A dispute between the Kanifing Municipal Council (KMC) and the National Roads Authority (NRA) over the Kanifing Municipal Road Network Project escalated this morning after NRA Director Ousman Sanyang claimed on Coffee Time with Peter Gomez that there is “no signed MOU between KMC and the NRA” on the project.
The statement drew immediate reaction from KMC Mayor Talib Ahmed Bensouda, who not only dismissed the claim as false but also released documents that directly contradict the NRA director’s assertion. These include a signed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the two institutions and a formal letter of approval from the Gambia Public Procurement Authority (GPPA), both of which are published below alongside this article.
Mayor Bensouda said the claim came as a surprise, especially given that officers from the NRA were at the KMC Planning Department just yesterday “frantically” trying to retrieve a copy of the MOU. According to staff at the council, they were told by NRA officials that the document was urgently needed before 8am Friday morning. If the NRA was unaware of the MOU or believed it didn’t exist, the mayor asked, why were they so eager to obtain it?
More troubling for KMC officials is the suggestion that the request was not made for constructive engagement but rather to allow the NRA Director to go on air and dispute facts that are clearly documented.
Mayor Bensouda also took issue with Sanyang’s broader claim that KMC does not have the legal authority to construct roads, calling it a thinly veiled warning that central government may be preparing to obstruct a project designed to serve tens of thousands of residents in the municipality.
“This isn’t about me. These roads aren’t for my house. They are for the people of The Gambia,” Bensouda said, calling on officials within the Ministry of Works and the NRA to step back from politics and act in the public interest.
Adding to the confusion, Bensouda pointed out that the NRA has been deeply involved in the project’s development from the start. The authority had representatives on KMC’s evaluation committee, participated in the selection of contractors, and agreed on the choice of consultancy. All of this, the mayor noted, happened with full knowledge of the project’s scope and KMC’s involvement.
The central question—asked directly by veteran broadcaster Peter Gomez on the show—still hangs in the air: if KMC had no authority to build roads, why did the NRA participate in the process?
For now, the released documents speak for themselves. They paint a picture that’s very different from the one presented on radio this morning, and they raise serious questions about whether the NRA’s leadership is working in the public interest or following a different script.
This is unlikely to be the end of the story. But as political undertones creep into what should be a straightforward public works initiative, residents of Kanifing and beyond will be watching not just what is said next—but who chooses to stand in the way of much-needed development.
