By Mariama Njie
Vice President Dr Isatou Touray doubled down on her labourer work comments on Wednesday disclosed that ‘all of us who have travelled abroad have done some toilet cleaning’.
Dr Touray brought herself all manner of criticism in April when she said that Gambian youth complained of unemployment when they could work as labourers.
Her comment developed as a result of lack of manpower to upload and offload the foodstuffs meant for distribution across the country as parts of government response to ease burden on citizens after the declaration of the State of Public Emergency meant to curb the spread of coronavirus pandemic in the country.
Defending her statement at press briefing held at open pavilion of the McCarthy Square on Wednesday, VP Dr Touray said Gambian youths should have received her call with pride.
She expressed that “When we started, there was a time when I said we have been waiting last three days and we could not get young people from The Gambia who would take this responsibility.
“And I had delayed it because I wanted them to benefit because there was a lot of money paying in offloading and uploading. There were other people coming from other regions, sub-region and I thought Gambians need more, I thought the Gambians also need to be exposed.”
“ It was being deflected, deflected to mean that my children are out there enjoying something and I want these people to do this type of job. But I am very happy to say that the young people who understand where I am coming from expressed their appreciation for the observation I have made to encourage them to come and engage in national building,” she lamented.
“Whether you are a graduate or not if anything comes that requires national responsibility, I think we should all come, I personally was coming here on a daily basis to support the team because it’s a national call.
We must be patriotic and nationalistic irrespectively”
Vice explained that she has travelled to other countries and saw PhD holders carrying buckets, going to do national responsibility, and she called on the youth because she felt they deserve to be engaged in national development and contribute in nation building.
She went on that hey should take leadership and I am very happy that they responded. “I want to use this opportunity to say thank you for all the efforts that they did. We are friends, we are your parents, we are your government and we have to be honest to you and be transparent to you to call you to accountability if things are not going right and that is exactly what I did. To call your attention and I am happy that you have responded,” she said.
She disclosed that youths have now formed themselves into a group that are going to be responsible in managing certain things when there are national calls. This she said they will earn money out of it as “Rome was not built a day. All of us who have travelled abroad have done some toilet cleaning, we have done dish washing, we have done anything and we paid school fees of our children out of that.”
She therefore urged the youths to always answer to the call whenever they are needed to participate in national development “it should be a pride because it’s history this has never happened.”
VP Touray added that “If it means getting the money to go for training or you want to pay for training, get it. People were receiving more than 5000, 3000, 6000, 9000. Some business people were paying 90,000 for offloading and uploading. So those who worked gained it and I want Gambian youths to benefit too.”
