Gambia’s dictatorial leader, Yahya Jammeh, on Thursday suffered a shock defeat in the country’s presidential elections, losing to the 7-party coalition candidate Adama Barrow, the electoral commission has said.
Electoral commission chief, Alieu Momarr Njai, declared on national television that Jammeh received just 36.7 per cent of the votes compared to Adama Barrow’s 45.5 per cent, ending his 22-year rule of the small west African state.
“Having received 263, 515 votes out of the total votes cast in the election, I hereby declare Adama Barrow newly elected to serve as president of the republic of the Gambia,” said Mr Njai.
President Jammeh has been at the helm of affairs for more than two decades after seizing power from Gambia’s first president in a bloodless coup.
Mr Barrow, Jammeh’s opponent, said he was expecting a congratulatory phone call from the president.
Mr Barrow once worked as a security guard at a branch of Argos in London before becoming a businessman in his home country. He campaigned as a reformer who would reverse Mr Jammeh’s decision to withdraw Gambia from the International Criminal Court.
Photo credit: Saihou Hydara
