(JollofNews) – In response to Madi Jobarteh’s no-nonsense piece with regard to the Kanilai Jammehkunda gates altercation between some Jammeh loyalist Gambian soldiers and the ECOWAS forces, I would like to suggest that the government of President Barrow and the National Assembly should pass an emergency bill, temporarily allocating all so-called “Yahya Jammeh Lands” to the Local Women’s Garden Co-operatives. The rainy season is upon us and the lands must be used to grow crops by the local people.
As stated in many Daily Observer editorials when I visited many of these lands with Yahya Jammeh himself, the lands and their produce belong to the people of the Gambia. They are national assets. They are not, and were never seen as, one individual’s land – which they could not legally or morally be for the following reasons:-
* Jammeh never paid for any of the lands – he simply grabbed them;
* Jammeh himself stated that he was “farming for the country”.
Now that Jammeh is not around to farm the lands, the local people must be allowed to farm the lands during the rainy season that is almost upon us.
You can read the full article here.
Congratulations to both Mr Halake and Madi/
Your on the right track;
Oh! and not forgetting Burama and Mr Manneh.
Very very sensible economics.
“temporarily allocating all so-called “Yahya Jammeh Lands” to the Local Women’s Garden Co-operatives.” I’m sure Yahya would not mind if that was to happen, no emergency drama would have to be called, I’m sure Yahya stated that in his immunity deal or his final TV speech, that he would like the project to continue.
Oh, he stated it in his ‘immunity deal’, The final TV speech-
And thought; oh people, I the cruel Yaya Jammeh, have betrayed you, tortured you, killed your loved ones, jailed them, maimed them, robbed them and sent them in exile. Oh please take back your land and some of the wealth I robbed from you. I have seen the signs of the wrath about to befall me. Oh take some of your properties and please let me go, oh please.
Who knows it’ll be Equatorial Guinea who are about to learn their lesson. I bet he has all the aspirations to be president of that country too by any means necessary. Some cheap popularity to his favor out there, he only needs mercenaries to do it.
Ndugu Dida and Madi, I would advocate for acts of parliament that not only repossess all of the illegally acquired Jammeh land but also dedicate some of the land to PUBLIC PARKS AND RECREATIONAL SPACES that are clearly in short supply in peri-urban Gambia. A prime target for public access and recreational space could be land in the Tanji, Batokunku and Sayang beach area. I believe that the Barrow government must also review the questionable policy of reserving most, if not all beach front coastal areas for a Tourism Development Area (TDA).
Jammeh farmlands in the Kombo and other areas could be carved out to the members of general public with the requisite funds to fulfill a requirement that the same land be dedicated to commercial agriculture albeit that I will not advocate for dedicating additional peri-urban land to women’s vegetable gardens that may command immense goodwill on the part of Gambians but may not be yielding the targeted results.
The former Jammeh residence and other facilities in Kanilai must also be repossessed and the homestead transformed and leased out to private operators for a country lodge and tourist facility in rural Gambia. A gentleman, Per Olssen that was involved in the construction of the Sindola Lodge and knows the area well could help steer this effort.
The KGI and Kanilai Bakeries should also be declared assets that private investors can buy shares into and run as commercial outfits like similar businesses. I’m confident that Gambians would be interested in owning shares in this venture. A properly structured arm of a “Sabiji or Brikama Youth Kafo” could serve as a model of ownership of a divested and privatized Jammeh bakery.
Again, all we need to achieve the objectives stated above are targeted acts of parliament to get the job done! We need the bolder NAMs in the new parliament to take lead in this noble endeavor!
Asante Njema Ndugu Dida!!
Indeed, Ndugu Andrew, I agree there could be other uses for the Jammeh-Grabbed lands other than allocation to local farmers. Kanilai, which I have toured with the Devil (who later threatened to throw me into the crocodile pool! Honestly at the side of the pool!) could, for example, be used as a major site for NARI.
My worry about “private investors” getting a hold of those lands is simple: the Kombos Mafia will dispossess the local people of their land. It really is as simple as that and no Acts of Parliament will prevent it. It happened with Mugabe’s Elite, with Jomo Kenyatta’s Elite and is happening with Zuma’s Elite. Then what you have for generations to come will be “land wars” – Kuki Gullman’s Laikipia Reservation Lodge was burnt down two weeks ago, and two days ago Kuki herself was shot, because local people want THEIR land back.
