Surprised New Year ‘gift’ for Gambian journalists

Even the most gifted seer could not have seen it coming.

Gambian President Yahya Jammeh once again demonstrated his unmatched unpredictable persona when he announced the lifting of a ban on two media houses.

Taranga FM radio and The Standard newspaper got the Presidential stay of execution thanks to a Presidential decree made public on the eve of the New Year.

According to a statement, the move was “a mark of goodwill for the New Year.”

But there is hardly any Gambian you will come across, other than the President`s diehard supporters of course, that have accepted the ‘goodwill’ talk.

Jammeh forbids criticism and he sees the media in particular as obstacle and therefore Enemy Number One.

The two media houses which have been allowed to operate were ordered shutdown by him last year, together with another newspaper, The Daily News.

In fact, the exclusion of The Daily News in the New Year amnesty, as it were, forms the basis of suspicion for many media watchers.

The Daily News is owned by a veteran journalist, Madi Ceesay, a former President of the beleaguered Gambia Press Union which has had a thorny relationship with the regime since the 1994 coup that brought to power a young army Lieutenant Jammeh.

Since day-one of his reign, Jammeh has made no effort to conceal his dislike for the press. He sees journalists as trouble makers, the root of all evils and has severally vowed not to ever allow them “to destroy a country” he believes he has taken from nowhere to where it is today.

But all of Jammeh`s megalomaniac thoughts could have gladly been overlooked if he hadn’t blended them with ruthlessness in dealing with divergent views.

Gambian journalists, who simply ask to be allowed to serve their watchdog role, have bore the brunt of his actions.

The price for defying him have been numerous – extrajudicial killing, as in the case of one of Gambia`s best known journalist, Deyda Hydara, who was shot at point-blank range by men widely suspected to be soldiers of the Gambia Armed Forces.

There have also been several enforced disappearances, with the most popular case been of a young journalist called Chief Ebrima Manneh. He was in 2006 accused of sabotaging the government, detained and has never been seen since then.

Jammeh has repeatedly denied knowledge of his arrest.

Dozens of Gambian journalists have been forced into exile because of the hostile state-media relationship.

The owners of Taranga FM radio, The Standard and The Daily News newspapers were among the few remaining voices who decided to stay put and weather the storm.

Taranaga FM was shunned for its popular program which ensured the news was brought to the vast majority of the local population which is often left out.

It translate daily news carried by the country`s tabloids into the major local languages – Mandingo, Wolof and Fullah.

As is the case in many part of Africa, the segment of the population holding most votes do not read and write and keeping them in the dark is the best bet for insecure, failed and dictatorial regimes.

In August, personnel of the highly dreaded National Intelligence Agency (NIA), which is answerable to only Jammeh himself, stormed the offices of the radio station and forcefully shut it down.

Its proprietor was eventually forced to leave the country.

Although the government, in its trademark style, never gave any reason for the closure, the development happened shortly following the infamous executions of nine death row inmates, another action that attracted widespread international condemnation.

Both The Standard Times and the Daily News also widely covered that development.

The Standard, been the newest news medium at the time, could hardly have caused any other trouble to warrant such response.

The paper reportedly published a statement by the famous Islamic scholar and human rights activist, Imam Baba Leigh, who condemned the executions. Mr Leigh was himself later kidnapped, yes, kidnapped, by the NIA and was detained incommunicado for six months.

He was later released, under international pressure, and warned to stay away from politics.

He eventually moved to the US.

Given his aversion for liberty, therefore, it is clearly unlike Yahya Jammeh to overturn a ban on media houses considered as hostile to his regime only on humanitarian grounds.

Therefore, the question is: why the ‘goodwill’ gesture?

One likely explanation has been pressure by the international donor community, notably the European Union which, reportedly, recently held back millions of Euros in aide in response to the deteriorating human rights situation in what is mainland Africa`s smallest nation.

As a hugely tax-dependent nation, Gambia heavily depends on donor support to fund its infrastructural development and other needs, although Jammeh hates admitting this fact.

He often brags that he needs no body`s help (meaning no western help) to develop Gambia; yet besides a poorly performing agricultural sector, the country boasts of nothing substantial that can bring in much needed revenue.

I have heard many Africans, in my little travel across the continent, praising him for his ‘Pan-Africanist stance. That`s a topic for another day.

Jammeh is simply a mockery to Pan-Africanism.

Many of those who hold this view of him on see the image he makes of himself on the state media he has monopolized. And those who believes he has transformed Gambia clearly only judge based on what they see in Banjul, yet Banjul is just a fraction of the country.

No doubt Western aide money has been instrumental in Gambia`s development effort, which is one reason why Jammeh must listen to them.

Also, the diaspora based dissident Gambians have recently upped their campaign which have seen them even involved in physical attacks on the President`s entourage when ever he ventures out of the country (By the way, Jammeh hardly travel out of Gambia). The most recent of such event was in France.

Before that it was in the US, during the last UN General Assembly.

When he returned home, an angry Jammeh single-handedly declared Gambia`s forfeiture of its membership at the Commonwealth of nations. He accused the US and UK of supporting the dissidents to overthrow his regime.

Could those developments have also shaped his thinking to influence his decision on the media ban? 

Only time will tell.

But if you know a little about Gambia`s recent history, you will know that we do not have long to wait.

Taranaga FM and The Standard will be resuming operations under some of the worst draconian media laws in the world – enacted only last year.

And the Presidential statement did make this categorical reminder.

“They are free to operate but the two institutions are urged to operate within the framework of the laws governing the media in this country,” stressed the statement signed by the Secretary General of government and Presidential Affairs Minister, Momodou Sabally.

First published by Aloft News (print)