needs a decision.
