The leader of the United Democratic Party (UDP) believes that his party has cause to celebrate. Lawyer Ousainou Darboe, who was addressing his party’s 18th anniversary rally at Serekunda, said the UDP members sacrificed everything, including their lives, resources and jobs in their drive to salvage the Gambia.
Some UDP members were harassed, intimidated and tortured to death.
He paid tribute to the party’s fallen militants and founding fathers who not around for the celebration of UDP’s founding on August 23rd, 1996.
Mr. Darboe was elated to celebrate his party’s 18th anniversary with oppositions National Reconciliation Party and Gambia People’s Democratic Party. The party also received a goodwill message from the People’s Democratic Organisation for Independence and Socialism. “This indicates that there is unity among the opposition parties.”
He said UDP has been at the fore front of the fight against impunity, injustice and corruption in the country saying the party was the first to condemn the brutal killing of Koro Ceesay, former Fiinance Mnister and asked Captain Ebou Jallow to return the stolen Gambian money.
The Campaign Manager of UDP, Lamin Dibba, said the party was formed on the “basis of truth, democracy and transparency.”
An erudite opposition figure said the rally was meant to inform the electorate about what the party had gone through during the past 18 years. “It is also meant to engage the electorate ahead of the birth of a new Gambia in 2016,” Kemeseng Jammeh said. “The Gambia’s current system of governance is not sustainable; Our youths, the bedrock of the country, lost hope with the current regime, which is why they are risking their lives in the perilous journey to Europe.”
The women leader of UDP said the Gambia was bereft with human rights, democracy and freedom of speech when the party was established. “It has been a long journey, a journey which saw harassments, intimidation, threats and torture of UDP members,” Aja Yama Secka said. “The party militants do not rest their on laurels to salvage our country. By Allah’s wishes, the UDP will win the 2016 presidential election and put an end to the suffering and impunity and bring back the country’s lost glory. UDP is determined to salvage the Gambia from mental slavery come 2016.”
Aja Sukai Na Kah said women are ready to effect change of leadership as the economic hardship in the Gambia is terrible. She urged women to continue to strive hard in influencing their fellow women to deny the APRC a win in 2016 presidential election.
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what is UDP and Lawyer Darboe doing to free Amadou Sanneh? This should be their top priority than otherwise.
I don’t like this suggestion that there is unity among the opposition parties. There is none, my friends. UDP tend to be too moderate sometimes but we know that pdois’s position on unity and that of UDP are irreconcilable. Gambians need to be told this plain truth rather than them giving unrealistic impression which will never materialise. It can only lead to despondency. So no sugar coating Lawyer Darboe. There is no unity among the opposition in The Gambia. You will have your irredeemable clash with PDOIS once again. Absolutely no doubt about it.
Halifa Sallah is not an opposition anyway. His wife is a permanent secretary in the Jammeh administration. Sounds inconceivable yea! But it is true, guys.
Thanks
Stop using Halifa as a scapegoat and talk about the real issues.
Lafia Touray you are very fussy, lousy and tarnished on this social media. Halifa’s wife has her qualification and the inalienable right to work in anywhere and in whatever capacity in the Gambia. If you don.t like go suckle your mother’s breast to allay you anger. Take it or leave it, Halifa and PDOIS are the fathers of modern day politics in the Gambia, they are cosmopolitans and have immensely contributed to the political evolution in the Gambia. You must be myopic to compare his achievement to that of DARBOE both nationally and internationally. A former parliamentarian, member of the AU parliament, special rapporteur for the AU in Darfur, a member of CODESERIA an organisation for the development of Social Science and Research in Africa, a lecturer at the UTG from its embryonic to its matured stage and the list goes on and on.
Mansakonko what are you doing to free any Gambian. The UDP put a legal defence team to represent Amadou Sanneh and a mercenary judge threw the case and convicted an innocent man. under the circumstances, the UDP can only appeal and call for Amadou Sanneh’s release. But if you expect the UDP to storm mile 2 with bare hands, then you are crazy. Dictatorship is a national problem. Standing aside and asking what X is doing expose your limited understanding of the issues at play. No wonder we have many such fatal minds like you. The UDP brought together over 3000 Gambians in place, talked about Gambians issues, yet all you could say is what are doing about Amadou Sanneh? Do you even know Amadou Sanneh? The false crocodile tears for Amadou will not be bought,
Bravo Lawyer Darboe and UDP a job well done.
