The vice-president and secretary of state for Women’s Affairs, Dr Aja Isatou Njie-Saidy, on Wednesday, officially opened the new Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) Secretariat at the OAU Boulevard, Banjul, on behalf of President Alhaji Dr Yahya Jammeh.

The ADR system, adopted in The Gambia in 2003 with the promulgation of an ADR Law, is an important mechanism for dealing with matters of dispute outside the usual conventional modern-type justice delivery and judicial system.

The new secretariat is expected to provide critical backstopping to ADR initiatives, as well as provide strategic guidance towards deepening the impact of such initiatives.

Commissioning the secretariat, Vice President Njie-Saidy described the office as another landmark development in The Gambia, as it deepens the process of institutionalizing the ADR system in the country.

She added that the establishment of an ADR Secretariat is not only timely, but also represents a clear and glaring testimony of government’s resolve to maximise justice delivery in The Gambia, by promoting access to justice for every Gambian and non-Gambian residents alike.

She further observed that the ADR is not a new phenomenon, particularly in The Gambia, where conflicts and disputes involving families, communities, and even organisations are often subject to close-door mediation and settlement by third parties.  

“In Africa, alternative means to conflict resolution have been part and parcel of our traditional justice delivery system for generations. So too in Asia, particularly China and Japan that are known to have made tremendous strides and achievements in providing alternative means of solving disputes in varied cultural and traditional contexts. These include commercial disputes, and disputes over property inheritance by families and communities. Consequently, the ADR is firmly rooted in cultures and traditions,” the vice-president elaborated.

According to her, the ADR endears itself distinctively as a system that can be administered to deliver justice and judgement without parties going through costly and lengthy litigation proceedings, often associated with the conventional system of justice delivery.

“The system also endears itself by being inherently flexible in its approach and dealings, an attribute that not only makes it a unique, fast, easy-to-administer, and cost-effective system, but also, an important tool for promoting understanding and tolerance between and among parties in disputes. The system is founded on the principles of mediation, conciliation, reconciliation and arbitration,” she highlighted.

She further observed that the ADR mechanism also provides an important complement to the more formal justice delivery system, which is plagued by numerous cases whose handling take longer than normal and at great cost to litigants. As a result, the vice-president hoped that the system will contribute meaningfully to reducing caseloads and turnaround time for judgement in the conventional courts.

She then revealed that no country can achieve and maintain peace and stability without a sound, fair, and responsive judicial and justice system. “In the absence of such a system, not only would the environment become violent and unsafe, and lives and properties at serious risks, but also it serves as a total disincentive for foreign investment that is so vitally important for sustainable economic growth and development,” she added.

Vice President Njie-Saidy then urged all and sundry to collaborate and give maximal support to facilitate the work of the secretariat. She disclosed that the government would do everything possible to support the office, including meeting its training and manpower development in the areas of arbitration, reconciliation and mediation. Notwithstanding, the vice-president added that government would also build the capacity of the formal judicial system, since both systems are crucial.

She observed that the ADR should not be mistaken as a stand-alone substitute system, but simply an added option made available to help people and institutions to choose between two delivery systems to seek justice.

She thanked DFID and the World Bank for providing strategic support and urged the referral of matters such as commercial, land, family, industrial and employment related cases to the ADR Secretariat, for settlement as required under the ADR Act.

For her part, Mrs Marie Saine-Firdaus, the attorney general and secretary of state for Justice, described the event as a significant milestone in transforming The Gambia, since there can be no development without settling disputes.

She noted that the establishment of the ADR Secretariat has ever been her priority since her assumption of office. She lauded the tremendous support gained from President Jammeh and the secretary of state for Finance and Economic Affairs to meet the goals.

SoS Saine-Firdaus stated that the ADR is mandated to handle all types of cases of civil nature and encouraged the conventional courts to forward cases, such as those involving land disputes, to the secretariat to facilitate the resolution of the matters.

She also urged the staff of the secretariat to enhance quick dispensation of justice by making best use of the ADR, assuring them that the Office of the Attorney General will provide the maximum support in the discharge of such a constitutional requirement.

