{"id":31593,"date":"2017-01-04T23:50:38","date_gmt":"2017-01-04T23:50:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/gambian-army-chief-pledges-allegiance-to-defeated\/"},"modified":"2017-01-04T23:48:58","modified_gmt":"2017-01-04T23:48:58","slug":"gambian-army-chief-pledges-allegiance-to-defeated","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/gambian-army-chief-pledges-allegiance-to-defeated\/","title":{"rendered":"Gambian army chief pledges allegiance to defeated president"},"content":{"rendered":"

{The head of Gambia’s army has given his full backing to the country’s president, Yahya Jammeh, amid a deepening political crisis.}<\/p>\n

Mr Jammeh suffered a surprise electoral defeat last month to Adama Barrow.
\nHe initially accepted the result but changed his mind days later, citing electoral “abnormalities”.<\/p>\n

In a letter to the pro-government newspaper, Gen Ousman Badjie pledged the “unflinching loyalty and support of the Gambia Armed Forces” to Mr Jammeh.<\/p>\n

Gen Badjie’s intervention follows the threat of military action by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) if Mr Jammeh refuses to leave office on 19 January.<\/p>\n

President Jammeh has said any such intervention would constitute an act of war.<\/p>\n

Mr Barrow’s team had previously claimed the support of Gen Badjie. The army’s support is seen as critical in building a transition after Mr Jammeh’s 22 years in power.<\/p>\n

The tiny West African state has not had a smooth transfer of power since independence from Britain in 1965.<\/p>\n

The dispute over the election results has raised tensions in the region, with both neighbouring countries and international powers urging Mr Jammeh to step down.<\/p>\n

Mr Barrow won 43.3% of the vote on 1 December, beating President Jammeh’s 39.6%. A third-party candidate, Mama Kandeh, won 17.1%.<\/p>\n

Those figures were revised from earlier totals, after the electoral commission discovered a tallying error affecting all candidates. The revised results did not alter the outcome of the election.<\/p>\n

However, Mr Jammeh declared that he would no longer respect the result and has launched a court action to annul the result.<\/p>\n

His security forces have seized control of the commission’s headquarters in the capital, Banjul, and the head of the election commission has fled the country over fears for his security.<\/p>\n

Three private radio stations were also taken off air, in an apparent media crackdown. One has since resumed broadcasting music and advertisements only, with no on-air presenters or DJs.<\/p>\n

Despite the threat of military intervention and President Jammeh’s protests, Mr Barrow’s team said they plan to declare him as president on 18 December.<\/p>\n

In an interview with the BBC, Mr Barrow said he would not prosecute the former president after a transition, but focus instead on reconciling the country’s opposing forces.<\/p>\n

“If South Africa can reconcile [after the racial system of apartheid ended in 1994], I see no reason why Gambians cannot reconcile. We are not saying prosecution; we said truth and reconciliation,” he said.<\/p>\n

\"Gen<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{The head of Gambia’s army has given his full backing to the country’s president, Yahya Jammeh, amid a deepening political crisis.} Mr Jammeh suffered a surprise electoral defeat last month to Adama Barrow. He initially accepted the result but changed his mind days later, citing electoral “abnormalities”. In a letter to the pro-government newspaper, Gen […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[100],"byline":[249],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-31593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics-48","tag-africa","byline-bbc"],"bylines":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"contributors":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31593\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31593"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=31593"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=31593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}