I still think the best thing is to forget “private investors” and “commercial farmers” and give the land to the local subsistence famers (I once saw a study – UN? – which argued that subsistence farmers are the ones who fed the nation. Kenya’s commercial farmers are only into FLOWERS and Coffee for to Europe – ‘as advised by IMF and WB’ – and do NOT produce FOOD to feed the people – hence the starvation).
Bax, my in-law, don’t be jealous – “in-law” has a higher status than “Ndugu”!
Dida, I totally agree with your take on Suburban and Kombo Mafia as indeed they represent a real threat sitting on mostly ill gotten wealth with which to buy party connections that could work to steer policy in their favor.
However, my primary concern is that the current lending structures and agricultural support structures on the ground do not adequately serve the needs and interests on the subsistence farmer albeit that the subsistence farmer is a key driver of agricultural production in The Gambia.
A second concern is the alarming rate of rural-urban drift that leaves very few able bodied Gambians in rural areas to engage in productive agriculture while the scramble for land in the Kombos becomes a sticking point.
If there was a set way of creating awareness among small farmers to focus on growing food crops to feed the nation as opposed to growing peanuts in support of what has been erroneously labeled a “Cash Crop” and foreign exchange earner, The Gambia would be much better off in food security in five to ten years. However, we are faced with an evolving and dynamic situation. So the approach to feeding the nation remains a topic that is up for discussion.
Thanks for the input.
Bax, you will start calling your in-law Mu Hesimiwa that’s higher in status than Julius Nyerere’s popular and humble Ndugu! Dida will tell you the meaning of the word! Smile!
“Mheshimiwa” Andrew, and in my Nairobi ghetto that we named “California” we reserved that title for the mighty Ugali and Sukuma Wiki!
It is rather upside down thinking that the lands that were illegally seized by JAMMEH should be given away to people rather than the actual owners.
What kind of justice is that or is it just another keyboard justice at work
Momodou Janneh, “the lands that were illegally seized by JAMMEH should be given away to people rather than the actual owners.” I agree with you that if the lands were illegally seized by JAMMEH , then yes the lands should go back to their actual legal owners.
Ndugu Dida.
Go easy on those gambia ndugus. They a have accepted you both as ndugu na shemeji. U bet it is a rear and fair, them gambia brothers fell so.Let them be. Sawa?
Andrew Pjalo, U dawm right that Muheshmwa thing,I bet Dida will puke.
Offcourse we in east africa dida opens a widow. We gota glassop.
FROM greffrin, shaw, Ngugi, Gambia observer and to real deal JAMMEH. To be honest dida is one of a kind. I always look forward to read his massive thanks social media.
I could be wrong. Dida hardly venture into GAMBIA music,Art etc.
Dida mtoto wa nymbani thru and thru
.(Dormu Rewwum Gambia (aka Luntango Suun Gann G) te
Upo Mzee??
Nithamu tele.
Upus. Yahya Jammeh’s NIA must have set you on my trail!
Shaw was a SOB and he set his CiD on me in 1975 – when I challenged him face to face over JM Kariuki’s Assassination. I moved the motion at Griffin’s BARAZA to name “New House” “JM House” – never happened but sent Shaw crazy! Shaw killed so many people – and got exactly what he deserved at the hands of Moi’s assassins!
Adored Griffin – but he was frail when I last saw him and took a picture with him in 1999 and he died in 2005. I would have considered teaching at Starehe if Griffin had lived.
I love Gambian Kora – but my real love in West African music is the late Ali Farka Toure of Mali.
“One of a kind”! Hmm, some have said “CMF”!
Dida and Upus, here’s your laugh of the day.
A colleague from Zanzibar heard the words Sukuma Wiki and was wondering what it was all about. So he asked whether Sukuma Wiki is the the name of a little bird. The whole room burst out laughing. A kind gentleman then added, Oh no, Sukuma Na Ugali (Bugali) is the Gikuyu, Meru, Embu and Ukambaani staple and the poor man’s meat and potatoes! Kariuki quickly added, oh no, that belongs to JaRamoji aka Luoland!
I challenge you folks to tell us the origin of the word. Laugh!
LoL, I can tell you Andrew, but I will give my esteemed in-law a chance to try first!
Right Andrew, no answer from Bax, so I will try:
“Sukuma” means push; “Wiki” is week. Sukuma Wiki is “push the week” – more accurately “SURVIVE the week”.
So, broke Half-Die Kibera Slum fellas stay alive until they get a pay check at the end of the week by eating the poorman’s Bongo Fish – Sukuma Wiki with their Ugali.
