Opinion

Letter From New York: My Loyalty To President Jammeh Is Unwavering

Samsudeen Sarr

(JollofNews) – I wonder what kind of democracy some of the opposition Gambian activists, especially those in the diaspora are advocating for, who are acting increasingly intolerable to my divergent political opinions or affiliation?

Even some unexpected close members of my family are denouncing me for standing by my belief that the presidential election results in the Gambia on December 2, 2016 were questionable and the outcome or process lacking every credibility; hence, I strongly concur with the nullification of the results and the need to organize fresh elections in the country under a more competent Independent Electoral Commission (IEC).

I want to however make it crystal clear to those opponents of President Jammeh that in my capacity as the Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York, my loyalty to him is unwavering and even more solidified than ever before. Simply put, I will remain loyal to Babillimansa to the end, a commitment that must be respected as my fundament right to own and manifest at will. Cursing me or calling me all kinds of names or even threatening me with extrajudicial measures in a post APRC government that I can’t see ever happening will not under any circumstances deter my efforts or obligate me to abandon my position at this moment.

I have so far conducted two interviews, first with Aljazeera TV and then with a BBC radio program where the hosts were flabbergasted by the missing truth that the IEC’s initial results of the election announced publicly on December 2, 2016 showed Mr. Adama Barrow defeating President Jammeh in the polls by a margin of over 51 thousand votes, but on December 5, 2016 shadily and sneakily decreased into a whopping number of only 18,000 votes. Instead of the IEC transparently bringing up the error issue to the national TV like they initially did in the first results, they simply sent out a one-page-press release to the contenders and to the press stating that they made some errors in the counting.

Apparently, the initial results announced on December 2 indicated that out of the total 578,583 ballots cast, Mr. Adama Barrow won with 263,000 votes, His Excellency President Jammeh, 212,099 votes and Mr. Mamma Kandeh 102,969 votes; then on December 5, after the president humbly conceded and assured Mr. Barrow that he was going to handover to him in January, the IEC, from nowhere, came out with the baffling press release that the first results were instead erroneous with the new total corrected as thus:
1. Mr. Adama Barrow      227, 708votes
2. President Jammeh      208, 487 votes
3. Mr. Mamma Kandeh    89, 768 votes.

The reason, according to the press release, was that “certain figures were inadvertently transposed”; but the winner was still Mr. Barrow.

Mr Jammeh enjoys the support of the army

What else could the IEC have said and be still hailed as rock stars everywhere for conducting a very free and fair election after the first announcement, other than the reconfirmation of Mr. Barrow’s victory? Anything announced differently, even a draw would have translated into a huge condemnation by those commending them since; because throughout, the commission was widely suspected of planning to rig the elections for President Jammeh.

So, the alteration of the numbers after everything was said and done happened to trigger the whole doubt over the results which the mainstream international media is either not aware of or is deliberately ignoring because of certain ultra-motives.

As for the UN Security Council, it appeared that they had made up their minds of forcing President Jammeh to relinquish power well before the West African heads of state fact finding mission arrived in the Gambia on December 13 to gather the facts. In their press release on December 10, they made it clear that President Jammeh must handover to Mr. Barrow Barrow on January 18, come what may. No wonder they simply adopted the UN position despite the overwhelming evidence the team gathered from the APRC government showing that the results were skeptically altered.

However, this is like imposing their authority to a small nation without any regards to the unintended national security ramifications.
Once again, I think the international community, especially the UN Security Council is dangerously targeting a strong and very stabilizing leader in a politically fragile sub-region of which if they are not mindful could metamorphose into the kind of chaos that will take years to resolve.

Ousman Badgie’s visit to Sundan was cancelled by the UN

The UN’s denial of the Gambia Chief of Staff, Ousman Badgie, to visit his troops, Gamcoy 19, currently serving in Darfur, UNAMID, was another wrong signal sent to the security forces in the country for being unfairly targeted on behalf of a “prospective government of Mr. Barrow’s”.

The Gambian soldiers had suffered enormously in the hands of the PPP government since its inception in 1985 until when President Jammeh finally rescued them in 1994 and put them in their well-respected places in the community. Instead of contracting the Army to a foreign government or to hired military officers for its command and control duties-1992 to 1994-the president expelled all foreign forces and handed over the security forces to the Gambian men and women in uniform whose excellence in running their own affairs has been exemplary and certainly dynamic.

Taking back the Armed or Security Forces back to their pre-revolution days-predicament is tantamount to a worrying national security threat, period.

Long live the Gambian people!
Long live the Islamic Republic of the Gambia!
Long live His Excellency Sheikh Professor Doctor Alhagie Yahya A. J. J. Jammeh Babilimansa.

Samsudeen Sarr
New York City

The author is the Gambia’s deputy ambassador to the United Nations. He was a former Lieutenant Colonel and commander of the Gambia National Army.