Abdou Karim Savage, the chief justice, thanked President Jammeh for yet another milestone in the development of the country. He also thanked the Office of the Attorney General for accomplishing such a positive initiative, noting that the ADR will greatly help to ensure win-win situations in cases to ensure a peaceful society, rather than the litigation system, which takes people apart.

Chief Justice Savage then expressed his office’s support and called for the proper sensitisation of the public about the ADR.

Other speakers at the ceremony included Dr Ebrima Lowe, the chief executive secretary of the ADR, who gave an overview of the establishment of the ADR, Alhagie Sawaneh of the CBEMP, Department of State for Finance and Economic Affairs and Mrs Penda Gibril, who gave the vote of thanks.

In attendance were the speaker of the National Assembly, Hon Fatoumatta Jahumpa-Ceesay, secretaries of state, and members of
the Judiciary, among other personalities.

Three new ambassadors accredited to The Gambia and based in Dakar, Senegal, yesterday, presented their letters of credentials to President Alhaji Dr Yahya Jammeh at State House, Banjul, to formally start their diplomatic assignments in the country.

The three envoys namely Dr Sukarni Siker of Indonesia, Jean-Francois Paroz of Switzerland and Auguste Richard Paracin of the Island Republic of Madagascar, have resolved to further strengthen the existing bilateral relations between their respective countries and The Gambia.

The first to present his credentials to the Gambian leader was Dr Sukarni Siker of  Indonesia. He told waiting journalists shortly after the ceremony that he will work to consolidate agricultural cooperation and provide scholarship for Gambian students to study in Indonesian institutions of higher learning.

For his part, Jean-Francois Paroz of Switzerland said his discussion with President Jammeh centred mainly on migration and measures needed to curb the illegal aspect of it.

According to him, his government will create more training opportunities for Gambians study at learning institutions in Swiss, as a ways of tackling illegal migration. He was quick to add that the phenomenon is a global problem, but both countries need more time to study the issue and come up with coherent mechanisms to curb the phenomenon.
 
He then disclosed that his government has procured new uniforms for the Gambia Immigration Department, which will soon arrive in the country.

The Malagasy envoy, Auguste Richard Paracin, said his discussion with Dr Jammeh centred on cooperation in the areas of tourism, environment and culture, amongst others.  

He disclosed that he also conveyed a special invitation from President Marc Ravalomanana to Dr Jammeh to attend the next year’s AU Summit, which will be hosted by his country.

Dr Aja Isatou Njie-Saidy, the vice-president and secretary of state for Women’s Affairs, who represented President Jammeh as SoS for Agriculture, during a question-and-answer session of the National Assembly, has disclosed that the Department of State for Agriculture has put in place strategic measures to combat the phenomenon of global food crisis and soaring prices. The vice-president said this challenge has taken centre stage in government’s current development efforts.

The vice-president made these remarks while responding to a question posed to her by Momodou LK Sanneh, the minority leader and NAM for Kiang West, on whether the Department of State for Agriculture has any immediate plans to invest in agriculture to enable farmers to work all year round in order to increase the production of cereals crops, in the face of the current global food crisis.

According to Vice-President Njie-Saidy, the state department has put in place heavy investment for agricultural machinery, which includes irrigation facilities and the tractor-loan scheme with KGI International, the provision of agricultural inputs, the empowerment of farmers through intensive training on issues related to increased food production and management of cropping strategies to minimise the impact of food crisis on the farming communities.

With the introduction of irrigation machinery and other facilities, the vice-president continued, all-year-round production can be achieved.

There is this entrenched mind-set among some section of society that what ever belongs to everybody belongs to nobody. This, expressed in both the thinking and the approach of our people to public property, is one of the most deplorable of attitudes for a development oriented society, and it had since become a state of affairs that generations of our people have had to deal with. The attitude is, without an aorta of doubt, the culprit responsible for the snail-pace development the entire continent has been enduring since independence.

