By Mustapha Jallow
The Gambia Armed Forces Chief of Defence Staff, Lieutenant General Masanneh Kinteh, has embarked on a tour of the country’s media houses starting yesterday Wednesday 14 August 2017. During his visit at Gambia Radio and Television Service (GRTS), he promised to restore the civil-military relationship in the GAF.
He said most of the activities within the Armed Forces have been misconstrued by the public. He said the intension is to have armed forces that are subordinate, answerable and accountable to the civil populace.
‘‘We must have lost the public confidence in some way,’’ he said. “We would not be able to do that accountability and be able to answer to that call without our actions being transparent,’’ he said.
CDS Kinteh said the media had played a very crucial role in terms of public awareness and in terms of promoting the development agenda of government.
“We want to be part of this agenda. We don’t want to be part of it just because we are holding activities that need to be reported, but because we want to proactively meet the media and share some of our aspiration with them,’’ he said.
Ebrima Sillah the Director General of GRTS said they value the collaboration, partnership and cooperation with the GAF in particular but generally on all security services of the country.
‘‘Together we can help secure our country from all forms of threats perceived or real,’’ he said. ‘‘We already have a programme that is dedicated to security. After 22 years of what we went through, everybody is conscious of the fact that we need to protect our democracy. The best way we can do it is by contributing to the peace and security of this country,’’ he said.