9 Comments

  1. Sam, when you appeared on the Al Jazeera panel, Fatu Camara asked you why Jammeh put you in jail and you said that was just because of the coup. I recall that Edward Singhateh gave you a really good slap in mile 2 at that time. It was so hard that he left finger marks on your cheeks. But that was only the first time. Jammeh then pardoned you and you eventually became Army commander. That was the time you paraded the Kartong attackers on TV. You probably participated or condoned their torture. Why were you removed as Army commander and why did you abscond to the USA at that time? Also, the book you wrote after that, you outlined a lot of abuses by and for Jammeh including torture, killings and mutilation of bodies. You said some were buried at or near the Yundum barracks. Are you now saying all of those were incorrect accounts or are you now loyal to Jammeh inspite of those wicked actions?

  2. Sam, a few more questions: 1) Are you aware that Jammeh does not have the authority to nullify the election results? 2) If you are, then do you recognize that Barrow needs to be inaugurated while APRC pursues their claims in the supreme court? Just like Jammeh was inaugurated in 2012 while the opposition was still pursuing electoral fraud claims. 3) You mentioned in your article that Jammeh gave control of the armed forces to Gambian soldiers instead of contracting it to foreigners. Then why did he contract control of the Judiciary to Nigerian judges instead of Gambians?

  3. Just why can’t you shut up; Sam Sarr shall never cease to wonder; still doing the MURDEROUS kanilai DEVIL’s bidding even when the Horror kanilai Fiefdom Show is almost over…

    The (so-called) “computer glitch” being relied upon insistently for evidence to error &/ fault the election for the continuity of the status quo won’t be of any avail this time around; DEVIL yaya employed all avenues viably available to no avail; there’re computer expertise imported into Gambia at the material time who at times tampered with the fibre optical communication network terminations amongst others; these technological criminal elements were assigned to hack into the IEC systems just to cause a glitch to frame some form of an anomaly of a kind to bank on when everything else seems not to work to the DEVIL’s intentions this time around…

    DEVIL yaya was gobsmacked & had the children & high maintenance wench on the ground so must have to play along in pretence to buy time to evacuate the trio out to safety; knowing the fermented “glitch error” for final tabulation will eventually pop up before, or one of them to points out if not…

    The TRUTH is; GOD has spoken now clearly; there’s nothing anybody can do about that anymore…

    Long live the Gambia

  4. You samsudeen sarr and yaya jammeh have nothing to prove…

    On the 2nd, December 2016 when yaya jammeh stood in front of the GRTS tv to accept the election result and conceding defeated the difference of vote he mentioned that he defeated with was the CORRECT RESULT which was 18,000 vote different and said he accepted because even if it was 1 or 2 votes he was won with he SHOULD accept because the Gambian law says SIMPLE MAJORITY carries the vote(winner)

    Now what are you guys trying to bring CONFUSION about…?
    Yaya jammeh announced the 18,000 votes instead of 51,000 votes meaning the correct results which is the MANUALLY counted results was given to him and he accepted that.
    Only a computer glitch which no one knows how it happened is what you want to use to maltreat the Gambians.

    If the independent eletoral committee (IEC) was NOT fair or was trying to rig the results AGAINST the favour of yaya jammeh, they would not have revealed the error which will reduce the margin of his defeat.

  5. You samsudeen sarr and yaya jammeh have nothing to prove…

    On the 2nd, December 2016 when yaya jammeh stood in front of the GRTS tv to accept the election result and conceding defeated, the difference of vote he mentioned been defeated with was the CORRECT RESULT which was 18,000 vote different and said he accepted because even if it was 1 or 2 votes he was won with he SHOULD accept because the Gambian law says SIMPLE MAJORITY carries the vote(winner)

    Now what are you guys trying to bring CONFUSION about…?
    Yaya jammeh announced the 18,000 votes instead of 51,000 votes meaning the correct results which is the MANUALLY counted results was given to him and he accepted that.
    Only a computer glitch which no one knows how it happened is what you want to use to maltreat the Gambians.

    If the independent eletoral committee (IEC) was NOT fair or was trying to rig the results AGAINST the favour of yaya jammeh, they would not have revealed the error that will reduce the margin of his defeat.

  6. A desperate article by a discredited and highly dangerous Jekyll and Hyde character struggling to remain relevant amidst the impending undignified fall of the Gambian dictator. Sam is a proven liar without a shred of moral fibre. Please spare us the Jammeh charm offensive, we are not interested. We are only interested in bringing Jammeh and his murderous cabal (including yourself) to justice.

    This piece and your Freedom Newspaper interview are riddled with disingenuity, lies and half-truths. I almost fell about the floor laughing when I read your bit about Jammeh putting the army back into local hands post 1994. You know full well that the army contains a disproportionate amount of rebellious Casamançais Jolas thanks to Jammeh. That statement of yours is an out and out lie and you know it. How dare you feed us with this unsanctimonious tripe? As for your Al-Jazeera interview, I never seen such an embarrassing spectacle in my life. I’d be surprised if they ever call you back on there to make a chimpanzee of yourself.

