Meet the civilians who instigated and helped carry out the constitutional coup d'etat in The Gambia

Balla Jahumpa, Minister

The Gambia made history last week by being one of the first, if not the first country in the African continent or anywhere else in the world for that matter to dislodge an entrenched dictatorship from power through the ballot box.

The smallest country on the African continent made history again a week later by reversing the results of an election that was certified by an Independent Electoral Commission and conceded to by the sitting dictator president and universally hailed by America, the European Union, the African Union, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and numerous countries alike.

Pierre Minteh with US Ambassador

An equally astonishing peculiarity of the events of the Gambian presidential elections was not only the unexpected manner in which President-elect, Adama Barrow, swept the polls but the ensuing reactions of Yaya Jammeh and his civilian civil servants, led by Balla Jahumpa, Minister of Works who wtote the speech that Jammeh delivered reversing his decision to accept the verdict of the Gambian people, Pierre Minteh the Welfare Officer at the Gambia Embassy in Washington DC and Rtd. Col. Samsudeen Sarr who is now Deputy Mission Head at the United Nations Mission of the Gambia.  

These civilians shown here in this blog post took part in the planning and execution of the coup in collaboration with Jammeh and his military.  They did it for selfish reasons to protect the privileges they otherwise would not have earned in an open labor market.  They are all cronies and hangers-on of a murderous regime that has been able to sustain itself only through assassinations, extra-judicial executions, torture, disappearances and the use of rape an instrument of suppression.  

Seedy Njie

These two US-based civil servants joined militants of the ruling party in taking part in the political campaign to re-elect their boss in contravention of all rules governing the conduct of this class of public servants.

Samsudeen Sarr,  posing in front of UN

The constitutional coup d'etat was announced today by the Gambian dictator that the results of the elections which President-elect Barrow was instigated and implimented what later became known as Plan B by civilians that included ministers, mayors and parliamentarians some of whom are presented here.

Seedy Njie and Babou Gaye Sonko are parliamentarians of the ruling party- the former a nominated member representing the youth wing of the party and a chief propagandist and the latter an elected member who is a youth mobilizer and a leading propagandist of the party.

Alieu Jammeh, Sports minister

Alieu Jammeh is Jammeh's minster of Youth and Sports who is from a family of traditional chiefs who became a major promoter of a political party through sports.  As minister responsible, he made sure that all of the major sporting associations in the Gambia, ranging from the Gambia Football Federation to the National Olympics Committee are stuffed with party militants.  The knowledge and interest in sports takes a back seat to party loyalty which has contributed to the backwardness of Gambian sports.

Yankuba Colley is the mayor of Kanifing Municipal Council, the biggest local government authority in the country with one of the largest concentration of voters.  He was the former youth mobilizer for the party and one of the fiercest defenders of not only the dictatorship but the style of governance that puts higher premium on torture as a means of controlling and subduing an otherwise unwilling population.

Yankuba Badgie, NIA

Yankuba Badjie is Director General of the notorious National Intelligence Agency (NIA), a fugitive from the law in the U.S. State of Ohio is responsible for the maiming and killing by torture of opponents of the regime.  It was under his watch that Solo Sandeng, the United Democratic Party youth leader died in custody via torture.

In addition to these civilians, there are, of course, the assassination squad known as the "Jungulas" who confronted Yaya Jammeh when he conceded defeat and force him to have a change of heart. These class of killers felt betrayed and about to be thrown at the mercy of a new civilian government after carrying our Jammeh's orders to kill opponents of the regime.  Jammeh assured them that his decision will be revert.  Conceding defeat was a ploy to get the international community off his back and assured them "not to worry."

The international community's reaction to the decision to annul the results of the elections was swift and unequivocal.  Senegal has asked the Security Council to convene, the U.S State Department has condemned Jammeh's action and so are most of the civilized world.  

KMC Mayor, Colley

Travel bans and other sanctions will follow immediately before military action is taken to install the legitimate government of Adama Barrow as President of the Republic of the Gambia.  The mishandling of the election of the president-elect by those close to him must be re-examined to ensure that lapses of the kind witnessed in the past week are not repeated.  And that includes the unsavory characters and shady businessmen who have contributed, in large measure, to the current predicament of the country and must be arrested together with Yaya Jammeh and all those responsible for the constitutional coup d'etat that has unnecessarily put Gambian lives at risk.

The fact that Mohamed Bazzi, an alleged arms trafficker who is currently a subject of United States Treasury investigations and a financier of Hezbollah was able to gain access to President-elect a few days ago has raised concern among drug and small arms control agencies in the United States and Europe.  A bank, Prime Bank, he owned in The Gambia was liquidated after a US Treasury investigation discovered that it was used to finance Hezbollah, an organization classified as a terrorist organization by the government of the United States.