Barrow versus Gambian Diaspora: Another commonality between Dictator Jammeh and Barrow
By NDEY JOBARTEH
Another commonality between Dictator Jammeh and President Barrow is their anti-Diaspora stance. When Dictator Jammeh was slipping into dictatorship his first casualties were the Diaspora and President Barrow is no exception.
Dictator Jammeh’s first move was to extent the disenfranchisement of the Diaspora . This energised the diaspora who took on to their keyboards to bring him down.
President Barrow, after all the promises and praises once he realised the fact that the diaspora cannot be controlled, he continued from where Dictator Jammeh stopped to further disenfranchised the Diaspora. The Diaspora then bought their tickets and took the fight home to meet Barrow on the campaign grounds, canvassing for votes to remove him.
Dictator Jammeh calls the Diaspora dogs and President Barrow calls the Diaspora Baakotong Fenyoo (Goat’s tail) and useless people.
In his own words to the Diaspora in this video he said: “If The Gambian people see my work and they are the voters then they are more important than those useless people in the Diaspora talking about useless things and causing problems in The Gambia, and they don’t contribute anything in this Country. You people are better than them. Don’t listen to them, those sitting in the Diaspora talking on social media; they don’t even have what to eat. Even a chicken house they don’t have in The Gambia here. It is those parties who collect money and send it to them for them to be there saying useless things, causing confusions among Gambians, giving false news and information on The Gambia. These are the people who do not have a job. Some of them came asking me for a job when they did not get it, they became opposition. Such people are many among them.”
The irony is the statement from Buah Saidy, Governor of Central Bank of the Gambia, who disclosed that private remittances continued to be the main source of foreign exchange inflows in the domestic foreign exchange market, adding that the volume of remittances injected into the country in 2021 stands at US$657.22 million.” (Source: Alkamba Times)
This is more than foreign aid President Barrow received in The Gambia and over 48% of GDP. This shows The Gambian Diaspora is holding the economy on stilts, supporting it from collapsing and feeding the nation.
Gambians in the Diaspora are more than 200,000 whose outflows into The Gambia are in multiple streams, for feeding, pay school fees, pay rents, medical bills extra, community engagements etc. Most of the people who are dependent on the Dispora for support have voting cards. These are very important votes in this election.
Dictator Jammeh must be regretting why he made the diaspora his #1 enemy.
Mr President, it’s the same diaspora that helped to elect you. Never bite the hand that feeds you.
Diaspora the choice is Yours!!
Gambians the Choice is yours!!
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect The Monitor’s editorial stance.
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