On Farming: A Letter to my Friend

It was with great delight that I read your recently published lyrical piece “Jookaa” in which you translated a song by Foday Musa Suso. A song beautifully sang in the rhythm of the Mandinka motivational genre for farmers called ‘Timpa julo’. I will not deliberate on the whole song for I am only interested in the part on Kamang Sanneh, a legendary farmer who astounded his generation with his insatiable zeal for work and his tirelessness in farming. The timing of your essay could not have been better for we are in the middle of the farming season and also at the height of a national re-awakening to push agriculture into its rightful place in our quest for socio-economic development. But lest I should forget, my dear friend, when I read your that elaborate piece on this song I almost grabbed my phone to call you and admonish you like you did to your nephew in the matter of dancing. Indeed I would have told you “know you not that sheriffs do not sing, especially in Ramadhan?”

But coming back to the subject, the importance of farming in our economy and culture is tremendous yet we do not have much to show for the countless years our farmers have tilled the land. They have toiled and moiled under sun and rain only to become more and more impoverished. Many are the policies and programmes implemented in the area of agriculture and yet we cannot even feed ourselves, having to import our staple food, the indispensable ‘maanibaa’ (rice) to feed a nation that knows nothing but benechin and nyangkatang.

Jaliba kuyateh was truly right when he sang “Gambia mu benteng ti senelaa maala barumaati ning bentengo the boye las barumaa nyangta seywoe la”. I will not attempt to translate the song being laden with words that I feel inadequate to render in English for I am not as blest as you are in the use of “tubaabu kango” (white man’s language). My training at Saint peters technical high school and Gambia high school where I focused in the sciences have not given me much opportunity to learn the arts. A degree in mathematics does not make my case better, yet I trust your dexterity in rendering words (nay concepts) from our rich Mandinka language into white man’s language.

Anyway I will not hesitate, while awaiting your competent translation of Jaliba’s great song, to explain that the message he wants to convey is that for the attainment of any form of sustainable development in the Gambia, agriculture (and farmers) would be the indispensable catalyst. To this I could add the words of poet who once wrote (about our farmers): How do you rate us? We are behind your budget statements.

But have our farmers been happy? What is the record of the GPMB? What has happened to the resources of the nation garnered through the margins between the low prices they bought the farmers produce and the higher world market prices? Is it not because of the inefficiency of this institution that it was privatised as part of our economy adjustment programme? Yes privatised with the envisaged advantages of private sector efficiency. And what do we have to show for such private handling of this institution?

And how about the Gambia cooperative union which served as the middle man between the farmers and the GPMB? Was it not yet another vehicle for the fleecing of the poor farmers? I have personally heard first hand stories of how some officials of this institution duped our poor illiterate farmers in the process of selling their nuts to the GCU ‘sechos’. I once participated in a nationwide tour to assess the damage caused by the inability to sell the output of the farmers as the groundnuts became infested with pests and the farmers despaired of getting any money from their sale (by credit) of their produce. During this trip, I heard former GCU staff tease one another about how they duped farmers who could not read the scales that were used to weight their products - the wages of illiteracy. And they laughed about it.

One man would tease the other saying “you have denied the true weighing of the scale and that’s why your eyes are no longer healthy”. Some of them even claimed that most of the young men who worked for the GCU have developed eye problems - the wages of sin! What shall we do with the educated rascal who uses his trained mind and all his gifts to ruin the very people who look up to him as a guide? Asks the great American thinker, Orison Swett Marden

And thinking of this, Sheriff I can understand why our fathers would never trust “tubabu karandingo” (white man’s student). Certainly our people have never taught us such corruption so if those people they sent to school would conspire against them, they have every right to distrust us. No wonder my granny would not allow my parents to send their first child to do “tubabu karango” (white man’s learning).

Thinking of the contradictions, I believe the logic is simple. Old Fa Dembo who was affectionately called “Numu Jango” (the tall smith) in my Harr Yalla neighbourhood in Lamin knew no books. Yet he produced the finest hoes and ploughing equipment that had a direct positive impact on the livelihoods of our farming community. Now if the same man should send his son to school who would later shun his father’s trade and then engage in activities that impoverish his own people what do you expect those people to think of the institutions that trained such a child.

Now I am in no way lending myself to the castigation of western educational systems for I have, gone a long way in that direction and have witnessed the enormous advantage it could bring to any country or community that invests in it. But my question is, Sheriff, why has the same system of education that has worked so well for those from whom we inherited it failed us?

Now my friend, I have thrown at you many questions in this letter but you must bear with me. Indeed I do believe that you have the capacity to answer these questions for you have travelled a lot in the world. And is it not the very same jooka song that you so competently translated into Mandinka that says that “dunuya taamoe mu kawandi letti seelaa lu beh nyo so-so la (travelling is learning; those who do not travel are entangled in unfruitful debating).
While awaiting your prompt response, I continue to pray for your continued success, like the old Marabou did in your pilgrimage to Touba, that: God bless your pen.

Momodou Sabally
Author, Jangi Jollof: A Memoire on The Gambia’s First University Programme