The assets of Gambia’s former dictator, go for a song!
April 30, 2025, Mustapha K. Darboe
Mustapha K. Darboe
‘Needless transaction’ that only enriched the receiver!
In the sale of Jammeh’s assets by at least 4 different state entities, none appears to have been done transparently, nor were significant details about the sales published. The Gambia Public Procurement Authority was not involved. The latest sale by Alpha Kapital was done through a closed bid. A closed bid allows buyers to make their offers for a price without knowing what others are offering.
At least 18 assets, the most expensive of which is D15m, were published on a website. There is no evidence of any other publication on the site.
Alhagie Mamadi Kurang — a chartered accountant — was a Secretary to the Commission who left after a disagreement with its leadership. “These assets should have been sold through open bidding. That would have fetched the state more money,” said Kurang.
However, the criticisms against the sales were merely more than the use of closed bids, which reportedly made the State lose money.
A good chunk of the assets and shares — including over a D100m spent on Futurelec by the Central Bank of the Gambia – were trading between the government or its agencies and itself. Social Security and Gambia National Petroleum Corporation have spent nearly D300m procuring 17.2% of Muhammed Bazzi’s 31% shares from Gam Petroleum. Bazzi was a close associate of ex-president Jammeh, whose assets were forfeited to the state after the Janneh Commission found him culpable for the dictator’s corrupt practices. All his assets, including company shares, were forfeited to the state.
Social Security procured 14.3% of the shares, while Gambia National Petroleum Corporation procured 2.9% from Gam Petroleum. The Gambia Ports Authority, where Alpha Barry of Alpha Kapital served as a board chair until December 2019, also purchased a D1m property at Hagan in Banjul.
When contacted, the managing director of the GPA, Ousman Jobarteh, said the procured property was to be utilised in their Port expansion project.
“Only the agent (Alpha Kapital) gains from these sales. We have granted a transactional fee to someone for transferring ownership of state assets from one state institution to another,” argued Kurang. Tambadou sees it differently. “The act of simply transferring forfeited assets belonging to the state to these SOEs at zero cost would have been unlawful and would have meant the loss of income for the government,” he argued.
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Thank you for being a part of the OPEN GAMBIA PLATFORM community. Mustapha K. Darboe contributed to the article published in the theRepublic.gm Investigation Journal on April 30, 2025! Views expressed by contributors are strictly personal and not of TheOpenGambiaPlatform!
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“This story was supported by Code for Africa and funded by Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ).”