Kariuki of the Kikuyu tribe is too proud to admit to surving on Sukuma Wiki – so he passes ownership over to the Luo tribe of Jaramogi Odinga Oginga (but in secret the Kikuyu are the biggest consumers of Sukuma Wiki – just as yours truly secretly visits Deepest Deepakunda for a 10-dalasi plate of Cassava!).
A Price For Compulsive Behavior:
The Case of The Obessesive Compulsive Behavior With Everything Jammeh By Some in the Gambia and Abroad.
The Obession with Former President Yaya Jammeh among some Gambians and Non Gambians, who ought to be more Focused on the State of Affairs in the Gambia has Crossed a Bridge in our Social interaction and can therefore, be Diagnosed as a Mental Health Disease or Impairment. The Government and Gambians of Good faith Who are Dedicated to a Renewed Gambia and Ready to Work, Should Pull up their “Tocca”, “Chaya” and “Padding Njehen” Shoes, anything and Get on with the Job of Building on what is Passed on to the Current UDP Led Regime. The State of Affairs of limited Water and Electricity cannot be Sustained by a “JAMMEH this, a JAMMEH that Obession”. Jammeh is gone and Gambia and Gambians have to Move on. It is Not Healthy, nor Emotionally useful for the Gambia and Gambians to get Stuck in time and engage in Unhealthy Blame Game, Name calling, Violence, Vigilantism, and an environment of Rising Crime. Reports of Ethnic Cleansing and Selective Arrrests and Detentions, Purging out of the Civil Service of Members of the Jola Ethnic Group, is at a Level that cannot be endured before it reaches a Critical Mass and Breaking Point. Enough with the Obessesive Energy, Time, and Effort that should be Redirected to More Gainful Economic and Socially Cohesive Activities. ENOUGH with the Pontification, and More with the Practical, Applicable Policies and Economic Policies and Programs. Caveat. Gambia and Gambians Should Be Aware of Free-lance Mercenaries Amongst Us. If Gambia Fails, it Fails for All Gambians. If it Succeeds, it Succeeds For All. Obessesive Compulsive Behavior is a Diagnosable Mental Health Disease. Let’s Not Allow ourselves to Degenerate or Sink to that Level by Default. Gambia is More than the Sum Total of One Individual, One Ethnic Group and Region. One Gambia, One People, One Destiny.
Sidi Idiot Bojang
Wow you guys are now ashamed of your tribal association with your kinsman Jammeh as the mention of his name alone bring dis repute while the mentioning of his various crimes against our people send chills down the back sides of his kinsmen for fear of some kind of revenge. Or are you just trying to pontificate, bark your ugliness and give sermons of togetherness while at the same time failing to understand why we are in this juncture at the first place. What transpired during the 22 years of Jammeh’s barbaric and despotic rule, what lessons we can learn as a people,as a nation and what means we can employ to remedy some of the ills,the crimes committed by Jammeh and his stooges. Those should be the practical and applicable policy solutions needed to achieve any resemblance of togetherness in our homeland.
I am baffled always by the contradictions of what comes out of your big mouth. You want us to stop blaming Jammeh for his various crimes, but its ok for you Sidi to continue with your insidious, abhorrent, ignorant blame game, blaming Mandinkas of violence, ethnic cleansing, selective arrests and detentions, purging of Jolas from the civil service, baseless allegations coined from the dark gutters of your fallen Jola hegemony or empire.
Yahya Jammeh and his evil killers will forever be mention in the darkest of lights for what they are, evil personified.
Sidi, are you really serious about a ‘rise in crime rate’ and an ‘ethnic cleansing’ in the Gambia. Come on check out for who is really obsessed with Yayah Jammeh. I believe there were men as well who give him roses.
Look, fellow citizen Sidi, go get a life! Jammeh did illegally acquired land from regional administrative areas and individuals, a situation that warrants a redress. These lands should simply be given back to their rightful owners. You don’t know how or where to make a point. You are talking about crime rates now to forget about the past when armed robbers have beheaded privated citizens to rob them of their belongings. What all the roadblock automatic-armed robberies along the trans-Gambia, and the dead bodies in unmarked graves around the country. What about the licensed to kill-without-trace- squads. What about the crocodile pools and the torture-death installations around the country. Sidi, you are completely out of your senses!
Sidi, well said.
Sidi, It’s like you have 2 birds locked in a cage for 22 or 50 years(which ever one you feel comfortable with) and then suddenly one day you lift the cage off the 2 birds one bird sees the opportunity and flies off, while the other bird sit there complianing about the past and how life is hard blah, blah, blah, man human nature.
