By: Kebba Foon
My fellow Gambians, today our nation stands at a crossroads. We wake each day to the cries of our people and the echoes of unfulfilled dreams. Our young people—bright, ambitious sons and daughters of The Gambia—are casting themselves into the Atlantic Ocean on the “backway” journey, desperate for a better future. Too many of them have perished in those waters, lives of promise lost forever beneath the waves.
Our mothers and sisters, the backbone of our communities, remain economically marginalized, toiling endlessly yet reaping little reward.
Even those who make it to foreign shores often end up bent over in distant fields, exploited as seasonal labor under the European sun—picking fruits for meager wages, their hopes of a new life turned into another tale of hardship. This is not the Gambia we dreamed of.
We must face a hard truth: after years of suffering and sacrifice, our homeland is still stuck in a web of failed leadership and broken systems. The current regime under President Adama Barrow has let our people down. We were promised prosperity, but instead we struggle with an economy in shambles and youth unemployment at crisis levels. We were promised better healthcare, yet our hospitals run out of basic medicines and families beg for help to save loved ones. We were promised opportunity, yet the cost of living soars while wages stagnate. Corruption creeps into every corner of public life, and crime rises as despair takes hold. Gambians everywhere—at home and abroad—feel the pain of these betrayals. We cannot continue on this path. Enough is enough.
How did we come to this? Not long ago, we showed the world the power of unity. In December 2016, we Gambians achieved what many thought impossible: we stood together as one people, across party lines, and peacefully ended 22 years of dictatorship under Yahya Jammeh. The night we learned that our votes had finally prevailed over fear, a new hope was born in this country. We proved to ourselves and to the world that no oppressor, no matter how mighty, could withstand the will of a united Gambian nation. That victory was not just one man’s achievement or one party’s achievement—it was the people’s victory, forged by a coalition of ordinary citizens and leaders brave enough to put the nation first.
Yet, my dear brothers and sisters, that hard-won change has not yielded the lasting progress we yearned for. We removed a dictator, but the system that allowed tyranny and misrule to thrive remains largely intact. Old habits of divisiveness and greed returned as soon as the celebrations ended. The promise of a new Gambia has dimmed, and many of our gains have slipped through our fingers. We cannot allow the struggles and sacrifices of 2016 to be in vain. We cannot lose hope now. If we did it before, we can do it again—and this time, we must do it with a clearer vision and dogged commitment to real change that endures beyond one election.
The truth is stark: no single opposition party or leader can defeat President Adama Barrow alone. Anyone who believes their individual party, on its own, can unseat the entrenched incumbent who is ignoring our recent history and the reality on the ground. The numbers do not lie, and neither does the pain in our communities.
Only a united front—a grand coalition of all Gambians who love this country—can bring the change we so urgently need. It is time to revive the spirit of 2016, not to relive the past but to rescue our future. We need a Gambia Grand Opposition Coalition that includes every opposition party, every independent voice, civil society, the diaspora, youth, women—everyone with a stake in a better Gambia. In unity, our strength is unstoppable. Divided, we will only hand victory to the status quo and prolong the suffering of our people.
To the leaders of all opposition parties: I implore you to remember why you entered politics—the love of country and the drive to serve your people. Now is the moment to put Gambia first and set aside personal ambitions and old grudges. Whether you lead a big party or a small one, whether you are a seasoned politician or a new voice, know this: we need each other. Sit together, talk to each other, trust each other, and be ready to compromise for the greater good.
The challenges we face—youth dying in the ocean, families in poverty, corruption unchecked—are bigger than any one of us. Do not let ego or the quest for power blind you to the cries of the Gambian people. Our nation’s fate depends on your ability to find common ground. A grand coalition is not an option we can take or leave; it is the only realistic path to save our country from further decline. If you fail to unite, you fail all of us, and history will not forgive that failure.
To every ordinary Gambian listening to this message or reading these words: you too have a role in this fight. Our leaders are nothing without the people behind them. Raise your voice and demand unity. Tell your preferred parties and candidates that you expect them to work with others for the national interest. Do not allow anyone to divide us with petty politics or tribal rhetoric. We are one Gambia—one people, one nation, one destiny. Remember that the power ultimately lies with you, the citizens.
In 2016, you proved it by insisting that the opposition unite and by voting together to reclaim our country’s freedom. We must do so again. Talk to your neighbors, your family, your friends—remind them that our children’s future is at stake in the coming election. We cannot afford another five years of stagnation, broken promises, and watching our youth flee or drown searching for hope. We have to create that hope here, together, on our own soil.
My fellow Gambians, time is not on our side. The 2026 presidential election is fast approaching—it will decide the course of our nation for a generation. We have a solemn duty to ensure that this time, change does not slip through our fingers. Let us learn from our past triumphs and mistakes. Let us build a coalition that not only wins at the ballot box, but also ushers in a new era of good governance, accountability, and opportunity for every Gambian.
This coalition must be grounded in a shared vision: a vision of a Gambia where no young man or woman feels compelled to brave the sea for a livelihood, where our daughters and sons can find dignified work here at home, where women have an equal chance to thrive, where public service is about serving the public, not enriching a few. We want a Gambia where the rule of law is respected, where our hospitals and schools are adequately funded, where the dignity of every citizen is upheld. This is not a dream beyond our reach—this can be our reality if we stand united.
We have bent before under the weight of hardship, but we have never broken. Gambians are strong, resilient, and loving people. In our darkest moments, we have always found light in each other. Now, we must shine that light together to drive out the darkness that hovers over our beloved nation. United, we will prevail. Together, we will build a Gambia that offers hope and opportunity to all her children, at home and abroad. Divided, we will watch our nation continue to drift, and our heartaches will only multiply. I refuse to accept that fate, and I believe you do too. Let this be our rallying cry: unity now for a better Gambia.
Brothers and sisters, let us join hands—Muslim and Christian, young and old, urban and rural, diaspora and home-based, from Kartong to Koina. Let us speak with one voice so that when we say “Enough!”, it reverberates from the River Gambia to the Atlantic coast, and all the way to the State House in Banjul. We removed a dictator once by standing together. We can remove a failed leadership now by doing the same, only this time we will ensure that the victory truly belongs to the people and the benefits of change reach every corner of The Gambia. The hour to act is now. In this fight for our nation’s soul, there is no opposition versus ruling party—there is only all of us Gambians versus the poverty, injustice, and hopelessness that threaten our future. And together, we will win.
May God bless The Gambia and guide us on the path to unity and renewal. The destiny of our nation is in our hands. We owe it to the memories of those we have lost—those youths who lie in watery graves, those mothers who passed never seeing better days—to make sure their sacrifices are not in vain. We owe it to our children to rise above our differences and deliver to them a country they can be proud of. United we can do this. United we will do this.
