By Buba Gagigo
Momodou Sabally, Campaign Manager of the United Democratic Party and former Secretary General and Head of Civil Service, has criticized the establishment of an office of a Chief of Staff and the establishment of the State Own Enterprises Commission by the Government.
“I’m totally against the establishment of this commission (SOE). And I think Barrow’s advisors are fooling him into doing things that would be detrimental to the entire country, not just the economy. The Gambia Public Service has a structure that has been functioning by our standards. I think President Barrow, when he won the election, he wanted to tinker with the system to make it a little bit more efficient.
“I believe he had good intentions. But when he split the position of Secretary General, to create Secretary General and Chief of Staff, I said this is not going to work as former Secretary General and Head of Civil Service. You cannot have two captains on a ship. What has it created for the government? The government is dysfunctional,” he said.
The former Secretary General and Head of Civil Service also describe the Chief of Staff as a dishonest person who is misleading the president.
“You have a chief of staff that is dishonest and misleading the president, and you have a better qualified, more intelligent, more decent, more responsible, Secretary General, you sidelined him. I understand right now some of these public officials, civil servants will have to create two files, one for the Chief of Staff, one for the Secretary-General,” he said.
According to Mr. Sabally, the creation of the Ministry of the Civil Service is completely redundant. He argues that the functions of such a ministry are already performed by other government agencies and that its creation would only add another layer of bureaucracy and cost taxpayers more money.
“You have a secretary General and Head of Civil Service. So what happened, and I’m sure if President Barrow had independent advisors who would have assessed what happened since he created these new structures, I think this system has become more corrupt and more inefficient. It’s bad,” he said.
On the creation of the State Own Enterprises Commission, Sabally expressed his belief that there are mafia cabals in the country that operate independently of the government but have control over it in order to loot state resources.
“You’ve had that experience. Now. You have government ministries, and each of these parastatals reports to a line ministry that advises the President. Each of them has a board, my friend is like you to fetch firewood, the firewood is heavy you cannot carry it, but you still put another firewood on the one that you are not able to carry. I think it is completely disingenuous. And I believe there are some mafia cabals in this country, working outside the government, who have control of this government.
“So they want to bring in their people to supervise some of these parastatals and sell them to their friends and colleagues in the private sector in the Gambia and abroad so that they can loot the entire country’s commanding heights. Our most strategic assets. If this government cannot build this country. They should not destroy what they met here, I’m totally against this State-owned Enterprises Commission. I think it’s bad,” he concluded.
Momodou Sabally, Campaign Manager of the United Democratic Party (UDP) made these remarks while speaking to Kerr Fatou last Thursday after his release from police detention.