Omar Bah
The EF Small Centre has seen a State House letter dated April 4, 2025, requesting the Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs to provide funds amounting to D3,625,957.80 being the per diem to be paid to security officers, the Secretary-General, and other officials to accompany the President’s mother to seek medical attention in Dakar, Senegal. We find this request quite troubling, highlighting several issues raised in our advice to the President on April 7 to prioritize and adhere to sound governance principles and provide accountable leadership for citizens’ welfare.
First, we express our total condemnation and rejection of this request as unlawful, which constitutes an abuse of power. This is precisely because the state has no legal obligation to the president’s mother. After all, she is the mother of the president. The state’s commitment to the president extends only to their immediate family, which is considered the First Family. The members of the First Family are the spouse and biological children under 18 years of the President. The State is not responsible for the rest of the extended family or relatives of the president beyond its responsibilities to the rest of the citizenry.
Secondly, this request did not state how many individuals are the beneficiaries and for how many days. Without such information, it asks how the Office of the President arrived at more than 3.6 million dalasi. Our national budget has no vote or line catering to the mother of the president. Hence, the question is raised as to which budget vote or line this allocation is taken from.
Fourthly, EFSCRJ is deeply shocked and concerned that the President’s mother would travel overseas for medical attention at the State’s expense when the President had claimed that medical facilities in the Gambia are the cheapest and the best in the world. We therefore ask why local health facilities were not utilized in the first place.
As an organization dedicated to transparency and accountability as the foundation of good governance and sustainable development, we are hugely concerned about this development because of what it represents. Just like the president’s mother, ordinary Gambians who can afford it have to resort to traveling to Senegal or beyond to seek medical attention simply because of our country’s poor health system.
This indicates that since Independence, the various governments have failed to make the necessary investments in our health system. Yet, top officials and their families would have the opportunity to seek healthcare abroad at the expense of the public. This is blatant injustice and discrimination that violates the fundamental rights of citizens to quality healthcare. The AU Abuja Declaration on Healthcare in Africa, to which The Gambia is a party, stipulated in 2001 that African states should invest at least 15% of their national budget to improve the health sector. The Gambia government allocates only 9% of the national budget to health, failing to fulfill its regional obligations to the people.
Therefore, we consider this request evidence of bad governance, corruption, and abuse of power that must be challenged. In this regard, we demand the following from the Office of the President:
- To return these funds if they were disbursed.
- To provide Gambians with the legal justifications for this medical trip.
- To provide full financial details for this medical trip.
- To desist with immediate effect from engaging in the use of public funds for unjustified and ineligible expenses.
- To judiciously preserve and protect public wealth for the benefit of all Gambians.
We also demand the National Assembly of The Gambia,
- They will perform their oversight function by summoning the Chief of Staff, Minister of the Presidency, and Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs to explain this request.
- Insist that at least 15% of the national budget is allocated to the health sector.
- To exercise maximum oversight on the Ministry of Health to curb corruption, inefficiency, and poor service delivery to protect the rights of Gambians to quality healthcare services.