Low level of maintenance culture, which has seen essential social, political and economic structures dissipated into the doldrums, is an awful manifestation of this retrogressive attitude that continues to eat right into the fabric of our society. The overall result is that we hardly are able to register meaningful gains when it comes to missions that require our collective effort, yet the existing structures rapidly shrink with little or no prospect of revival.

This is why it should not, and it certainly would not the least surprise us (just as we would not expect anyone to be surprised either), that efforts are under way to stem this attitude. This is in the president’s latest announcement, as part of his ongoing tour of dialogue with the people that this time round the newly imported record 500 tractors would not be given free of charge.

Out of sympathy for the poor people, government had merely decided to make these services accessible to all regardless of our status. But, unfortunately, a few of the very people that government had asked to assist took advantage of the expressed softness from the latter to misuse the much needed facilities made available to them. And now people with genuine need for these materials do not have access to it. It is therefore a perfect idea that government attached some form of a fee to their usage henceforth. .
 
It is a common phenomenon that wherever one puts their money, they are likely to exhibit some level of interest in ensuring the protection and preservation of it. Besides, any such minimal fee will be used to ensure continued maintenance of the equipment, which will guarantee a prolonged existence of the machines.

In the same vain, the decision of selling fertilizer to farmers is sure to ensure that the fertilizers do not get into the wrong hand. Naturally, free distribution of valuable commodities like these tends to attract high competition for accessibility. And there is always bound to be people that would opt for it only for covert undesirable purposes.

While some would hustle for it only to engage in profiteering, others would go for it with the intention of using it. But because they normally would not buy it, they get caught up by thoughtlessness. While they would have failed to make good use of it, they might deny others, who, in fact, would use it for a genuine purpose.

Therefore, it is indeed a good idea that government have come up with this fantastic shift in policy. This will not only ensure some level of fair distribution, but it will also prevent wastage by crooked ploy.

All these talk about souring food prices and a cut in rice production; are they natural phenomenon or man-induced? This question is relevant in that we shall soon be on course to the end of the dead heat if we establish the explanations to them. In the meantime though, what is obvious is that times are hard. But it is important to note that the hardship we all are going through is tied to a global trend.

The unfolding drama in global price hikes of food goes to confirm that what happens in one corner of the globe has the potential to cause a ripple in the extreme opposite end. Of course, we need not mention that it was national policies of the major rice exporting countries of Vietnam, Indonesia, China, among others, which are causing stir in the rest of the world. The eminent outcries that followed the decision of these countries are being made laughing matters in some quarters as no time is being wasted in exploitation of the devious prospects abound.

Fingers have already been pointed at the so-called nuclear-energy cultivation, as food stuff traditionally cultivated for human consumption are being diverted to the production of biofuel and energy. By this unacceptable practice, human survival has been relegated in the name of energy production. What an absurd idea!

In any case, it might interest one to note that the countries that are into this morally fraudulent business do not consume these food stuffs as their staple. So, their citizenry would hardly feel the pinch. Having said this, we must not forget to draw attention to the fact that the people that stand to benefit most from this development are those in the business of rice and other food stuffs; a class of people who do not necessarily belong to the developed world alone.

We have seen what some of them are capable of doing here in The Gambia; no mercy for the poor. And, as you would expect, they are the same people behind the worsening situation in Senegal, Egypt, Haiti, and the other affected areas in the world. These people seem to take delight at the sights of rioting citizens in action, in desperation of the increasingly high cost of living.

But come to think about it, were we not warned that we were better of being food self-sufficient than being dependent on others for our food supply? All what we are seeing around the world are just the echoes of the wise.

Nonetheless, in order to tranquilise the current food related unrest, it is the responsibility of a national government to stem this selfish inclination by the largely inconsiderate business community. But it is also our collective responsibility to ensure that this does not re-occur. This we can do by reverting to the inevitable. ‘TO GO BACK TO THE LAND’!  

This has been the repeated call of President Jammeh.

