|
 |
 |
|
|
NADD: PROACTIVE PRAGMATIC FOREIGN POLICY
|
|
|
 |
|
|
NADD: PROACTIVE PRAGMATIC FOREIGN POLICY
NADD: PROACTIVE PRAGMATIC FOREIGN POLICY
By Foday Samateh
For those still holding out in denial, I wish to inform you in open confidentiality that Yayha Jammeh and Lawyer Darboe have long since known beyond all doubts that there is no comparison between NADD and both APRC and UDP in any area of governance. More so, in the pivotal foreign policy.
Twelve years as a first-class frequent flyer around the world, Yayha Jammeh’s foreign policy (if it can be called one) has gone in as many directions as his countless flights. The only difference is, while his pilots have always successfully landed the planes at their intended destinations; his one-man foreign policy team is forever lost dillydallying in the middle of nowhere. His foreign policy (for want of a better term, the lack of it) is driven by his Town-boy diplomacy, which is as ill-advised as ill-informed. And as a result, The Gambia is playing a heavy price in the lost potential foreign investment, international recognition and respect, and democratic credibility. I hear the voices of his “loyalists” shouting me down to remind me that he recently hosted the African Union (AU) summit meeting. They are staring at me in incredulity and full of questions, wanting to know in what planet I have been residing lately. They can bet that I have always been on Planet Earth. And they can also bet that Yayha Jammeh indeed hosted the summit meeting. Their money will be good on both.
Now let us find out who is not on Planet Earth. While I have invested great hope in the stocks, bonds, and futures of the AU for the long term, my pro-Yahya-Jammeh critics cannot pretend to forget that hosting AU summit meeting by most African leaders at the present is hardly any extraordinary event. I would like to kindly remind them that the last host of AU summit meeting prior to Yayha Jammeh was Omar el-Bashir, a man supervising the Janjaweed genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan while AU meeting was taking place in the capital Khartoum. And I can go on and on. But for a few African leaders (Yahya Jammeh not included), hosting AU is in itself neither a credible entry in anyone’s diplomatic resume nor a credential for foreign policy accomplishment.
In the overall scheme of things, Yahya Jammeh is a total waste of time, opportunity and resources on the foreign policy front. Since his coming to power through the back door, The Gambia has suffered a linear regression of isolation from the international community, and a battered reputation to repair; all thanks to his squandering of opportunities time and again, radioactive personality, sheer incompetence, and bad governance. On the domestic ground, he may purport himself the proverbial second-coming of Jonathan Swift’s Man-Mountain in Gulliver’s Travels, but on the international scene, he is the true converse: a Lilliputian in influence. The Gambia needs a fast-track to reputable recognition both in the region and beyond. And to do that, Yahya Jammeh needs to be retired this September to the status of a private citizen whose democratic participation is limited to voting for others.
While “it is time for Jammeh to go,” the people must not buy into the simple argument that any change is better. The Gambia does not have a fresh start in UDP and its “unequal coalition” partner NRP, but rather a continuation of policies that breed failure. You do not have to believe me on this one; just listen to their own propagandists who confess out of frustration that their presidential candidate, Lawyer Darboe, is in fact a “quiet man.” How could anyone be both a lawyer and a politician, and end up being a quiet man? That is indeed stranger than strange! If they choose to be quiet, fine; but The Gambia cannot afford to be represented by a silent man in this age of proactive national interest in conferences of nations.
The most dramatic pointer to the inability of UDP/NRP to negotiate Gambia’s national interest in any bilateral, regional or multilateral engagements is their dismal performance in making a deal for their own political careers in the founding of NADD. Lawyer Darboe has spent all his professional life as a lawyer and Hamat Bah has spent most of his political life making laws in the National Assembly, and they could not read between the lines a simple memorandum of understanding they signed in a ceremonial media event? They almost convinced me in their apology that their signature to the unity opposition memorandum was a “mistake.” But when they later turned around in their face-saving measure to claim that they “know the laws of the Gambia,” my reaction was categorically dismissive: Give me a break. These shifting positions perfectly confirm the truth that in their political dictionary, contradiction is a policy of consistence. They must not be trusted to act responsibly on behalf of The Gambia’s foreign obligations and interests. So much is at stake for a country that desperately needs a fresh start on proactive pragmatic foreign policy.
There is no doubt in any circle of views that the NADD flag bearer, Halifa Sallah, is the ultimate negotiator. He embodies the right balance for successful foreign policy. This is not just this writer’s conclusion. It is also the conclusion of the conference of African intellectuals in Dakar, which delegated him with the former Malian president Alpha Omar Konare to address the UN in Geneva on its behalf. It is also the conclusion of the UNDP that had been courting him to work for them in Geneva. It is also the conclusion of the nascent Pan-African Parliament that delegated him (as a distinguished member) the rapporteur of a fact-finding mission in the troubled region of Darfur, Sudan. He is a familiar presence in the UK Labour Party conventions. He is an international standing with a precision for judgment: he comprehends the implications of commitments from the beginning, and anticipates outcomes long before they materialize. What more could The Gambia ask for?
NADD is the way forward. Vote NADD this September.
[This is the Fourth in a series of Ten Articles.] |
Posted on Friday, August 18, 2006 (Archive on Monday, August 21, 2006)
Posted by PNMBAI Contributed by PNMBAI
| | Return |
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
|