Compounding the constraining effects of a pulverized party system and structural barriers to effective coalition formation are behavioral characteristics among opposition parties that are inimical to collective action. These include excessive displays of ambition, personal rivalry, mutual mistrust, inflexibility, and a persistent preoccupation with leadership positions among some opposition leaders.
The recent coalition negotiations appear to illustrate these difficulties. Reports indicate that disagreements over fundamental questions, including whether a grand coalition should be party-led or candidate-led, contributed to growing tensions among participants. Some members of the negotiating team reportedly walked out in frustration, while the chairperson subsequently withdrew from the process without providing a clear explanation. These departures were preceded by the withdrawal of the main opposition party, the United Democratic Party, which later allied with other parties in what has been described as the “Gambia First Coalition.”
The negotiating process nevertheless proceeded and eventually resulted in the selection of a flagbearer for the 2026 presidential election under the auspices of those who remained involved in the mediation process. The development has subsequently generated mutual finger-pointing, blame-shifting, and accusations and counteraccusations, including allegations that pecuniary or other inducements were offered by some leaders in exchange for support, as well as allegations concerning the competence of some mediators. These allegations remain matters of political dispute rather than established facts. Some observers have also noted the absence of certified written records of the proceedings that might establish precisely what transpired.
Whatever the merits of the competing claims, the episode suggests that the negotiation process was disorderly and inadequately managed. More importantly, it raises questions about the ability of political leaders to establish the trust, discipline, procedures, and compromises necessary to form and sustain a coalition whose members inevitably have different interests and ambitions.
Apart from the disorderly conduct of the negotiations, two other related factors contribute to the behavioral barriers to coalition-building: the absence of established working relationships among participants and the “my turn” mindset among some political leaders. These factors are related but distinct, and each deserves separate consideration.
Lack of Familiarity and Established Working Relationships
The absence of established working relationships and mutual familiarity among political party leaders negotiating a pre-election coalition can constitute a significant behavioral obstacle to effective coalition-building. Political coalitions require more than formal agreements among party organizations. They depend on trust, communication, personal familiarity, predictable behavior, and confidence that negotiating partners will honor commitments once an agreement has been reached.
Where political leaders with different backgrounds, personalities, organizational cultures, and political histories are suddenly required to work together toward a common objective, the absence of prior working relationships can make compromise more difficult. Participants may have limited knowledge of one another’s negotiating styles, political priorities, reliability, or willingness to compromise. In circumstances characterized by uncertainty and intense competition for leadership, this unfamiliarity can easily reinforce suspicion and mistrust.
This factor may help explain some of the difficulties experienced during the recent coalition negotiations in The Gambia. The problem is not necessarily that the participants are incapable of cooperation, but rather that they may lack the accumulated experience of working together that makes cooperation easier. Successful collective action is often facilitated by repeated interaction, through which participants learn one another’s preferences, establish informal norms, and develop confidence that agreements will be respected.
The “My Turn” Syndrome
An event involving two opposition parties in Zambia many years ago provides an illustration of another behavioral barrier to coalition-building: the “my turn” syndrome.
In 2016, Hakainde Hichilema of the United Party for National Development, who had narrowly lost the 2015 Zambian presidential election following the death of President Michael Sata in October 2014, approached Edith Nawakwi, leader of the Forum for Democracy and Development, to explore joint action for the election of that year. Although Nawakwi had polled less than one percent in the 2015 election compared with Hichilema’s nearly 47 percent, she reportedly maintained that it was her turn to receive Hichilema’s support because she had previously supported him in an earlier contest a decade before.
The episode illustrates a broader problem in coalition politics: previous political support can become transformed into a claim to reciprocal support, irrespective of the relative electoral strength of the parties or candidates at the time of the new election. Such a logic can make it difficult to select a candidate according to the considerations most likely to maximize the coalition’s electoral prospects.
In The Gambia, the “my turn” or “our turn” syndrome has been expressed in a more subtle and generalized manner. Suggestions have been made, for example, that the leader of the main opposition party, the United Democratic Party, who has unsuccessfully contested several presidential elections since 1996, should step aside in favor of younger politicians. In the most recent negotiations, there have also been unconfirmed reports of opposition leaders seeking one another’s support for leadership positions, while one leader in particular was allegedly actively seeking a prominent leadership position within any negotiated alliance and in a future government.