Halifa Sallah is a public figure and I have every right to talk about his nexus with the Jammeh regime. That nexus is his wife who is a permanent secretary in the jammeh administration. Inconceivable, isn’t it? You will have to be a genuine regime collaborator within the opposition to be rewarded this way in today’s Gambia.
Thank you Haruna for your observation. The hypocrites should not go scot free when they shed crocodile tears for Amadou Sanneh and his family.
Thanks
“I don’t like this suggestion that there is unity among the opposition parties. There is none, my friends. UDP tend to be too moderate sometimes but we know that pdois’s position on unity and that of UDP are irreconcilable.”
Lafia, Pdois has sent a solidarity message to the UDP on the occasion of the party’s 18th anniversary since its inception in 1996. This is in recognition of the fact that the UDP and PDOIS at this stage in our political history can play a meaningful and decisive role in shaping and guiding the evolution of the Gambia’s third republic. And despite what you would want us to believe there is still a measure of goodwill.
PDOIS’s position and UDP’s position are irreconcilable as long as you want it to remain so. And you are one of the principal architects who perpetuated and anchored a party-led coalition agenda that has no basis either in fact or in practice. This has derailed any prospect of the opposition political parties building a formidable challenge to the status quo for all these many years.
Just like the Democrats and the Republicans in the US who have their talking points on every major national issue, your parade of this mantra of “the biggest opposition political party and therefore must lead” to the detriment of having any meaningful dialogue that will put the nation’s interest first.
“Gambians need to be told this plain truth rather than them giving unrealistic impression which will never materialise. It can only lead to despondency. So no sugar coating Lawyer Darboe. There is no unity among the opposition in The Gambia. You will have your irredeemable clash with PDOIS once again. Absolutely no doubt about it.”
Because we understand the dynamics that are at play in our political situation we can never be despondent. May be you will. But at any rate you should be honest to the Gambian people and tell them why there is no prospect of unity among the opposition in The Gambia. You absolutely know where the problems lies. Renounce your faulty party-led coalition agenda and you will most definitely have a partner in PDOIS.
“Halifa Sallah is not an opposition anyway. His wife is a permanent secretary in the Jammeh administration. Sounds inconceivable yea! But it is true, guys.”
Thanks
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Halifa Sallah is a public figure and I have every right to talk about his nexus with the Jammeh regime. That nexus is his wife who is a permanent secretary in the jammeh administration. Inconceivable, isn’t it? You will have to be a genuine regime collaborator within the opposition to be rewarded this way in today’s Gambia.
Thank you Haruna for your observation. The hypocrites should not go scot free when they shed crocodile tears for Amadou Sanneh and his family.
Thanks
Lafia, what we are saying is talk about the issues for crying out loud. Do you know for how long you have been in this bashing Halifa campaign?
Halifa Sallah is not your problem. He is not the one who caused your presidential candidate the presidency of The Republic Of The Gambia for four consecutive election cycles. Try to do a thorough analysis of what went wrong with your presidential aspirations and stop harassing this gentleman. Gees.
If there is anything to celebrate, that’s what you should be doing, rather than focus on Halifa. ..This occasion is for the celebration of UDP existence for 18 years. ..
Halifa may be a public figure but his wife isn’t. ..It is shameful and disgraceful that you keep including her in your “mud slinging” endeavour against Halifa, in particular ,and PDOIS in general…
Share with the audience what is there to celebrate, as a UDP member. ..Or have you got nothing worth celebrating. .?
Bax Lafia has nothing worth celebrating this is why he always abysmally abase himself on this media.It is a blessing that his choice of a leader will never lead even a constituency talk less of a country. You are so divisive that GOD will not grant your wish.
Lafia, it seems you have rattled the cages of the PDOIS brigade. This is why, many people don’t bother neither have any interest in engaging these people. Lafia, trust me, PDOIS have no interest neither urgency in seeing the back of Yaya Jammeh. Did you see Kamalo saying Halifa’s achievements, all of which occurred under Jammeh’s reign.
