With
the much-anticipated National Assembly elections concluded, it is now time for
the newly-elected National Assembly Members (NAMs) to get to work for the good
of the nation, putting aside personal and party differences that are likely to
hinder the collegiality that is required for the much-needed and urgent reform
of the legislative machinery of the country, and the restoration of its
credibility which has been compromised over the past 22 years.
The
composition of the new National Assembly provides hope that the challenges that
it has to contend with will be confronted with zeal, commitment, patriotic
fervor and non-partisan attitudes. For the first time in the history of the
nation, we will have a United Democratic Party-led National Assembly, a party
that has been anxiously waiting all these years to dominate the country’s
political arena, but which, unfortunately, has fallen short of the needed
two-thirds majority that would have enabled it to dictate and control the
affairs of this important organ of government.
We
congratulate our new NAMs on their election and pray that they will measure up
to the task that awaits them, and to the expectations of the Gambian citizenry,
when they take office. We look forward to seeing and hearing vibrant and
informed debates, the passing of well-scrutinized bills that put the interest
of the nation above all else, and the approval of well-prepared and responsive
budgets that will enable meaningful socio-economic development.
The
big questions are: Who will the President nominate as Speaker and Deputy
Speaker of the National Assembly, respectively? Will his nominees be supporters
of or affiliated to the majority party in the National Assembly? Will they be
persons of integrity, non-partisan, highly educated and sage? Will some of them
be women as they constitute the majority in the population? We are waiting to
see.
Congratulations
once again all elected NAMs.
“We
are made wise not by the recollection of our past, but by the responsibility
for our future ”
George
Bernard Shaw