The scheduled meeting of the Senegalo-Gambian joint- Ministerial Commission yesterday kicked-off at the Kairaba Beach Hotel.

The two-day meeting started with the two countries’ Technical Committee experts breakaway session.

There were Sector Committee meeting on Trade, Transport and Customs, Environment, Forestry, Agriculture and Fisheries, as well as Security, Secretariat matters and Tourism.
These sector breakaway sessions continued for the whole day, in the first day of the commission meeting.

Declaring the meeting opened, Hon. Crispin Grey-Johnson, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs welcomed the Senegalese delegates, assuring them that “Banjul is as much a home for Gambians as it is for Senegalese”.

According to him, the session is expected to kick-start the work of the commission and expressed hope that substantive issues that are to be placed before the Ministers would be thoroughly examined.

“I am aware that since the two sides last met in 2004, at the meeting of the Consultative Committee, not much has been done by way of follow-up on the many important courses of action that were agreed upon. Furthermore, it would appear that with the passage of time, the tendency has been for us to move further and further away from the numerous agreements and treaties that we signed. The effects have been quite unwholesome, to say the least,” he noted.

The Gambia’s Foreign Affairs Secretary of State then urged the delegates to undertake a thorough review of the contentious issues that need to be addressed and proposed for the consideration of the Ministers- a set of practical measures to have them addressed systematically and realistically.

He added that much work have to be done in the areas of Trade, Transport, Transit and Customs and there are also several security matters that need much polishing.
These, he said, “include important trans-boundary questions, which the two nations must, perforce and work on collectively; questions pertaining to environmental management, forestry and wetlands management, fisheries management”.

“We must examine all the pending issues in these areas, with a view of transforming them from the disenabling factors in the relationship-which they currently are- to enabling and mutually empowering elements in the relationship which in fact, they should be made to be,” he revealed.

He then challenged delegates to ensure that they come with the types of recommendations whose implementation would bring the two peoples closer, not push them apart, bearing in mind that they are at the meeting, thanks to the resolve of the two Heads of State to move the relations between the two countries and peoples from strength to strength. “In fact, the realities of geography, culture, language and history demand that we do no differently,” he highlighted.

SoS Johnson then urged officials of the two nations to address all the issues placed before them with frankness, courage and sincerity and with the only aim of having them serve the greater good of our brothers and sisters-The people of The Gambia and Senegal.
He then saluted the two Heads of State, who made the meeting possible and for their commitment to the spirit of good neighbourliness that must govern relations between Senegal and The Gambia.

During today’s deliberations, the meeting is expected to start with a preliminary session and the opening of the Joint Ministerial Commission meeting, by Dr Aja Isatou-Njie Saidy, Vice-President and Secretary of State for Women’s Affairs.
The Joint Ministerial Committee, is also expected to hear the report of the Sector Committee meetings held yesterday, to be followed by discussions.

At the end of the day, Ministers are also expected to sign a joint communique to be followed by a news conference.
Modou S Njie, Permanent Secretary, Personal  Management Office (PMO), chaired the opening ceremony, attended by Service Chiefs, Permanent Secretaries and National Assembly members.