Thursday 2 October 2008

Voting patterns in the Gambia

The 1992 Election result and total MP party percentage score. THIS IS THE VOTES CAST FOR THE RESPECTIVE PARTY MP’S.
Overall votes percentage of vote
The PPP TOTAL VOTES 109,059 54.23%
The NCP 48,845 24.29%
The GPP 13,937 6.93%
The PDP 9,291 4.62%
The PDOIS 4,632 2.30%
The INDEPENDENTS 15,331 7.62
201,095 100%

the total votes for the over all respective party MP's was as usual favourable to the PPP. the strange thing is, even the new party founded by eccentric business man Solo Darboe, The PDP collected more per head mp votes than PDOIS. another significant port of call is the existence of independent candidates in Gambian political land scape. With over 3 parties in our country, why do we still have independent candidates? is this a failure on the part of all our establish political parties?
it will be interesting to analyse recent election trends.

THE TOTAL PERCENTAGE FOR EACH PARTY LEADER IS HAS FOLLOWS: 1992 election
DK JAWARA PPP 117,549 58.48%
SHERIFF DIBBA NCP 44,639 22.21%
ASSAN MUSA GPP 16,287 8.10%
LAMIN BOJANG PDP 11,999 5.97%
SEDIA JATTA PDOIS 10,543 5.24%
2O1,017 100%

Source: the political history of the Gambia 1816-1994, pages 330-344.
Initially my interest was about the voting pattern of my own constituency Sandu. But then it is apparent that there is a need to analyse the number of Gambians voting and their party of choice.

It seems to me quiet an overwhelming number of Gambians aren’t voting in numbers. If our population is said to be over a million, then two hundred thousand odd voters is too minimal for effective democracy.
Now coming to the election history of Sandu, where the honourable Musa S. Darboe dominated until his final retirement from contesting election after losing the 1982 general elections to Alhagie AK Touray.
The vote counts for the candidates are: 1982 election
Musa S Darboe scored PPP 2,480
Alhagie AK Touray Independent 3,193
Kissima AK Sillah NCP 250

This means AK Touray won the elections with a large margin. Musa Darboe was a heavy weight. Ak Touray did his campaign with the Basse's famous orator Buba Baldeh who contested in Jimara and won as an independent. Buba's fame and mass support was overwhelming, his car is sometimes lifted up by jubilant supporters.
I will try to shed some light on the records of the late honourbale Musa S. Darboe's election results for the 1970's. the bye-election he won after Batapa was became insane. musa won the bye-election.
more later.

No comments: