GAP chief tells cabinet to put words into actions

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Photo credit: The Chronicle

By HALIMA JOBE

Ousainou Musa Yali Batchilly, opposition leader of Gambia Action Party, has asked Barrow’s newly formed cabinet to put their words into actions, as he prepares to gauge their first hundred days in office.

Batchilly’s comments came weeks after vice president, Alieu Badara Joof urged his colleagues to deliver up to the expectation of Gambians amid rising cost of living.

However, Mr Batchilly said he is supervising the cabinet’s actions, adding vice president Joof who commented that about delivery at the just concluded state retreat was in the same government from 2017 to date.

“I am pleading to the new ministers. The President selected you to run those ministries so we don’t need your words. We need your actions. We don’t need sugar coated words. What we need is you to implement your words into actions,” he said.

“With due respect to the vice president who is the second most important person in the cabinet after the President, I will spare my comments on his retreat speech until August 15 because I am watching them. He was part of the government in 2017 and I am watching their actions. The country is hard and I feel this hardship because I am a family man and everyone feels this pain. The rich and the poor are both suffering because people depend on eating bread for breakfast, lunch and dinner,” he added.

Meanwhile, he called on President Adama Barrow to ask the newly formed cabinet to declare their assets and immediately set up the long-awaited anti-corruption commission in the country.

“There are lots of issues I want to expose. And President Adama Barrow under my watch will not fail, unless he tells me, Batchilly, I don’t want to hear from you, I will know he doesn’t want to succeed. But if he wants to succeed, any difficult issues he has, let him just call me. I will come with a special team and address those issues,” GAP leader added.

“But if he wants to fail, he can listen to those people who tell him don’t listen to Batchilly and if you empower him, he will destroy you, because he is smart and fast. We need visionary people with commitment and Mr. President Adama Barrow should bring such people in his government,” he continued.