Dr Henry Carrol, acting Solicitor -General at the Attorney-Generals Chamber s, Department of State for Justice has stated that democracy ‘is a work in progress and it is a process that requires constant adjustment and refinement’.

Dr Carrol made these remarks, on behalf of the Gambian leader, President Yahya Jammeh during a consultative meeting of the National Human Rights Institutions in West Africa, which is currently underway at the Sun Beach Hotel and Resort, Cape Point Bakau.

In his opening address, Dr Carrol said that democracy ‘is a work in progress; it is a process that requires constant adjustment and refinement’. “We as Africans have to tailor our democratic experiment to meet the needs and yearnings of our people.
Our democracy should be able to deliver concrete social needs for our people in terms of basic human requirements of food, clothing and shelter. Also, there is need to create the space for human self-actualisation through the protection of the inalienable rights of the people and should also be conscious of the need to build political and social consensus in our respective countries so that dialogue and negotiation become tools for political bargaining rather than violence”, he noted.

Dr Carrol further outlined that “if we got our politics right in terms of building stable and democratic societies, we would succeed in laying the foundation for economic prosperity in the sub-region, which will eventually make the work of Ecowas in promoting economic cooperation and development much easier.”

Sanji M Masenono Monageng, a member of the African commission on Human and Peoples Right, and a judge of the High Court of The Gambia spoke on the theme; “Building a right-based society in West Africa: opportunities, challenges and constraints”.

She then highlighted the significance of the forum, underlining that the objectives are inter alia, and stimulate debate on constructive strategies for tackling the region’s economic and political problems.

Touching on the opportunities in building a right-based society in West Africa, S M Monageng, said Ecowas is an institution that has been set up through the political will of West African Heads of State, noting that “it gives legal basis for action, and it is also an asset to tap on building a right-based society in West Africa”. .

Commenting on the challenges, S M Monageng said the first challenges start from the existence of conflicts in the region which, she said, has witnessed an increased in the number of armed conflicts and sporadic violence over the past decades, adding that many of these conflicts are at times sparked by a failure to protect human rights. “There is no development without peace and no right-based society can be built in a war-torn region. The issue of Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) is one of the biggest challenges to be tackled. Therefore, Ecowas has addressed the issue by transforming the moratorium into a convention which is signed in June this year,” she concluded.