Such
is our political predicament that associations of all colours have been coming
out of the woodwork, but as far as I can gather, from reading the newspapers,
they have all been singing from the same hymn sheet: the out-going president
must step down peacefully, in honour of his acceptance speech. All in choral
harmony, bar one: the African Bar Association.
It
was quite curious to me that an undistinguished, hitherto un-heard of,
collection of lawyers had decided to wade into our troubled political waters,
giving unsolicited advice, on matters they hardly know anything about.
Reports
of their meeting with our out-going president were splashed all over the
papers, and when I read what they had to say, I could not believe the
sanitised, mealy-mouthed pap these legal luminaries were passing off for sound
judgement.
At
the meeting, the president of the Association spoke about “Gambian issues can
best be discussed and addressed by Gambians”; and that the Association believes
in “African solutions to African problems”.
He
cautioned against outside involvement in our domestic politics; and rambled on
a bit about dispute resolution – in short, the president of AFBA skirted around
the elephant in the room and ‘came out of this detergent process sounding
perfectly banal’, and cleansed of all quiddity.
The
elephant in the room, Sir, is this: the constitutional position of the Gambia
right now is what the IEC declared: President-in-waiting Adama Barrow won the
presidential election. And it will be so until the Supreme Court decides
otherwise. I am not a lawyer, but I do understand that, though the Chief
Justice can sit on his own, all matters of finality can be decided only by a
full, 5-member Supreme court. More importantly, this process of petition filing
does not in any way affect the fact that the current presidential term ends on
the 18th January 2017.
And
that President-in-waiting Barrow will be sworn in on the 19th January 2017. In
2011, while out-going president Jammeh was being sworn in, Ousainou Darboe’s petition
was doing the legal rounds. So out-going president Jammeh’s petition is one
thing; President-in-waiting Adama Barrow’s swearing in ceremony on 19th January
2017, quite another. And the twain shall not meet.
And
the thing about ‘Gambian solutions to Gambian problems’ and ‘African solutions
to African problems’ – where have you been, Sir? When the Gambia voted in Adama
Barrow, we were applying a Gambian solution to a Gambian problem; when ECOWAS
sent over four presidents in one day, not to mention the series of meetings
held, to try to resolve our situation, they were applying African solutions to
an African problem.
President
Hollande’s views, and the EU’s, and the rest of the West’s, merely reflect and
echo what we ourselves have been saying. There is no imposition, here. The
thing is, AFBA has been the dissonant, weakest link in a universal orchestra of
vocal unanimity.
While
writing this piece, a story I heard some time ago came to mind: in the 2008
presidential election in Ghana, a group of Nigerian officials had gone to Accra
for the event, and when news broke that John Atta Mills had defeated the ruling
party candidate, Nana Akufo-Addo, one of them asked, how could you let this
happen? Because by his reckoning ‘the party paid for the electoral commission,
therefore had the right to expect the ‘right’ result’. This is the kind of
cynical politics we want to steer well clear of. And to that end, we must be
wary of enemies who look like friends, and the self-seeking who noisily wallow
in the stardust of selflessness.