By Sailu Bah
“I was misquoted by a reporter of Standard newspaper on a caption that 
reads: ‘UDP may boycott 2016 Election,” Said Darboe.
Lawyer Ousainou Darboe , the UDP Secretary General said that the Caption that reads: “UDP May Boycott 2016 Election” on the Standard newspaper issued on Tuesday 28th October 2014, authored by Saikou Jammeh is a misquotation.
Speaking in his office at a press briefing on Tuesday 28th October 2014, Mr. Darboe said that the decision of boycotting the 2016 Presidential Election cannot be made by him alone as it has to be done in consultation with 6 other opposition parties. He added that the decision made by UDP can never be made by him alone but would have to be made by the Exceutive body of UDP.
Mr. Darboe gave an example of the boycott of the Parliamentary Election and said that decision was made by all 6 parties that came together and agreed that they should not participate in the past Parliamentary Election.
“Taking a decision of boycotting the election cannot be made by UDP alone, if we UDP have to take decision without consulting the other 6 parties then it means that we have betrayed them, which UDP will never do,” he explained.
The UDP leader said you cannot fight dictatorship and be a dictator as well, and added that UDP is a democratic party and not a dictatorial body.
He said this information written by Standard Newspaper might be used as a marketing Strategy to captivate the minds of readers.
He said the story can bring confusion to the public and added that his people are doing a ground work at different regions preparing for the upcoming Elections.
“I always record my interviews to make sure that I have the Audio. We cannot dictate to any media house but we have the authority to tell the media that something has been written which is not correct,” said Mr. Darboe
“Standard Newspaper should rectify the mistake to remove confusion in the information given which is a misleading story. This is the reason why I called the media for clarification,” he explained.
Mr. Jammeh, the authour of the article said, “I have been in the Journalism field for 10 good years and I know the ethics of journalism,. I have never come across such an incident, i.e. misquoting someone or writing false news against someone. I as a senior reporter will not in any way write things that are unethical because lots of young journalists are looking up to me,” he asserted.
He said though everyone has a right to his opinion but in this case he never misquoted Lawyer Darboe.
Editor’s Note
The important thing is not about who is right or wrong but what the UDP position is as a party. The position is that its participation or non participation in the 2016 Presidential election is to be determined by consultation among its executive members and with other opposition parties. This is the crux of the matter.
]]>
