“Gambia’s president Yahya Jammeh has said he will soon discontinue the use of English as his country’s official language, describing it as “colonial legacy”. The plan appears to be to make a local language the country’s official one, but reports have also emerged suggesting Arabic will replace English. Speaking at the swearing-in ceremony of the country’s newly appointed Chief Justice, Jammeh — known for his anti-western rhetoric and policies — said for the next “one billion years”, the British have “no moral platform to talk about human rights anywhere in the world”. Gambia gained its independence from the UK 49 year ago, and the president stated that the only British remnant is the English language……………..”
“A former Gambian Chief Justice who was sacked by President Yahya Jammeh for allegedly taking orders from an embassy of a ‘hostile’ country has gone into hiding. Mrs Mable Ayemang, fled her government allocated abode in Fajara hours after her services with the Government of President Yahya were terminated on 4th February 2014. The Ghanaian born judge who was appointed to the top job in July 2013 has not been seen in public and is unable to hand over matters of the judiciary to her successor…………..”
This is a throwback to the 1960s. When some African absolute leader screwed up real good, he would blast the former colonial masters. Some of the ‘blasting’ was well-deserved, as in the case of Lumumba and the Congo, and many others. Europeans, especially outside the British Empire, did little to get their captive peoples ready for independence. Some of it was just scapegoating the old European imperial goats. Often it was a combination of both. But that is an old argument of another era.
I remember Gambia mainly as the ancestral home of Kunta Kinte and Alex Haley. Yahya ought to apply to the Arab League of Dunces, they would welcome him. Better yet, he should be told that the Saudi king has been looking for new members of the Gulf GCC, new blood, fresh meat, so to speak. The old king teased humorless Jordan and faraway Morocco for three years before finally breaking it off, old teaser that he is.
He, the king, toyed with Egypt, sans the Muslim Brotherhood, but that is on a slow burner, given the unpredictability of Egypt’s current mood. After all it is hard to tell of Egypt is in a post-revolutionary phase or if it is in yet another pre-revolutionary phase. Maybe the Mubarak-ista plan to exhaust the people into submission to the return of the old oligarchy will fail after all. Remember the failed Russian Revolution of 1905 preceded the successful Russian Revolution(s) of 1917: the king may not know about that but he knows that Egypt in unsettled. Besides, he must have an inkling of how the Egyptian people really feel about his Kingdom without Magic.
Therefore, Mr. Yahyayaya ought to dispatch his foreign minister (if he is not on the run and hiding) to Qatar seeking to fill that void in the GCC membership. The Saudi princes will get pissed at him for going to Qatar, but they will get a country they can push around from a safe distance (Bahrain is too close to Qatif for comfort).
Cheers
mhg