PDOIS are merely operating to sell Foroyaa, and conceal the bad behaviours of Sam Sarr in Foroyaa bureau, whilst Halifa sits on Sedia and Suwaibou’s head. So, engaging PDOIS is a total and complete waste of time. But it is great you are taking them to task. Thanks Lafia, keep it up. watch and see the revelations on Sam Sarr.
Yama the only reason why PDOIS is not being engaged is that they are no match for any who disagrees with them either overtly or covertly. Did you hear lawyer Darboe saying that he has no time to engage in political debate with those who did not agree with UDP regarding its strategy for the political evolution of The Gambia. But has time to go to court and defend his clients after extensive research on decided cases. That is absurd, as political debates are part of modern-day democratic process and any political leader who wants to shy away from it is not worth the salt.
Lafia, ‘if an elephant fight with an ant, who do you blame’? UDP shouldn’t stoop to PDOIS level. Internet keyboard commandos who can only write to inflate themselves deserve no response. They are always on the lookout to say something, and usually trying hard to clash their ant-head’s with UDP. The sad fact remains, where Lawyer Darboe lose to becoming a President, Halifa will lose to become anything apart of when the UDP supporters helped him won in Serrekunda. His ungratefulness made him lose his seat and also his coveted Pan-Africanist parliamentarian status. Hence, Dr Halifa Sallah gain his seat base on UDP support, which is also UDP achievement. I think you guys outside the Gambia give too much respect and attention to pdois.
Whatever name you chose to call people who differ with your camp on the form of alliance to be adopted by The Gambian opposition, one thing that cannot be disputed is that this article is about the UDP’s 18th anniversary. …Let’s keep that way…
If you are a UDP member or supporter and has something to celebrate, then share that with us, if you don’t mind…This Halifa “this”, PDOIS “that” seems to be a “Red Herring” to avoid any discussion on the achievements or otherwise of the UDP…
UDP supporters won Halifa the S/K East seat, they stated…Good on them and so be it….How about the Wuli seat for Sidia. .? Have you forgotten to mention that.?
Your mate, Lafia, can defame and libel Halifa as much as he wants,but human decency and civilised behaviour requires that he avoids including his family or spouses. ..Unless of course, such standards don’t apply to him..
“Lafia, it seems you have rattled the cages of the PDOIS brigade. This is why, many people don’t bother neither have any interest in engaging these people.” Yama Conteh.
What cage has Lafia rattled? If you have anything to engage us bring it on. We are not the ones engaged in mudslinging. You are.
Lafia has been on a campaign since the NADD debacle to disparage and malign the person of Halifa Sallah. Why? He believes that Halifa in particular and PDOIS in general are responsible for denying Lawyer Darboe the Gambian presidency. This is the only reason why he is on this malicious campaign to tarnish the image and reputation of Halifa. He has not succeeded in doing that and now he shamefully turn to his wife.
The irony of this whole campaign is that Lafia constantly reminds us that PDOIS can only garner 3% of the electoral vote, yet he sees Halifa in particular and PDOIS in general as the only support mechanism that can lead the UDP and Lawyer Darboe to the steps of the Gambian State House. UDP had party-led alliances with almost all the opposition political parties except PDOIS, and none has brought them any closer to achieving their goal of gaining the Gambian presidency. In fact their share of the opposition vote tends to diminish every time they do the same thing expecting to get a different result. Talk about the law of diminishing returns.
The argument is simple. UDP conceptualized a party-led coalition agenda on the faulty reasoning that an opposition political party that has the majority vote in an election, should lead other opposition parties seeking to form an alliance against the power of incumbency of a sitting president. To give credence to this concept its architects made the claim that it is a universally accepted norm of coalition building everywhere in the world. Lafia who is the chief propagandist and proponent of this claim used the UK coalition government as an explicit example of how the UDP coalition government will operate.
We argued that there is no conceptual basis for the UDP party-led coalition agenda. A coalition government which is anticipated to be the end result is not a governing instrument under our system of governance. Coalition governments are norms that are prevalent mostly in parliamentary democracies. Our system of governance is one of an Executive Presidency. I have earlier explained how we elect our president and who forms a government. This is as plain as noonday. If Lafia has a contrary view let him bring it on.
