WHY THE TEAM GAMBIA GRAND COALITION AGENDA SHOULD BE SUPPORTED AND WHY OTHER OPPOSITION COALITIONS SHOULD COME TO TERMS WITH TEAM GAMABIA

By Sheriff Janha

The 2026 Presidential Election should not be reduced to a contest over who should become President.

The PRIMARY question should be:

WHAT ARE WE GOING TO CHANGE AND WHAT KIND OF GAMBIA ARE WE GOING TO BUILD?

This is where the TEAM GAMBIA GRAND COALITION is incredibly different in its approach.

TEAM GAMBIA is not being built around the question of who should lead. It is being built around an AGENDA to address the root causes of the problems confronting The Gambia.

There are three fundamental problems that this agenda seeks to address.

1. EXTREME POVERTY

We cannot continue changing governments while leaving the underlying economic conditions that keep our people poor largely untouched.

Therefore, the objective must be more than economic promises and annual development plans.

We need a clearly defined five-year national programme to eradicate extreme poverty and transform the productive capacity of the Gambian people.

2. THE POWER OF THE PEOPLE HAS BEEN ABUSED AND MISUSED

Power belongs to the Gambian people. And all authorities must drive their powers from the people and muse exercise it to serve the general wellbeing and welfare of the people.

Government exists because the people give leaders the authority to govern on their behalf.

However, when political power becomes concentrated in the hands of individuals and citizens become spectators between elections, the principle of popular sovereignty is weakened.

The Gambian people must become masters of their own destiny, rather than subjects of political personalities.

3. WE NEED TO BUILD A NEW REPUBLIC

If we simply remove one individual and replace him with another while maintaining the same political architecture, institutions, incentives and concentration of power, we have changed the occupant of the system without necessarily changing the system itself.

That cannot be the objective. The objective must be to build a NEW REPUBLIC. A republic in which institutions are stronger than individuals. A republic in which no President is treated as a king. A republic in which political leadership is understood as SERVANTHOOD, NOT KINGSHIP.

A republic in which the Constitution, Parliament, judiciary, electoral institutions and other public institutions function to protect the sovereignty and interests of the people.

A republic designed to prevent the concentration of political power from becoming a mechanism for self-perpetuating rule.

A republic where leadership is temporary stewardship of public power not personal ownership of the state.

I CHALLENGE THE OTHER OPPOSITION COALITIONS.

If another opposition coalition has a different solution to these problems, then let us put the agendas before the Gambian people.

Let the people examine them.

Let us debate them.

Let us compare the proposed institutional reforms, economic programmes, poverty-eradication strategies and mechanisms for returning power to citizens.

Nevertheless, let us stop reducing the national struggle to “Who should be President?”

Because if the only thing we change is the person sitting at the top, while the structures that produce poverty, weak institutions, political dependency and concentration of power remain intact, then we have not fundamentally transformed The Gambia.

TEAM GAMBIA is therefore saying:

THE AGENDA MUST COME FIRST.

First, agree on the problems we must solve.

Then agree on the blueprint for solving them.

Then agree on the institutions and safeguards necessary to protect the transformation.

And finally, choose leadership that is prepared to serve that agenda and remain accountable to the Gambian people.

The leader must therefore be a servant of the agenda, not the owner of it.

This is why I believe the conversation among opposition forces should not primarily be about WHO GETS THE FLAG?

It should be WHAT ARE WE COMING TOGETHER TO BUILD?

If we genuinely want to end the cycle of poverty and self-perpetuating political rule, then the opposition should be prepared to come to terms with an agenda TEAM GAMBIA PUTS ON THE TABLE.

Because the ultimate objective should not be to capture the state.

It should be to transform the state so that it serves the Gambian people

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