Waa Juwara hails Gambia’s democratization process

Lamin Waa Juwara, the leader of the opposition National Democratic Action Movement (NDAM), has hailed The Gambia’s democratization process, urging for a concerted effort to consolidate the gains.

"The Gambia,’ he said, ‘has gone  far ahead as far as I know. Democratic pluralism is already in the country, and all we need to do is to consolidate it. We have to be very mindful about the way we reason on issues," Mbarodi advised, while re-echoing the need for the country’s political leaders to honour their commitment to the dictates of 2006 MOU they signed.

Mr Juwara was speaking to the Daily Observer, in an exclusive interveiw, following the historic meeting between political leaders from Guinea Bissau; a meeting sanctioned by the Gambian leader, President Alhaji Dr Yahya Jammeh, aimed at fostering peace and stability in the small West African region at the head of their forthcoming legislative election.

Mr Juwara was responding to a statement made by Halifa Sallah, the spokesperson of the shadowy opposition caolition, the National Allaince for Democracy and Development (NADD), as published on Foroyaa’s last Monday’s edition.

The NADD spokesperson, who had represented his party at the political consultative meeting, felt somehow disappointed as the said meeting did not meet his expectation, warranting him to leave the venue uncerimoniously.  That move of his Mr Juwara found unhealthy and inexcusable, describing as ‘petty and immaterial’ the reasons forwarded by Halifa to that effect. The NDAM leader argued that ‘there must be something fundamentally wrong with Halifa Sallah.’ Waa stressed that the NADD spokesperson was very wrong in putting forward such comments as the reasons he forwarded were not the issues at stake for that meeting.

"Halifa Sallah, who received the same invitation letter as we did, had a very wrong concept about the whole thing. The letter sent to all opposition leaders clearly stated that we were given the honour to grace that historic meeting initiated by President Jammeh,’’ Waa explained,  clarifying further that there was no point in the invitation letter which mentioned that there would be a round table conference at the meeting, which could have accorded them the opportunity to make statement.

What mattered at that forum, he acknowleged, was for them to give prominence to their common will to reach an agreement on restoring lasting peace and stability in Guinea-Bissau. Juwara went on to contest Halifa Sallah’s view that a meeting of that nature would not  in any way earn any credence to the Gambian opposition.

He simply said : "The fact that we were invited to grace the occasion shows a maximum mark of respect of The Gambian leader to the opposition,’ and he added: ‘to me, I feel very comfortable and I think my fellow opposition leaders who graced the occasion were equally comfortable." He went on to say that for Mr Sallah to have expressed disappointment with the presence of people he claimed to have been used to seeing in other state ceremonies showed that he was out of touch with the actual agenda.

He therefore called on the NADD spokesperson to remember that ‘these people were the same enthusiasts who graced the signing ceremony of the historic Memorandum of Understanding between the Gambian political parties,’ emphasizing that such a major event deserves celebration. Mr Juwara further questioned Halifa Sallah’s claim of respect for Amilcar Cabral, the former freedom fighter ‘whose revolutionary ideas he claimed to believe in’.

"If Halifa failed to respect a meeting which aims at restoring lasting peace in that ountry, the country where his idealism originated from, then he his being disrespectful of Cabral as a liberator. If he is talking about Cabral’s contribution in liberating Bissau, he should value the role of President Jammeh intervened to make sure that those gains of Cabral are consolidated in the the best interest of Bissau, yet all he could do was to walk out of that meeting for some immateral reason; then I question his utmost respect for Cabral," Mr Juwara said.

The NDAM leader emphasised that Cabral would have endorsed any leader who works towards restoring lasting peace and stability in his country. He then called on the NDAM leader to take note of the fact that they had already made concession to reality in the best interest of the people as enshrined in the 2006 Gambia political parties’ MOU, advising him that they should be able to take advantage of everything that is bound to bring about peace and stability in the country.

The NDAM leader concluded by saying that their interest as politicians should not only be to gain  power, rather they should be working to ensure that democracy, peace and stability prevails in The Gambia, and in the sub-region as a whole.