Whether or not all such reports are accurate, the underlying problem is clear. Competitive political ambition is not inherently undesirable; indeed, ambition is an important source of political leadership. The difficulty arises when the pursuit of individual or party advantage overwhelms the collective objective. Successful pre-election alliances are more likely to emerge when politicians can balance their competitive drive with the cooperative behavior required to achieve a shared purpose.
Political leaders who engage in public grandstanding or display an uncontrolled drive for position rather than a commitment to collective duty may also expose themselves to negative voting—voting against rather than for a candidate because of his or her behavior, perceived shortcomings, or excessive pursuit of power.
Leadership Rather Than Policy?
The fact that the negotiations have been marked by internal friction over leadership from the outset may be symptomatic of a broader preoccupation among some Gambian politicians with status and political power rather than public service. This may help explain the disproportionate emphasis placed on two questions: who should lead a grand coalition and how Barrow and his government should be removed from office.
By contrast, there has been comparatively limited public discussion of the detailed policy agenda that individual parties would pursue if they came to power. The central question has therefore often appeared to be “unite around whom?” rather than “unite around what kind of future government?”
This distinction is important. A successful pre-election coalition cannot be sustained indefinitely by opposition to an incumbent alone. The coalition must also provide voters with a credible alternative program of government. It must explain what it intends to do differently, how it intends to govern, what institutional reforms it proposes, and how it will address the country's principal economic, social, and governance challenges.
Without such a program, the electorate may reasonably remain uncertain about the practical meaning of a coalition victory. The removal of an incumbent government is an electoral objective, but it is not, by itself, a governing program.
More recent local media reports indicate that the independent platform or initiative responsible for facilitating negotiations among opposition parties has indicated that further discussions would continue at the end of August in an effort to bridge differences and build a broad-based alliance. Given the entrenched positions of some key parties, the intense rivalry over leadership, the absence of established working relationships among many of the participants, and the historical record of inter-party relations in The Gambia, it remains difficult to predict whether further discussions will produce a substantially different outcome.
Conclusion
The difficulties surrounding opposition coalition-building in The Gambia in 2026 cannot be understood solely in terms of the personalities or ambitions of individual political leaders. They reflect the interaction of three broader forces: a highly fragmented party system, structural advantages enjoyed by a dominant ruling party, and behavioral patterns among opposition leaders that complicate collective action.
The pulverization of the party system creates a numerical imperative for cooperation while simultaneously making cooperation more difficult. The inherited tradition of centralized political authority has contributed to the recurrent emergence of dominant ruling parties, although the mechanisms of dominance have varied from cross-carpeting under Jawara, to suppression under Jammeh, and political co-option under Barrow. Finally, the behavioral characteristics of political actors—including personal rivalries, excessive ambition, mistrust, inflexibility, lack of familiarity, and the “my turn” syndrome—can transform potentially manageable differences into obstacles to coalition formation.
The broader implications extend beyond the 2026 presidential election. They concern how political capital is mobilized in a liberalized and increasingly vibrant environment of multiparty competition following the end of authoritarian rule. The existence of numerous political parties is, in itself, an important expression of political pluralism. But pluralism becomes politically meaningful only when political institutions and actors are capable of converting diversity into effective competition, cooperation, and accountable government.
There appears to be limited policy distance, and perhaps even less ideological distance, among many Gambian political parties. In such an environment, the personal qualities and demonstrated commitment of political leaders may become increasingly important to voters. Competence, integrity, credibility, restraint, and an evident commitment to the welfare of Gambians may ultimately matter more than the formal labels attached to political parties.
For opposition parties seeking to challenge a dominant incumbent, therefore, the fundamental challenge is not simply to determine who should lead, but to establish why they should govern and how they intend to do so. A coalition built solely around personalities and the desire to remove an incumbent may be electorally expedient, but a coalition built around a credible program of government, clear rules of engagement, mutual trust, and a demonstrated willingness to subordinate individual ambition to the national interest would have a much greater prospect of becoming a durable instrument of democratic change.
