Sanyang Urges Gambians to Trust Bensouda With Presidency, Cites Transformative Leadership at KMC

By Makutu Manneh

Yaya Menteng Sanyang, deputy party leader for finance and administration of the UNITE Party, has urged Gambians to entrust Talib Ahmed Bensouda with the presidency, arguing that his record as mayor of the Kanifing Municipal Council (KMC) demonstrates the leadership, competence and vision needed to govern the country.

Speaking during an interview on QTV, Mr. Sanyang praised Mr. Bensouda’s stewardship of the municipality, describing him as a trailblazer in local government administration whose initiatives have redefined the role of municipal councils in national development.

He argued that Mr. Bensouda had set a standard for local government leadership that other mayors and council chairpersons had yet to surpass.

According to Mr. Sanyang, local government institutions were previously regarded largely as political outposts or extensions of the central government, with limited ambition or capacity to independently undertake major development projects.

He said that perception began to change under Mr. Bensouda’s leadership, pointing to the council’s acquisition of 28 compact waste collection trucks as an unprecedented investment in municipal sanitation.

“Under Bensouda’s leadership, the council became the first local government administration to build a municipal library and to embark on road construction,” he said.

Mr. Sanyang also highlighted what he described as significant improvements at the Bakoteh Dumpsite, which he said had previously posed serious environmental and public health challenges for surrounding communities.

He claimed that conditions at the site had once become so severe that nearby residents were forced to relocate. However, he said rehabilitation efforts under Mr. Bensouda’s administration had transformed the area, with trees now covering portions of the dumpsite to the extent that it was barely visible.

Turning to the mayor’s international recognition, Mr. Sanyang cited KMC’s success in the Bloomberg Mayors Challenge, saying the municipality had competed against more than 500 cities, including some with populations larger than The Gambia’s.

He described the achievement as evidence of Mr. Bensouda’s administrative competence and ability to compete on the international stage.

The UNITE deputy leader maintained that the mayor’s accomplishments had fundamentally changed public expectations of local government, demonstrating that municipal councils could become engines of development rather than merely administrative extensions of the central government.

Mr. Sanyang further credited Mr. Bensouda with proposing a municipal housing scheme and public bus service, initiatives he said were intended to address housing and transportation challenges within the municipality.

He alleged, however, that both projects had encountered resistance from the central government, which he accused of deliberately frustrating the mayor’s development agenda for political reasons.

According to Mr. Sanyang, the government viewed Mr. Bensouda’s growing record of municipal achievements as a potential political threat to President Adama Barrow and feared that further successes would strengthen the mayor’s national standing.

He argued that such political considerations had undermined initiatives that could have benefited residents of the municipality.

Mr. Sanyang maintained that Mr. Bensouda’s record at KMC offered Gambians a practical measure of his leadership abilities, insisting that his experience in municipal governance provided a compelling case for his presidential ambitions.