Hon. Abba Sanyang, National Assembly member for Foni Kansala, has strongly criticized the department of Community Development for what he described as their poor performance in relation to the lives of the rural poor.

Hon. Sanyang who was speaking recently during the motion on the adjournment debate at the National Assembly, said that owing to poor capacity and poor budgetary allocations, the department of Community Development is performing poorly.

According to the Foni Kansala parliamentarian, it is pathetic to note that Community Development being one of the departments making an impact in the lives of the rural people can never be left out in meeting the development objectives of the country.

“It is community development staff that constitute the multi disciplinary facilitation scheme; they train communities, and build their capacities. Today if they are dead, it means all those components of our development aspirations are going to be dead,” he said, adding that consideration and support needs to be given to them in order for them to perform well in their various communities.

Turning to water supply, cost of food for Gambians, Hon. Sanyang lamented that the increase in salaries should not reflect an increase in the prices of commodities as prices are supposed to increase only if the need arises:

“Looking at people in the rural communities, 90% of them are not doing anything except farming. So if you increase the salaries of those employed, then you are helping the rural poor in no small way,” he added.

“On communication, Hon. Sanyang noted that research could have helped the department of state for Communication, Information and Technology to cover the whole country before the arrival of Africell and Comium in this country.

According to him, most areas in the country today are not accessing Gamcel and they are instead moving on to the other two service providers.

“We are not saying that foreign entrepreneurs cannot be welcomed in The Gambia, but let them find our investment capacity at its best,” he asserted.

He added that no matter how liberal one is, without a regulatory system, one is heading for failure. “Market liberalization and globalization is all a delusion, and not a reality,” he said, stressing the need for a regulatory system to be put in place.