UDP’s promise to form a coalition or alliance government if other opposition parties join them in their party-led coalition agenda is deceptive. They can only form a UDP government. They cannot form a coalition or alliance government. This has been succinctly argued previously. If lafia has a contrary view let him bring it on.
“Lafia, trust me, PDOIS have no interest neither urgency in seeing the back of Yaya Jammeh. Did you see Kamalo saying Halifa’s achievements, all of which occurred under Jammeh’s reign.”
If you have the interest and the urgency to see the back of this president what have you been doing right? You have just celebrated being an opposition political party for 18 years. Do you have to depend on PDOIS to have the interest and the urgency to see the back of this president for you? I see. You want someone else to do the heavy lifting for you and you then walk majestically into the Gambian State House.
” PDOIS are merely operating to sell Foroyaa, and conceal the bad behaviours of Sam Sarr in Foroyaa bureau, whilst Halifa sits on Sedia and Suwaibou’s head. So, engaging PDOIS is a total and complete waste of time. But it is great you are taking them to task. Thanks Lafia, keep it up. watch and see the revelations on Sam Sarr.
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Kamalo & Bax Leave them UDP militants and UDP on flip flop policies. Rightly stated LAW OF DIMINISHING RETURNS observed in all election cyces. What is interesting is where is Yaya Jallow UDP no.2?
Let any UDP militant proof to me how “party-led” applied in UK and Senegal PRIOR TO THE ELECTIONS? LET IT BE CLEAR THAT IF “PARTY-LED” WAS NORM IN SENGAL ELECTIONS MACKY SALLAH WOULD NOT PRESENTLY BE THE PRESIDENT OF SENEGAL BECAUSE IDRISSA SECKA (WHO COMMANDED MAJORITY & INSISTED OF LEADING) WOULD HAVE LED THEIR COALITION AGAINST WADDA!
In UK PRIOR TO ELECTIONS no coalition was even discussed or considered but dictated POST-ELECTIONS by hung Parliament!
AM REPEATING AGAIN; please let any UDP militant proof to me how “party-led” applied in UK and Senegal PRIOR TO THE ELECTIONS?
GUYS IF HALIFA IS A PUBLIC FIGURE, HIS WIFE IS ALSO A PUBLIC FIGURE.IN 1996 A POLICE SERGEANT WAS FIRED WHEN HE WAS COVERING THE UDP MEETING AS A SENIOR POLICE OFFICER,AFTER THE RALLY WHICH TOOK PLACE IN SERRAKUNDA ON SATURDAY,THE FOLLOWING MONDAY MR SERGEANT CONATEH WAS FIRED.A FAMILY MAN HE WAS JUST THEIR FOR SECURITY REASON IN A FULL UNIFORM.SO HOW CAN YOU GUYS TELL US HALIFAS IS A FRIENDLY OPPOSITION THATS WHY HIS WIFE CAN WORK FOR A MURDERER HE IS OPPOSSING.IS NOT A PROBLEM FOR AN OPPOSTION TO WORK FOR A RULING PARTY IN POWER,BUT YAYA JAMMEH CHANGE THAT EXCEPT FOR HALIFAS WIFE.BUT IS TRUE YAYA CANNOT BE THREATEN BY PDOIS AND HALIFA,THAT WILL NEVER HAPPEN IN OUR LIVE TIME.WE WILL END THIS JOURNEY ONE DAY.IS ONLY THE TRUTH THAT WILL SAFE US ALL,IN THE MID NINETIES IS THE UDP,BUT NOW EVERY GAMBIAN IS SUFFERING WHETHER YOU ARE APRC,UDP OR JUST A CIVIL SERVANT.A KNOWN MEMBER OF THE UDP WILL NOT BE A GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEE IN THIS TIME,BUT HALIFA SALLAH”S WIFE CAN BE A PERMANENT SECRETARY IN THE APRC GOVERNMENT.BUT WHY NOT IT WAS HALIFA WHO TOLD GAMBIAN TO VOTE YES,SO YES LETS ENJOY THIS TOGETHER.
THE LAST SENEGALESE ELECTION,IT WAS MACKY SALL WHO GOT TWENTY SIX PERCENT,NOT EDRISA SECKA.TO HELL WITH THE UK PARTY LED,UK POLITCS CANNOT BE COMPARE TO THE GAMBIA,IF YOU STOP IN SENEGAL BETTER.