After the feast

We want to welcome again the whole Gambia, Muslims and non-Muslims, for having been through another wonderful occasion such as Eid-al-Adha, known as Tobaski.

We should first of all thank God for giving us the opportunity to witness the feast and for providing for us to make the day an enjoyable one, in our little ways and at various levels. We should therefore thank the Almighty Allah.

After the feast, we should all endeavour to continue our business with God; that is to do what is good and eschew what is not.

We should endeavour to ‘imbibe the lessons of commitment and obedience to higher authority inherent in Prophet Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son to the will of Allah.’

As the statement of the President says: "A true Muslim should always obey what Almighty Allah has ordained and to abstain from anything that He has prohibited. In the same vein, true Muslims should not harbour hate or unleash violence on others; or wrongfully take the life of another human being. In fact, all those who save lives and help the poor and the suffering will always benefit from the blessings of Allah the Almighty."

This is exactly what we as a people should endeavour to do always to improve the quality of life of our people.

There is poverty, which we have to fight as well. And this challenge can only be mopped out with promoting equal rights and justice for all, equitable distribution of the wealth and resources in the country, economic and financial growth through entrepreneurial development, local and foreign investment, and international trade.

We should also be ready to work harder, to transform our economic condition for the better, and continue to dream and bring our dreams into reality, as a country becomes poor when its population ceases to dream and overwhelmingly embraces the cultures of lamentation and dependency, which are enemies of self-confidence at the individual and collective level.

A pertinent call has been made by the President to all and sundry, especially the youth, to move from our zones of lamentation and find something to do to beat down poverty and ignorance.

‘In this connection, I reaffirm our commitment to eradicating poverty in this country. But I count on all Gambians to desist from the easy tendency of embracing “self inflicted poverty” whereby one sits idly by hoping that good fortune would descend from the heavens without using one’s God-given talent and energy to work and improve one’s livelihood. What we need today is the change of attitude from complacent and dependent mindsets to more forward-looking and achievement-oriented dispositions.’

“A country becomes poor when its population ceases to dream.”

The Point