The Minister of Defense Honorable Omar Sheikh Faye has made it cleared that the ECOMIG Troops that are currently serving in The Gambia are here for the interest of the Gambian populace and nothing more than that.
He therefore encouraged Gambians to cherish them and exercise patience as they came at a time that we needed them most to help us resolve our political crisis.
Honorable Faye made this remarks shortly after paying a courtesy call on the ECOMIG Troops at Fajara on Tuesday 29 Sept 2020. The purpose of the courtesy called was to foster good relation between the ECOMIG forces serving in The Gambia and the Ministry of Defense.
According to the Defense Minister the Gambian leader President Adama Barrow and Commander-In-Chief of the Army Forces was aware of his visit to the ECOMIG Troop in Fajara. He said the purpose of his visit was to express total appreciation on behalf of the Gambian leader, cabinets and the population of The Gambia to the ECOMIG Troop for the excellent job doing which all gearing toward helping the country in the maintenance of peace and tranquility.
The Honorable Minister said at the time the country need the ECOMIG , they came and it is therefore important to visit them sometimes and thank them for good performance as they have been protecting very sensitive areas just to ensure that Gambia people enjoy peace and stability.
Minister Faye as well used the opportunity to acknowledge Honorable Halifa Sallah for the excellent role that he played at that difficult time talking to the whole world about the situation in The Gambia. “He’s worthy of commendable for that Patriotism.” we should not forget that time,” he said.
He added that “it was during that difficult time that the President and ECOWAS Presidents decided that it is important to get security in The Gambia to keep the peace before it fall into a constitutional crisis of even a civil war.”
Giving detail of how ECOMIG came in to being in the country, he said the AU Presidents discussed and they went to the United Nation and resolution 2337 was given and that what brought ECOMIG in the Gambia to help their brothers and sisters in The Gambia..
According to him the ECOMIG are here for three stages, thus Intervention, Stabilization and withdrawal stage.
He said the ECOMIG had moved from the intervention stage to the stabilization stage , protect the government , protecting the leadership , protecting the population to make sure that the Army forces , the security forces work with civil authority to understand each other again because there was a break , change in government.