By: Momodou Justice Darboe
Senegal has notified the Gambia government of its plan to cease the exportation of basalt to The Gambia, said trade ministry’s permanent secretary Lamin Dampha.
“Senegal has already notified us that from October, they would not be exporting basalt to any country because they have a huge infrastructural development project that they want to deal with. And they don’t think the quantity of basalt they have will be able to be shared with other countries, considering that demand,” added PS Dampha.
He said the government was working on an alternative.
“We are a sovereign state. We have ways and means of getting some of those commodities just as how we are getting from Senegal,” he explained in a Coffee Time interview.
This planned move by Senegal has been seen in some quarters as an intensification of “the trade war” between Banjul and Dakar but PS Dampha disagreed.
“It’s not correct. Senegal has their own internal policies and we have our own policies. What is happening now…The two countries are engaging. We are expecting the Senegal team to be here in December for us to finalize some of the areas that we could not finalize when we met in Sally[Mbour]. And we are hopeful that the discussions that are going on will encourage trade flows between the two countries,” he clarified.
Meanwhile, Senegal is currently the Gambia’s only source of basalt.
