There are currently two vacant cabinet positions in President Barrow’s cabinet. They have been vacant for over a month since the resignation of the Basic Education Minister, Madam Fatou Sey, who refused to renounce her United States citizenship status, and the sacking of the Communications and Digital Economy Minister, Mr. Ousman Bah, for unspecified reasons.
The two vacant cabinet positions, the Basic Education Ministry and the Communication and Digital Economy, were temporally reassigned to the Minister of Higher Education, Dr Pierre Gomez, and the Minister of Information, Dr Ismaila Ceesay, respectively.
But a cabinet insider informs this medium not to be surprised if it took far longer than expected for President Barrow to fill the vacancies due to what the president is facing during his most challenging times as head of state: trying to reconstitute a cabinet during the midterm of his second term while under domestic, Subregional and international pressure to relinquish power in the name of best democratic practice even though there is NO term limit in The Gambian constitutions.
The other colossal pressure presented to President Adama Barrow is the fragility of his party, the NPP, which is built on a shaky political alliance of opportunistic and divisive forces with no coherent political ideology to unify his base, making it impossible to find a successor stands a chance of winning the 2026 presidential election at the same time the person he can trust to guarantee his protecting from prosecutions for the massive economic crimes, the fostering of impunity for injustice and the unabated corruption during his tenure.
Another significant pressure and potential powder cake on President Barrow’s plate is his failure to alleviate poverty, his failure to find a solution to ease the suffering of the people due to high commodity prices, which resulted in his mismanagement of the economy, and the constant tax hikes worsening the already precarious situation of the poor citizenry.
The Barrow administration’s uncertainty is made severe by the current change in the subregion, the call for the end to self-perpetuation, takeovers in Mali, Burkina and Niger, and the change of leadership in Senegal after a brutal uprising that shows over 100 hundred fatalities before his Godfather Macky Sall finally turn in the towel for his 3rd term bid, a major set back for president Adama Barrow. Former president Macky Sall’s presence gave President Barrow the protection he always had and confidence that his Macky Sall would always protect him and help him win the 2026 election as he did in 2021.
The heavy jockeying for power in his party/alliance by different fronts isn’t helping either. It is making it difficult for him to identify a trusted and winning candidate who will protect him, his family, and the loot after the presidency while also providing him with the freedom to enjoy his loot without having to leave the country, just like his Godfather, former Senegalese president Macky Sall.
The relentless and determined efforts by those within his NPP political alliance and the economic patrons’ repositioning themselves to keep a steady grip on influence in the corridors of power show no signs of easing. The situation of striking a balance for a compromise with these different interest groups presents a daunting task for a man who cannot think outside the box on his own. Achieving a continuing NPP government with the same NPP Political Hegemony and protecting their interest has given President Barrow the most significant headache since he assumed officer reminiscent of the end of the Jawara and Macky Sall regimes.
The two daunting tasks are for President Adama Barrow to appoint the transition cabinet to oversee his succession plan and for a candidate he can trust for his security & protection to win the 2026 election and effectively maintain the power grip considering the domestic and external challenges.
Hardly anyone who meets all these criteria is outside the president’s inner circle.
President Barrow is now desperate to solve the challenges, which has left him confused and fearful for his future and security. He has finally realised that he underestimated the challenges of governance. His greed made him allow the economic cartel to hijack him for their interests. Satisfying the different interesting groups poses the most significant challenge because their competition to protect their group’s interest further makes it difficult for Barrow to decide. Whenever he places a mark on an individual, the other opposing groups make him change his mind. Close family members advise him to settle the matter as leaving it closer to elections without having a successor poses a severe threat to the entire transition succession program, which will fall into total disarray if the wrong person is chosen as the successor, they would lose control, and there would not be enough time to salvage the situation, similar to what happened in President Macky Sall and Former PM Amadou Bah case.
The Ministries under consideration for a potential mini or significant cabinet reshuffle in preparation for the transition of Barrow Succession are Finance, Trade, Agriculture, Youth Sports, Interior, and Defence. The three principal ministries that would indicate a potential successor of Barrow are the vice president’s position, local government and land, and foreign ministry. In these three positions, the ethnicity of the person is under contest.
Let it be no surprise if President Barrow fails to find the courage to decide to carry out a significant Cabinet reshuffle that would determine his Succession plan, brace himself to tackle the domestic and external pressure, and muster the courage to run for the 2026 elections because the massive task before him increases his indecisiveness!
He’s likely to fill the two cabinet vacancies and continue procrastinating until a significant crisis hits his administration or when it is too late to act decisively because he never has an exit strategy. He got carried by greed.
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