Opinion

The relay still signs. Part Two found it in the state's own record: the seyfo and the alkalo administer the land the state claims ownership of, and no transfer of it moves without their mark. The office that endorsed the Kombo Coastal Belt leases in 1970 endorses transfers today. It never stopped. Part One asked by what right the state claims the land. This essay asks the narrower question, the one that falls on the men whose mark moves the land. By what authority was their

By Dave Manneh, Securing Futures: Land Rights Action Collaborative (SFLRAC) August 10, 2026 On 22 and 23 July, at the DPPH hall on Marina Parade in Banjul, the Ministry of Lands convened a workshop on the legal review of The Gambia's land tenure and land administration laws. The consultant leading the review set out its purpose from the front of the room. The task, the slides said, is to 'harmonise and modernise' the statutes that govern land in The Gambia. Fragmentation acro

Here is the uncomfortable truth about coalitions: they are rarely built on friendship. They are built on arithmetic. UDP is not my political home. I do not support the party, and I am unlikely to support it in the future. That is precisely why I think this deserves to be said without partisan emotion. If UDP has walked away from the coalition talks because it refuses to surrender leadership, I think the party may have made the right calculation. Consider what we often miss wh

Legal Notice 2 of 1994, made under section 5(1) of the State Lands Act, carries two operative sentences and a schedule of boundaries. The second designates Kombo North, Kombo South and Kombo Central as State lands with effect from the first day of March 1994. It recites no purchase, no conquest, no inheritance and no consent. One page in the Gazette, and three districts changed landlords on paper. Part One set down the premise and its proof: the state asserted title to the la

Supporters of Mr. Edi M.O. Faal keep producing academic and professional credentials. We hear about degrees, bars admitted, 44 years of practice, ICSID filings, and international consulting. Those credentials are not the issue. Since this nomination surfaced, not one supporter has brought forward his judicial philosophy. Not one has cited his books. Not one has produced his articles in major legal and judiciary journals. A résumé is not jurisprudence. The Supreme Court does n

For the sake of GALA’s cause not the man — Omar Saibo Camara must resign ASAP

In The Gambia, outrage is dead. Accountability is buried. Who benefits while workers starve? President Adama Barrow can run for reelection one million times if he wants. The constitution today places no hard limit on his ambition. But the Gambian political environment teaches a different lesson. In Kerewan, a worker’s monthly wage dies by day ten. In Fajara, what many describe as the “mother of all residential estates” rises from the ground, built by a man who once lived in a

This essay is a scholarly research I conducted. It is merit-based and reflects my personal philosophical argument on the standards required for the Office of Chief Justice in a post-autocratic Gambia. My hope is that legal scholars in this country do not feel bamboozled or intimidated by criticism. This is the moment to set the record right. Constitutional recovery demands open debate, evidence, and principle. This is my contribution to that debate. Gambia’s incoming Chief Ju