Gambia: Humbled Jammeh offers help to president-elect

BANJUL, Gambia

In a surprise move, outgoing President Yahya Jammeh has extended a helping hand to his successor on national television, as Turkey hailed Thursday’s election of Gambia’s new president.

In a statement early Saturday, Turkey’s Foreign Ministry praised the elections being carried out in a “peaceful” environment, and pledged to continue to boost relations with Gambia in every area.

And late Friday, with smiles and jokes, a style uncharacteristic of Gambia’s tough-talking military ruler, Jammeh telephoned Adama Barrow, the small nation’s president-elect, to express his readiness to offer any advice that might be needed.

Jammeh, Gambia’s ruler for 22 years, said he accepted the verdict of the Gambian people from Thursday’s elections and will vacate State House in January to return to his hometown where he plans to do farming.

“Congratulations Adama Barrow and your entire team… I am calling you to wish you all the best… You are assured of my guidance during the transition,” he said, also urging Barrow to reassure the nation that he would serve the entire country equally.

Jammeh argued that Gambia’s election was one of the “most transparent” in the world, adding he would never cheat because that would be against the will of both Allah and the Gambian people.

“I want all Gambians to reconcile. You have made your decision and Allah has decided that I am no longer going to be your president… I will hand over to the president-elect in January… If he wants to work with us, I have no problem with that,” Jammeh said in a nationwide address prior to the telephone call.

‘Power belongs to the people’

Jammeh’s concession came as a deeply compromising move by a man who had frequently branded his opponents “vermin” and “agents of the West,” threatening to “kill them like dogs” if they try to destabilize his country.

But Barrow told journalists late Friday that he was “not surprised that President Jammeh conceded defeat, because power belongs to the people.”

The leader of Gambia’s main opposition party, Ousainou Darboe, whom Barrow replaced as the leader of the United Democratic Party, is currently serving a three-year jail sentence after leading a peaceful protest in April demanding the release of a party member who later died in custody.

In April alone, two members of the UDP, the party Barrow served as leader before becoming the coalition flag bearer, lost two of its members in state custody in mysterious circumstances that Jammeh refused to investigate, despite calls by rights groups and the United Nations.

Though Jammeh is also accused of other human rights violations, including disappearances of journalists, human rights activists, and political opponents, Barrow remained silent on whether they would try him or not.

“We contested the election on principles and we don’t have personal issues to settle with anybody. When we get there, we will follow the process as sanctioned by the Constitution,” he told journalists.

In an exclusive interview with Anadolu Agency last week, Barrow pledged that Darboe and all Gambia’s political prisoners will be released once they take power, and that they will also return the country to the International Criminal Court and the British Commonwealth.

The real estate businessman, 51, was declared the winner of the presidential poll Friday afternoon, beating Jammeh by over 50,000 votes.

*Diyar Guldogan contributed to this report from Ankara.