The assets of Gambia’s former dictator, go for a song!
April 30, 2025, Mustapha K. Darboe
Mustapha K. Darboe
In his 22–year rule, the Gambian dictator was many things: a miracle healer who cures AIDS with an herbal concoction and a pious Muslim crowned leader of the people of faith (nasirudeen). Farming was at the top of what he wanted to be known for. This drove his ambition to have a tractor-assembling plant in the country.
In 2005, he secured a $6.7m loan agreement from the Exim Bank of India to import and assemble 500 tractors. Many imported tractors were distributed to farmers primarily affiliated with his Alliance for Patriotic Reorientation and Construction (APRC) party. The inquiry into his financial wrongdoing recovered over 200 tractors; 197 were sold.
Seven years later, people are asked about the number of tractors sold, their conditions, the names of buyers, and the amounts paid for each. From June to October 2018, the Janneh Commission auctioned 197 tractors in total, according to their scanty yet unpublished report, which neither has the names of the buyers nor any details or pictures regarding the state of the tractors.
Before he fell out with the Commission, former secretary Alhaji Mamadi Kurang sold 43 tractors through an open bid and generated D10,523,000 (equivalent to $212 547 in February 2019). Barely three months after Kurang was sacked, the Commission auctioned 154 tractors—over three times the number Kurang sold—generating D13,083,000 ($ 263,948 in February 2019)—only 2.5% more revenue than Kurang.
Amadou Sanneh, a former finance minister at the time, was on the list of people questioning how the tractors were sold. “… We were not aware (of the sale of tractors). We only knew about it after they were sold,” said former minister Amadou Sanneh, who spoke to The Republic in January 2024. Sanneh noted that the Commission, by selling itself, was acting as a judge and jury.
“Whatever they have saved, they should transfer to the arm of the government that is responsible… In financial transactions, we (referring to his profession as an auditor) try to avoid giving too much power to one entity.”
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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).”