One clique ruled by the gun/
The new clique rule by the National Assembly/
The first clique borrowed heavily and created chaos/
The new clique borrows heavily and creates hope/
So the choice is what matters;
The first clique took your money/
The new clique offers you hope/
What would you rather have ? Money or Hope ?
So who benefits ? those who have money?
Or those who have hope?
The measure of success will be the measure those who left but choose to return with money and hope.
Long distant letters and wishes, will never end this vicious cycle; Only those who do themselves, what they wish others will do for them.
Its time to return home and invest your money and hope in the next generation’s future;
Otherwise hope will fade and money will benefit only those who invest in so many foreign adventures.
The road is one of choice/ The choice is yours/
Genesis or Exodus
Which land of milk and honey do you value most?
“Ask not what your country can do for you. But ask what you can do for your country.”
Bourne,
Who should be interested in your non-educative diatribes, senseless and contentless. Yes, of course. I went to a mission school, one of the most venerable institutions of higher learning in our country, Saint Augustine’s. Ask your deified demi-god Ousainou Darbo who was my senior prefect when he was following his Lower 5 at this august Alma Mater. Ask your present Chief Justice Hassan Jallow who was my fellow schoolmate at this venerable institution of learning.
When I was reading all Shakespearan works perhaps you were a toddler and that venerable school gave me the foundation and concrete pillars of what I am writing to you, as a DUNCE, Bourne.
The Dutch know that. That’s why I was rightly placed without going through the back door as done in your incompetent government led by Barrow, the British Argos watchman in presidential clothing.
The diversity of the English language was possible because of the ruly and Judas behaviours of our black traitors who connived with the British and foreign intruders to facilitate the slave trade and colonialism. Traitors like the modern neocolonialists like Bourne and all those henchmen and sellouts in the bitty incompetent Barrow administration.
You are the hateful and untruthful fellow, Heer Bourne. Someone who fails to acknowledge the excellent works of President Jammeh because of his hatred for that patriotic son. Those who bear such sentiments are the hypocrites according to the Holy Qu’ran. Those who refuse to acknowledge the good. The loss of Manswanka, Mandinka, Wollof, Sarahule, Fula, Jola, Manjago, Kasinko alphabets/syllables/writing were also possible with the help of your treacherous and hypocritical allignments with foreign powers most especially the British. You SELLOUTS!
Babu Soli
If Bourne is hateful and untruthful for not acknowledging the excellent works of dictator Jammeh,then what are you for not acknowledging the various crimes committed by Jammeh and his evil henchmen? You baffled me sometimes Babu for your insidious inconsistencies and how far you are prepared to go to manifest your hatred for anything worthwhile for our nation. Your inadequacies as a person which was the primary reason for your failed miserable life in comparison to your senior prefect, in comparison to our chief justice, in comparison to our dear President left an indelible mark on your conscience and hence clouded all your judgement as an honest analyst in this trying times of our nation’s history.
The country that gives you shelter is one of the most evil colonialist of the modern times. What were they doing in Congo in 80’s? With whom did they connived to get Patrice Lumumba assassinated? and hence the turmoil afterwards. You worked your shaggy ass for years for those imperialist and colonialist and it’s ironic that you want us to believe that they are your adversary. You have no moral justification to call anybody in this forum neo colonialist as that terminology best described yourself before anybody.
I will refer you to your last paragraph and you can see for yourself what a treacherous, insidious hypocrite you are, quoting the Holy Quran in a false context. You refused to acknowledge the evil perpetrated against our people by Jammeh and cohorts, but preached to other to acknowledge his good work. The bankruptcy of your argument is there for all to see.
You know who is the biggest sell out here? Babu Soli is the biggest sell out, Gambian born, Gambian educated but life works for foreign powers whose aim was/is to make us vassals to their interests.
Long Live President Barrow and his government
Long Live our beloved homeland.
Natty Dread, great job!
Would I have bothered myself if I knew you’ve so well and brilliantly darned together, Babu Soli’s tattered old despot’s petit bourgeoisie suit…. Thanks very much. I can’t help the idiot any better than this.
Natty/Bourne,
Read this piece from a truly intelliegent and God-Blessed Foninka with such a mindset so totally different from Babu’s: https://sambagate.com/2017/04/26/gambia-first-says-a-true-foninka/
Slightly surprised to hear Babu declare himself an “Old Saint” contemprorary of Lawyer Darboe’s and Justice Hassan B Jallow – Babu sounds so different from them both!
