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kobo
United Kingdom
7765 Posts |
 Posted - 07 Dec 2011 : 23:52:31
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THE POINT NEWS;
JOLLOF ON-LINE NEWS;
"The leader of the PPP, Omar Jallow has said the opposition leaders have to apologise to Gambians for having failed them for the past decade partly resulting in their dastard performance in last week's presidential election.
Speaking in an exclusive with The Standard at his Pipeline residence, the first time he's talking to the press in three months, Mr Jallow said: “We, all the opposition party leaders, should have the courage and the decency to apologise to Gambians for our failures from 1996 to learn from our mistakes and come together and remove the APRC from power. We should have learnt from our mistakes in 1996, 2001 and 2006. After the establishment of NADD we were able to win four out of six by-elections. Therefore it was clear that if united, we would bring about the desired positive political change. But come 2011, we were as divided as before. We failed to fulfil the wishes and aspirations of the thousands of Gambians who looked up to us for guidance and leadership to salvage The Gambia from the clutches of a dictatorship. Therefore on my part, I am apologising to all Gambians here and abroad for our ability to lead.”
'Clearing the air'
Mr Jallow said while he was abroad from 11 September to 21 November, a lot of things were written about his position and involvement in the opposition alliance talks.
“Now I want to clear the air. I attended four of the opposition meetings summoned by the UDP.There were four proposals; a UDP-led coalition, an NRP-led coalition, a national convention propagated by PDOIS and a coalition led by Ousainou Darboe but not under the banner of any party proposed by Landing Jallow Sonko. After the second meeting, Ousainou made it clear he would not be able to contest under any other banner except the UDP and Landing Jallow withdrew his proposal. During these meetings, I tried to convince all the opposition leaders to support the UDP-led alliance proposal for the following reasons:
First, we were negligent in waiting for four years and nine months before consulting each other, so time was very much against us.
Second, the fact of the matter was that in 1996, 2001 and 2006, Darboe had more votes than any other opposition candidate.
Third, because of time and resource constraint, it would be more cost-effective and practical if we support the UDP after they made concrete recommendations acceptable to me. They said if we have a UDP-led alliance government, the leader will serve five years, retire and not support any candidate; that the government he or she will form will be inclusive of all parties in the alliance and that all decisions will be taken consultatively.
At the third meeting, Hamat Bah said he had consulted his membership and that while those in the Diaspora allowed him to partake in any coalition, those domiciled here demanded he must lead any alliance he takes part in. Halifa Sallah talked to his guns and started promoting his Agenda 2011. “
Disingenuity
Mr Jallow said he believed“it was unnecessary for Hamat to propose anything but join a UDP-led alliance because that was his position in 2006 and that was what he used to pull Darboe out of NADD and form a UDP-led alliance. In his own words, 'in politics, you talk about numbers'. Since nothing has changed in the equation I do not see why the shift in his position. And about Halifa's talk about conventions and primaries, my political experience informs me that that is applicable within a single party where more than one person is interested in leadership not in a coalition of parties.
“After the fourth meeting when I knew there will be no single candidate to represent all opposition parties, I decided to withdraw from the negotiations and allowed a member of my party to sit in the negotiations with the specific instruction that we'll only campaign for a single candidate and that our support for the UDP was premised on that. I told them otherwise we will not support or campaign for anyone because it will be waste of time, energy and resources. But that if they agree on a single candidate, I had an open ticket and would be back in The Gambia within 24 hours to campaign. They did not and I returned to The Gambia 72 hours before election day and cast my vote for the candidate I supported.”
Lost opportunity
The populist Serekunda politician and famous minister in the First Republic continued: “It was a lost opportunity for us. If we had banded together, we would not only have been in a good stead to wrest power from the APRC but the momentum we would have generated would have propelled us to get a minimum of twenty seats in the National Assembly elections and that would have stopped impunity in the country. Now I am appealing to the leaders of all the opposition parties to come back to the drawing board and form a truly united from for the parliamentary elections. The issues that unite us are greater than the issues that divide us. I am devastated. I am appealing to the opposition leaders to learn from the serious and dismal lessons [of the presidential elections]. If we fail to do that, then all the opposition leaders in The Gambia will be living on the wrong side of history.”
"See the rest of OJ's interview in our Monday edition." The Standard Newspaper
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Edited by - kobo on 08 Dec 2011 15:27:53 |
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