Faal to Join Barrow’s Coalition; Talks Reportedly Covered Land Allocation, Diplomatic Posts for Associates

By Fatou Touray

Essa Mbye Faal, one of President Adama Barrow’s most outspoken critics, will join forces with the president and his National People’s Party ahead of the December presidential election, according to a press release announcing the alliance.

The agreement represents a striking political turn for Mr. Faal, the leader of APP-Sobeyaa, who has spent much of the election cycle calling for Mr. Barrow’s removal and sharply criticizing his administration over corruption, governance, economic management, and accountability.

Sources close to the NPP and Mr. Faal’s camp told Kerr Fatou that several senior NPP party officials had been involved at different stages in efforts to persuade Mr. Faal to support the president. Those officials included Seedy Njie, the NPP’s deputy spokesman, and Dou Sanno, a presidential adviser, the sources said.

The rapprochement is particularly significant because Mr. Faal has repeatedly argued that the Barrow government should be voted out of office.

According to people familiar with the negotiations, the possibility of Mr. Faal becoming vice president was raised by Faal during the discussions. The proposal was considered a nonstarter, the sources said, prompting the parties to explore other terms that might be acceptable to Mr. Faal and negotiable for the NPP.

The discussions reportedly included Mr. Faal’s longstanding dispute with the government over land near the Tanji Bird Reserve, where he had planned to develop a tourism resort.

Sources familiar with the talks said Mr. Faal sought either the allocation of the property or reimbursement of the $125,000 deposit he said he paid toward the proposed development. He also reportedly sought overseas diplomatic appointments for some members of APP-Sobeyaa as part of the negotiations.

The claims concerning the negotiations have not been independently verified, and neither the NPP nor APP-Sobeyaa has publicly disclosed the terms of the alliance.

Mr. Njie and Mr. Sanno were said to have told Mr. Faal that his requests, including either the allocation of the land or a refund of his $125,000 deposit, as well as diplomatic appointments for some of his associates at Gambian missions abroad, were matters they believed could be addressed. However, as we file this report the land has not been allocated nor has the money been refunded.

Mr. Faal met President Barrow at State House on the night of Friday, Sept. 18, according to sources familiar with the discussions. Details of that meeting have not been made public, and it remains unclear what, if anything, was offered, negotiated or agreed upon during the talks.

The following day, at a ceremony in Gunjur marking the opening of a new road, Mr. Barrow publicly called on Mr. Faal by name to join him in what the president described as a nation-building effort.

The land dispute at the center of the reported negotiations has been controversial for years.

Mr. Faal has said the Gambia Tourism Board encouraged him to invest in the country’s tourism sector and that he subsequently applied for land to build a resort. According to his previous account, he received provisional approval and paid a nonrefundable development levy of $125,000, along with an application fee.

He said the project later stalled because government agencies disagreed over whether the allocated site fell within the protected Tanji Bird Reserve.

An investigation by Malagen reported that approximately 3.1 hectares had been allocated to Mr. Faal in an area whose legal status was disputed by the Gambia Tourism Board and the Department of Parks and Wildlife Management.

Mr. Faal has consistently rejected suggestions that he illegally acquired protected land. He has said he never received title to the property, never took possession of it and was neither allowed to develop the site nor reimbursed for the money he paid.

He has also suggested that his entry into opposition politics complicated the project. Mr. Faal said his application for a building permit stalled after he announced his candidacy for the 2021 presidential election.

The controversy has since become a political weapon.

NPP officials have invoked the Tanji matter when responding to Mr. Faal’s accusations of corruption against the Barrow administration, questioning why he had not pursued legal action to recover the money he said he paid.

Mr. Faal, in turn, has maintained that he followed the required procedures and has challenged the government to produce evidence contradicting his account.

Any attempt to allocate the disputed property to Mr. Faal as part of a political agreement could generate further legal and political challenges, particularly from communities claiming ownership of the land and from environmental authorities responsible for protecting the reserve.

The reported alliance amounts to a significant realignment only months before Gambians vote in the presidential election.

Mr. Faal, a former lead counsel of the Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission, built much of his political identity around accountability and criticism of the government’s record. In speeches and interviews, he has accused the Barrow administration of corruption, and maladministration.

He has also argued that government spending and reported economic growth have not translated into meaningful improvements in the lives of ordinary Gambians.

Joining forces with the president he has repeatedly urged voters to remove has therefore prompted questions from Mr. Faal’s supporters and critics about what changed and what commitments, if any, were made to secure his support.

For Mr. Barrow and the NPP, the alliance brings into the president’s coalition a prominent opposition figure who gained national recognition through his work at the truth commission and later challenged Mr. Barrow in the 2021 election.

For Mr. Faal, the agreement carries considerable political risk. He will now have to reconcile his support for the president with years of public criticism and an election message that repeatedly called for a change of government.