    In Jammeh’s concession statement, he quoted the correct poll figures, which were eventually confirmed by the IEC in their corrigendum. You keep pedalling this lie that Jammeh only complained once the IEC issued their corrigendum. Well that makes Jammeh very stupid, because the corrigendum figures were exactly what he initially quoted himself. The poll figures have always been correct. The mistake was in the totalling of the poll figures, not in the actual poll figures. The base figures have always been correct, so I struggle to see your argument. Good luck trying to prove in a CREDIBLE court of law that because IEC’s summation of the base figures was erroneous, it can be concluded that the base figures were also wrong. You are clutching at straws here, but we are not stupid, we can see right through your lies and your deliberate attempt to cloud over the hard facts.

    Your arrogance and sense of self-importance is monstrous. You kept bellowing out during your interview at Freedom and especially during your interactions with Mama Linguere Sarr during the Q&A session that you won’t respond to people you don’t know. As a so-called Gambian diplomat and public servant, it is staggering that you think you are not accountable to Gambians who you’re supposed to be serving. We are sick and tired of ex-military goons like yourself who think that you can ride roughshod over Gambians as though you were operating within some sort of jungle military barracks in a banana republic.

    During your Freedom interview, as soon as you began to lose any of the key arguments, you went off on a pathetic rant, telling everyone to calm down and to stop using emotive language, while you made no hesitation in using highly flowery and emotive language to defend your corner – all in an attempt to control the narrative and audience. We could all see right through this, so don’t think that you have won the argument. You just showed yourself to a pathetic bully who lost the argument a wrong time ago.

    Also during the Freedom interview, you hit a new low when you spouted that Solo Sandeng’s sacrifice was in vain because the election was free and fair anyway. What a monstrous thing to say about a man who was tortured to death by your comrades when all he did was petition his government peaceably. Most Gambians are acutely aware that Solo kick-started the freedom movement, the ascension of Barrow, the formation of the coalition and Jammeh’s election defeat. The people finally had a resistance hero in Solo Sandeng and they galvanised behind his legacy to defeat the Kanilai monster. If you have nothing good to say about Solo and his memory, please keep quiet. His family has been through enough already.

    Your use of the term Babali Mansa to describe Jammeh is ridiculous and unbecoming of someone who claims to be an intellectual and a UN diplomat. The sooner you are dragged out of that Gambia desk at the UN kicking and screaming, the better. You don’t represent me or anyone from Gambia. Calling you a gutter rat is an insult to gutter rats. We all look forward to the day when you are put behind bars. Then we shall all bellow out: “good riddance to bad rubbish”.

    WARNING TO GAMBIANS:
    Samsudeen Sarr is highly dangerous and a very slippery customer indeed. I genuinely think that he will be a big risk to a democratic Gambia going forward. He has all the hall-marks of a future coup-plotter or rebel leader therefore he needs to be neutralised, not given media platforms to spew out despicable untruths. People might see this man as a harmless rogue or a slightly nutty individual, but I would argue that his propensity to lie, twist facts and manipulate individuals to his own ends, while maintaining a pseudo-intellectual persona make him even more dangerous than Jammeh. This man needs to be watched, take it from me.

    Mendy Koto

  7. Mendy Koto, do not worry about Sam becoming a coup leader. He is too much of a coward to do that. He was so scared during the 1994 coup that he became Edward Singateh’s bitch. He knows what I’m talking about. Thats why he will never respond to me. He knows that I know him very well. I knew him even before Yahya Jammeh joined the army. Yahya was at the Gerndermarie before he joined military police. Sana Sabally used to prepare attaya for me and Sam, but when the coup came Sam was so scared, he became Sana and Sighateh’s bitch in a classic role reversal. If he responds to me then I will reveal more. He knows that I know what a coward he is. Even before the coup, he was so scared of going to Liberia (peace keeping) that he ‘accedentally’ shot himself in the foot to avoid ECOMOG! I am just waiting for him to respond, then I will tell Yahya Jammeh some more truths that he still doesn’t know about Samsudeen. Just respond Sam. Make my day!

  8. Baboucarr, the proverbial “computer glitch” doesn’t look “innocent”; especially as being relied upon persistently; it is a ‘school of thought’ as DEVIL yaya was in matter of ‘life & death’ so ANYTHING will be done possible to cling on, as being manifested; the MURDEROUS kanilai KILLER & enablers must be ‘beaten at their own games’ to annihilate the MURDEROUS OPPRESSIVE kanilai FIEFDOM…
    It’s proven fact computers can be hacked into & manipulated from afar; who can say that isn’t the case anyhow with the IEC systems for purpose of some form of advantageous manipulations for the kanilai KILLER DEVIL & cohorts…
    Only that God Almighty have shut all fraudulent avenues to the despicable kanilai devil & disciples this time around…

  9. The electoral commissioner should be blamed in this situation. In giving report towards this 2016 elections , he should have been well informed before letting out the result. Such errors in elections are not welcomed in contemporary political atmosphere in the world. The first result he announced was well welcomed by Yaya Jammeh, and in my own view should have been the final announcement. But he latter created this turmoil situation by calling the contestants and rendered the errors which was the reason that obliged Jammeh to defy his earlier decision. But my prayer for Gambia is peace to rest on the door step of all.

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