By Makutu Manneh
Ebrima Drammeh, a migrant advocate and founder of the Ebrima Migrant Situation Foundation, has challenged recent claims by the Gambia Immigration Department (GID) that the majority of people involved in irregular migration and human smuggling from The Gambia are foreigners.
At a recent press briefing, the GID’s Commissioner for Migration Management, Binta K. J. Barrow, said that most individuals embarking on irregular migration from The Gambia were non-Gambians. Drammeh, however, said the assertion was based largely on a single intercepted boat carrying 82 survivors, including 52 Gambians, 38 Senegalese, four Malians, and two Ivorians.
“Even in this single example, Gambians formed the largest group,” Drammeh said, adding that the focus on survivors distorts the broader reality of irregular migration. “Survivors are not the crisis. The missing and the dead are. Migration cannot be analysed by counting only those who lived.”
He argued that official statistics tend to rely on interceptions, survivors, and returns, while excluding vessels that disappear at sea. As a result, he said, the true scale of Gambian involvement in irregular migration is often understated.
Drawing on data collected through community reporting, departure monitoring, and route tracking, Drammeh described what he called a “devastating” reality.
According to figures compiled by his organisation, 893 Gambian migrants were confirmed dead in 2025, while 777 others were reported missing without a trace. He said 26 boats disappeared entirely during the year, including two that vanished from Jinack. Of 69 boats that departed directly from Gambian territory, he said, 24 reached Spain while 45 were intercepted.
“These are not foreign statistics,” Drammeh said. “They represent Gambian families, Gambian villages, and Gambian youth.”
He also rejected the notion that foreign smugglers could dominate the trade without local involvement, saying such operations depend on networks within the country.
“They do not simply arrive and start operations,” he said. “They require local agents, recruiters, safe houses, and transport.”
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