By Adama Makasuba
President Adama Barrow has commended democracy under his leadership for large participation of Gambians to contest Saturday’s National Assembly election which he described as unprecedented.
Speaking to reporters after casting his vote in Banjul City, he said the huge participation of candidates especially the independents showed that the nation’s democracy is growing under his leadership.
“One thing makes me happy, our democracy is moving forward because if you look at those who contested in this election it is unprecedented and it showed that people are now courageous to take part in the nation’s elections,” he said.
“This shows that our democracy is stronger than those of the bigger nations like the United States of America and England because 89.9 per cent turned out, it was registered in the past presidential election. There is no nation that got such percentage in the world,” he added.
“We are very hopeful that NPP will have their majority, looking at the [past] presidential election is a very clear indication that we will have the majority in the National Assembly. But I will seize this opportunity to thank all the parties, the independent candidates that have participated in this election. It’s unprecedented the numbers we have for this election.
“If you look at the independent candidates alone you have 85 candidates. It’s more than all the candidates that have contested in the previous National Assembly elections that’s a clear indication that our democracy is moving, that the field is level and I think that’s a very good going forward. It was a transition period and now the transition is over. We have built a strong foundation and we are moving forward,” he echoed.
The ruling National People’s Party has secured 19 seats in tightly contested National Assembly election that showed rival United Democratic Party secured 15 seats and Independents emerged third with 11 seats followed by breakaway APRC group with five, NRP four seats and PDOIS two seats.