President Adama Barrow on Tuesday inaugurated Government fully funded the first phase of the Brikama market project at an estimated cost of thirty-eight and a half million Dalasi (GMD 38.5 million).
He said the recent inauguration of projects is the outcome of his government’s vision to provide an agreeable environment where Gambians can access basic services that would enable them to lead decent and dignified lives.
The new market will accommodate more than a thousand, two hundred (1200) stores and various zones and facilities for assorted commodities and activities. All these are meant to boost its commercial visibility and viability.
“We are convinced that such transformative initiatives are always positively impactful on social life. We are certain also that, as expressed in the new National Development Plan (2022-2027), the nation can develop faster only if the environment is enabling enough for the private sector to flourish. The tell-tale sign of our conviction to the people’s development is the chain of visible physical features and developmental breakthroughs we continue to register around the country.
This is what inclusive development is about. It implies participation, progress, and advancement for all; that is, for those in the public and private sectors, as well as for individuals and communities in urban and rural settings,” President Barrow told the peoples of the West Coast Region.
He vowed his government will continue to traverse the country with responsive development interventions that ease the suffering of the people and improve their living conditions, without undue costs.
He stated that his government’s committed to improving businesses and business centres to revitalise and transform the economy, revealing that his government will build markets in Farafenni, Soma, Basse, and Latri-kunda.
He also said these centres facilitate trade and commerce and, thereby, enhance income creation for businesses within business-friendly environments, noting that the Brikama Market facility has come to fulfill a long-standing desire of the residents in the West Coast Region, it accords with a key flagship component of the Draft National Development Plan.
The expected output of the market master plan is a modern multipurpose one-stop business facility of international class that would be the first of its kind in The Gambia and the sub-region.
“Brikama is one of the large settlements in The Gambia, and it is in the biggest administrative region. With over seven hundred and thirty thousand (730,000) residents in the area, the market is designed to serve a population size of over eighty-three thousand (83,000). Because it is a huge project, it is designed in phases.
Phase one consists of eighty-eight (88) stores and the other facilities and health and safety measures described in the project profile,” President Barrow explained.
