OP

    By Pa Louis Sambou     I think one would be hard pressed to find anyone who in 2017 foresaw any cataclysmic defeat of the primary pillar of the Coalition agenda: the draft Constitution. Well, even if one existed, any such projection would most certainly have invited valid accusations of madness on the part of the maker. I’m sure there’s no short supply of voodoo artists who would today with a straight face claim to have had a ‘prophetic’ foresight of such an event through their crystal ball and in ways no rational being would comprehend. I speak of the marabouts of course but perhaps we should park their superstitious subject for another day.    Now, how has the most popular and lauded public policy of pedestal public appreciation become the casualty of the very people who championed  it , the team captain (President Barrow) included? I am sure the supine lobby and their extremist allies will blame everyone and everything else but themselves and their unsophisticated approach. Howe

 

By Pa Louis Sambou Just when one thinks that all bad news is exhausted, more and more nasty surprises keep emerging from the horizon. One would have expected the media and press fraternity likewise Gambian civil society to promptly zone in on this one but, approval of the draft Constitution by the latter (and passive endorsement cum apathy with respect to it by the former) suggests that they perhaps have not taken notice of what is an extremely concerning provision in the draft Constitution. I speak of section 36 of course which is a completely unprecedented constitutional concept in our jurisdiction. Section 36, effectively states that the State can restrict and limit the exercise of any fundamental human right (except for 3 out of the 31 specific rights under part two of the draft) as long as the State passes a law for such purposes. Without any doubt, such a broad-brush provision, or anything similar to or akin to it does not exists in either the abrogated 1970 Constitution or the c