HomeOld_PostsBritain sold Gambia on the market

Britain sold Gambia on the market

Published on

THE crass intolerance of humanity by colonialists can be best described by the treatment given to the tiny nation of Gambia during the days of colonialism.
Among all the chaos created by colonialists, it was the exchanging of exclusive trade rights, technically selling of an asset on the market; Gambia, between British and Portuguese colonialists that rank among the most of dastardly of acts committed by settlers.
Not satisfied, the colonialists not only established Gambia as a point for shipping out slaves, but also traded and took slaves from that country as well, an issue that is still of concern to current President Yahya Jammeh.
Religion and inter-tribal wars as was the trend then across Africa were used as a focal point to colonise The Gambia and neighbouring Senegal, and to trap and buy slaves most of whom were prisoners of war.
Today, like many other African nations, The Gambia, is still smarting from the effects of colonialism and shares historical roots with West Africa in the slave trade.
Slave trade was the key factor in the placing and keeping of a colony on the Gambia River, first by the Portuguese, during which era it was A Gâmbia, and later by the British. 
In 1588, the claimant to the Portuguese throne, Antonio, Prior of Crato, sold, exclusive trade rights on the Gambia River to English merchants.
Letters patent from Queen Elizabeth confirmed the grant.
In 1618, King James I of England granted a charter to an English company for trade with the Gambia and the Gold Coast (now Ghana).
During the late 17th century and throughout the 18th century, the British Empire and the French struggled continually for political and commercial supremacy in the regions of the Senegal River and the Gambia River.
The British Empire occupied the Gambia when an expedition led by August Keppel landed there—following the capture of Senegal in 1758.
The 1783 First Treaty of Versaiiles gave Great Britain possession of the Gambia River, but the French retained a tiny enclave at Albreda on the river’s north bank.
This was finally ceded to the United Kingdom in 1856.
It is widely believed that as many as three million slaves may have been taken from this general region during the three centuries that the transatlantic slave trade operated.
It is not known how many slaves were taken by inter-tribal wars or Muslim traders before the transatlantic slave trade began.
Most of those taken were sold to Europeans; others were prisoners of inter-tribal wars; some were victims sold because of unpaid debts; and others were simply victims of kidnapping.
Senegal surrounds the Gambia on three sides, with 80 kilometres of coastline on the Atlantic Ocean marking its western extremity.
The present boundaries were defined in 1889 after an agreement between the United Kingdom and France.
During the negotiations between the French and the British in Paris, the French initially gave the British approximately 320 kilometres of the Gambia River to control.
Starting with the placement of boundary markers in 1891, it took nearly fifteen years after the Paris meetings to determine the final borders of the Gambia.
The resulting series of straight lines and arcs gave the British control of areas that are approximately 16 kilometres north and south of the Gambia River.
It is the smallest country on mainland Africa with a population of just 1, 8 million people.
There are too many similarities between The Gambia and Zimbabwe when it comes to matters of sovereignty.
Just like Zimbabwe, The Gambia has found itself being constantly attacked by Britain and her allies.
On May 15, 2008, Jammeh announced that his government would introduce legislation that would set laws against homosexuals that would be “stricter than those in Iran”, and that he would “cut off the head” of any gay or lesbian person discovered in the country
In February this year, on the eve of Gambia’s 50th Golden Jubilee President Jammeh held an interview with the Daily Observer, The Gambia’s leading newspaper where he chronicled how colonialism and slave trade had dented that country’s prospects for development.
“Pre-independence, there was very little to talk about in terms of achievements; in fact throughout the period that we were colonised, it was a period of underdevelopment; we lost our land, Gambia was a big country, it was sold to create other countries around the region,” said President Jammeh.
“Our country was deprived of the cream of the population, due to over a century of slave trade, where the best and the youngest people were taken out and sold as commodities across the world and in that case; one, loss of earnings in the sense that agricultural production would have deteriorated where a family of maybe five strong not only boys but they also took the healthiest boys and girls.
“Imagine a family of five; maybe three hefty boys and two hefty girls they were taken away into slavery. How many families must have starved to death because of the slave trade?
“Colonialism, the One Million Reasons for Leaving the Commonwealth explicitly stated how Gambians lived, it was not my description, it is a description by a foreigner, in the state of what he has seen which cannot be denied. So, the colonial era can only be talked about in terms of suffering, backwardness and massive exploitation.”
In another interview, Jammeh said the United Kingdom had no moral platform to talk about human rights in The Gambia after European Union had been accosted by Britain to suspend its aid ‘if the country’s human rights situation is not improved’.
“What brought the British to the Gambia in the first place—which was bigger than it is now -was trade in ivory because the Gambia had a lot of elephants,” he said.
“They wiped out all the elephants and ended up selling Africans.”
In October 2013, Gambia pulled out the Commonwealth, the organization that groups mostly former territories of the British empire, following its criticism of its ‘human rights’ record, with Jammeh calling it ‘neo-colonial and an extension of colonialism’.
Jammeh is also implementing a policy change that would shift from the use of English from the official language to a local language.
Gambia is a statement of the repudiation of colonialism.

1 COMMENT

  1. There is mordern slavery in The Gambia right now and the slave master is Yahya jammeh, who is casting blames on colonialism to distract you people from his ill-doings in The Gambia. Ask Jammeh, how many houses and lands he annexed from The Gambias or how many youths are running away from the slavery in The Gambia: Jammeh lacks the moral responsiblity to castigate any colonial master because he is doing worst ( killing, torturing, exiling, stealing, treathening etc.)to his own people.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

Latest articles

FOZEU’s call for strike…an attempt at provoking anarchy

By Elizabeth Sitotombe IN an attempt to sow anarch across the country by calling for...

Chitepo’s fight for land

This story was first published on 21/03/2016 By Patience Rusare LAND ranked highest among the grievances...

Winning mindset in post-elections

WE, in the village, are known for our resilience, we never give up and...

Import of US illegal sanctions

By Jonathan N. Moyo TWENTY-ONE years ago, on March 6 2003, US President George W....

More like this

FOZEU’s call for strike…an attempt at provoking anarchy

By Elizabeth Sitotombe IN an attempt to sow anarch across the country by calling for...

Chitepo’s fight for land

This story was first published on 21/03/2016 By Patience Rusare LAND ranked highest among the grievances...

Winning mindset in post-elections

WE, in the village, are known for our resilience, we never give up and...

Discover more from Celebrating Being Zimbabwean

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading