DIDA HALAKE: INTERNATIONAL INTELLECTUAL PROSTITUTE

BY THE WATCHMAN

There have been many sellouts in politics especially in Africa and within The Gambia itself. Able and once respectable men, eager for the chance at self promotion, have jumped at the chance of being driven around by chauffeurs in vehicles provided by the state. To these enthusiastic social climbers, this is the epitome of "achievement". They get to hang out with the powers that be, snag invitations to state dinners and are constantly seen smiling widely during state sponsored photo ops such as hospital openings and wasteful beauty pageants. The various miscreants in this scheme include economists, scientists, philosophers, and most dangerously, the media. While these characters, in their smug self-regard, flaunt their new credentials and other commendations given to them by governments with tarnished reputations, the intelligent public overwhelmingly begs to differ. In fact, they view such action as out and out prostitution. Dida Halake is one such prostitute and until he got tired and bored of using him, Yahya Jammeh was his favorite client.

One can hardly understand why Yahya Jammeh and the APRC would have been attracted to the shifty shaman that is Dida Halake in the first place but on second thoughts it's easy to understand. Unlike the homegrown hookers such as secretaries of states and judges that the Jammeh cabal has become expert at exploiting, Dida Halake was “exotic”. Here was a hideously bearded, fast talking, shameless Ethiopian (or whatever he called himself) willing to be used as an intellectual harlot anytime, anyplace and anyhow. In the APRC, prostitute Halake saw a chance at getting an even higher paying customer after years of allowing himself to be used by less prestigious and "ungrateful" persons in the nooks and crannies of restaurants, night clubs and press houses. To his demanding abusers, Halake claimed he would "rock their world" by making sure their nefarious deeds would proceed smoothly through his application of propagandistic lubrication. Clearly, this Dida guy is kinky.

 The Jammeh cabal is brutal but not too stupid. Using Dida Halake, a foreign mutt, was one way of showing the other local sluts that their services could be gotten somewhere else. This allowed them to demand and get various favors and performances from the Gambian prostitutes that they normally would refuse to do such as daily oral reaffirmation of government goals, bending over backwards to implement government tools in the suppression of excitable reactions from unwanted quarters and outlining the missionary positions that government opponents should take when confronted by the NIA and other arms of the despicable security apparatus. Dida Halake was so willing and able to carry out these tantalizing acts for the APRC pleasure seekers they once came to blows over who was next in line while waiting their turn outside his house of ill repute.

One can understand and empathize with Dida Halake if he lashes out at the likes of The Watchman. Old age is very cruel to the art of prostitution and one can see that Dida's body of work is sagging, dilapidated and suffering from menopausal and other geriatric tell tale signs. During their decline, old hookers take a longer time in finding clients who won't make fun of their slow movements or excessive makeup to hide who they truly are. They lose their head of hair and have to contend with wigs or other artificial beauty aids. The whole sordid affair can be very expensive so when they find a good catch, they do their best to hold on to him and pray they don’t get rejected for mental and physical limitations. So the fact that he tried to hold on to Yahya Jammeh and The Gambia is a sign of the old prostitute Halake's desperation. At this age and about to lose some of his teeth, what sane client of the flesh would dare look at him?

In his retort to my initially kind dissection of his duplicity in The Gambia's wretched political condition, slut Halake described me as a "mere Gambian Watchman." I like that title. I'd rather be a "mere Gambian Watchman" than a rootless, stateless, self-hating, international intellectual prostitute.

Gambiaswatchman@gmail.com