As the Foninka brother so clearly states, Jammeh was evil to the Foninkas themselves – and to Babu’s own school-mates Lawyer Darboe and Justice Jallow whom he imprisoned in Mile 2.
But let us leave the last word with our brother Babu, clearly a well-educated “Saint”:
Natty/Bourne must be Sinners; they are, in Babu’s words, “Someone who fails to acknowledge the excellent works of President Jammeh because of his hatred for that patriotic son…”
Dormu Rewwum Gambia (aka Luntango Suun Gan Gi), Thanks. I have made reference to piece by the Blessed Foninka, Babucarr Sambou, on Kairo, and to say the truth, it is impressive and inspiring. It should be tons load of a help to Foninkas. If Babu Soli is one, it should help him more than any Foninka. My doubt is; if Babu Soli is a Gambian at all.
Dormu Rewwum Gambia aka Luntango Suun Gan Gi, no disrespect at all. You and I are Gambians citizens of equal rights. It doesn’t take just to be born in the Gambia to be a good citizen of the Gambia.
What a tired old brains Babu Soli. Bitty bitty bitty **** outta hell.
Hon. Ousainou or Hassan as you mentioned, your old mates at Saints, would go online anonymously to behave the way you are now, only because a devil in them must have to have overpowered them.
Evidently, Saint Augustine’s has produced some of the incredibly intelligent and resourceful people in the country who definitely, won’t go online boasting about their Shakespearean works. Or, perhaps they’ll do so to get the debates a bit heated up and lively but not to shower it down with bitterness and hatred.
I deeply regret not attaining a formal classroom education but even whereas I did, what a regret it would still be to be an educated fool like you. There is no point in calling me a dunce. That’s an appropriate term for an educated fool like you. Imagine someone your age and an acclaimed level of education of yours who knows nothing but to sow seeds of hatred and tribalism in a country like the Gambia, amazingly with an art of meticulous hypocrisy and contempt.
After all the caption of the article reads;
(Give “Jammeh’s Lands” To Local Farmers ASAP)!
What’s your garbage as usual, you got to say to that? The likes of you who are out to stake the Africans’ heads for the ditch’ better stop your gushing vitriol against the neo-colonialist because it makes the true and real anti-colonialists like Lumumba, Nkurumah and the likes shake in their graves. True advocates for a better Africa, are not hateful and hypocritical like you disgruntled, deposed state of bloodsuckers and clique, in the Gambia.
My humble advice to you is; provide anthropologic proofs that Manswanka alphabets and numerics ever existed in the first place, before claiming or assuming that they were lost. Thank God however, that your Manswanka language itself resist the ‘hypocritical alignments of foreign powers’, like the British, for it to be here to stay, though without it’s alphabets and numerics. If you have a brain at all you’ll apprehend the logic…
“The diversity of the english……….was possible because of the *ruly* and ‘Judas behaviours’…….’black traitors’ who connived with……………….” Babu Soli. This is it when one loves to impress people by writing lots of rubbish. Ask yourself this time; what a paradoxical nonsense!?
Dida, I’m sure you’d understand when I say, “Woriyaa Nabatt”.
You surely nailed the Sukuma and the Wiki parts!! How about Mutura?
Did I read somewhere that you mentioned the word, “Kachumbaari”. I wouldn’t therefore question your knowledge of Mombasa, Kwale, Kanamai, Laamu, Wattaamu and the old Shimo La Tewa bridge. Hahaha!
“Woriyaa Nabatt” is Nengadef according to our neighbours the Somalis.
We Oromos say “Akam Jirt” (how are you) or even better still “Nageni Badada” which means “Is Peace Sweet” – I love that. In Shimo La Tewa they say “Shikamo” and the less classy Kikuyus & Luos says “Jambo!” Indeed, I loved the old Swahili Coast – but I now prefer the Smiling Coast which retains the peace that the Swahili Coast has now lost.
Enough, pupils just walked in!
Marrhaba, Marrhaba Dida! I am reminded of the Samaki Pakka and Kuku Pakka and the Pilau!
Since your last name is now Halake-Jallow, I bet you would prefer the Chebu Djenn any time. Haha!
Marrhaba indeed, Andrew. Indeed, the Jallow-Halakes prefer the sweet, red and dry Benechin of the Fulani clansmen (Ugali and Nyama ya Choma are slightly tasteless besides Benchin and Chicken Yassa! Polle Wananchi WaKenya!!).