Police Commissioner, Jammeh Conta, has revealed that fatal road accidents were going crescendo during these past years, despite the authorities’ efforts to reverse the trend. He indicated that there were 3,372 cases recorded from 2003 to 2007 in the Police statistical figures, and that this also included part of 2008.

Commissioner Conta made these remarks while addressing youths and students in the recent celebration  of the Global road safety week, which lasted from the 23rd- 29th  April, 2008.

The team of this year’s celeberation was centred on the issue of traffic accidents and its effects on young road users.

He further went on to note that statistical report also unsealed an alarming reality during the same period: 280-fatal accidents; 737-serious accidents , resulting in major injuries; 1,196 minor injury accidents and 1,159 non injury accidents.‘To every reasonable person, these figures are very high despite efforts deployed through road safety campaigns by both government and the police,’’ deplored Commissioner Conta.

According to him, more dissuasive measures needed to be taken in order to curb the phenomenon. He therefore suggested the necessity to enact a bill prohibiting the use of cellular phones by drivers in traffic. ‘‘The use of mobile phones is incompatible with driving and has been one of the major causes of road accidents in the country.  It is therefore hoped that the introduction of this law will greatly reduce the number of accidents on our roads”,  he stated.

He finally called on all road users and other stakeholders to contribute immensely to the reduction of accidents on  Gambian roads.

Editor,

Please allow me space in your widely read newspaper to express my deep concerns about the menacing and dangerous attitude of some drivers on our roads.

As road accidents are becoming the order of the day, there is moral responsibility not only to deplore, but also to call for urgent to be taken against this trend.

Therefore, I would like to call on police authorities to take drastic measures against such a  phenomenon so that both passengers and pedestrians can arrive home safe and sound.  

Sainey NK Darboe

Nusrat Senior Secondary School.

The last few weeks after the landmark state opening of the legislative year 2008 have witnessed a chain of interesting development in the national assembly of this country. A number of key interesting bills have been passed through, but, as it turns out for some of these laws, not without thorough scrutiny from the probing members of the house, at least, as some of us have seen on GRTS.

This is by no means the first time such important laws have been brought before the legislatures. But because of their contentious nature, some of these laws have some air of controversy around them, with the potential to attract heated debate, just as we have seen in the house. The scrutiny is so much so for the members’ foresightedness than for mere debating purpose.

Take, for instance, the anti-terrorism bill. A topical issue these days, the world is so engrossed in the war on terror that everybody, including the belligerents, seems to have lost focus. It has become almost impossible to tell the terrorists from those defending themselves against the former.

Yet it is fundamentally crucial that we determine the difference between these two people if we are to dig through this phenomenon. Which means also identifying state sponsored terrorism from genuine war against terror. Since 9/11 we have seen deteriorating levels of human-rights, all in the name of "war against terror." And the thing the world gains from these human right abuses is a worsening of the situation, as attitude of certain states and individual organizations only make more terrorists instead of discouraging its proliferation.

There is no doubting that the scourge of terrorism knows no boundary. When terrorists strike some times the impact of their action goes beyond their primary targets, as we have seen in Kenya and Tanzania, where innocent Africans lost their lives and livelihood for a cause they know nothing about. You can never tell who the next victim would be. In that case it is the prerogative of everybody to join hands and fight the global threat head-on.

Editor

Please, let me use your respectable medium to express my concern about this deplorable phenomenon that threatens the progress of our society, ‘time-wasting’. It manifests itself in a number of ways, but the most common one is the accustomed attitude of late commencement of programs. This is especially so in the Gambia, as it is where I know about most.

On many occasions, when call is made for gathering, the organizers themselves turn up late; and, usually, the excuse is obvious: Gambian time. This leaves me morally devastated. I have always asked this question; with no clue of an answer: is there any such thing as Gambian time?

If only we know what it cost us to being so neglectful about this very important problem of ours, many of us would rethink our stance on it. When you delay time, you interrupt countless other isues that are related to your program. So, I am calling on Africans, in general, and Africans in particular, to desist from this attitude.

Lamin Kujabi

Fajikunda