25/12/2025
An Open Letter to Dr. Ismaila Ceesay
🇬🇲The Sea Doesn’t Lie, and Neither Do Grieving Families🇬🇲
Honorable Minister Dr. Ismaila Ceesay,
I write this not as a political opponent, but as a heartbroken Gambian who has watched our sons and daughters vanish into the waves. During your recent appearance at Coffee time with Peter Gomez, you stated that illegal migration was worse under the previous regime than it is now. With the utmost respect due to your office, but with the urgency demanded by truth, I must say: this claim is not just incorrect it is a profound insult to every family living in anguish.
Between 2023 and today, 2025, our newspapers and social media have become a chronicle of death. Hundreds of Gambians have perished in the Mediterranean. Boats have capsized, leaving mothers to mourn children whose graves are the deep sea. Every month, there is a new tragedy, a new fundraisers for recovery, a new wave of silence from homes that have lost their light. To say the issue was worse before is to ignore the fresh tears staining our communities right now.
The title "Dr." before your name signifies learnedness. True wisdom, however, is not just in academic credentials but in acknowledging the painful reality of the people you serve. When information shared from such a high office contradicts what we see and feel every single day the devastated families, the empty chairs, the desperate searches it erodes the very trust needed to solve this crisis.
We are watching, Minister. We are not illiterates unaware of the facts. We are not blind to the reality. We are Gambians bearing witness to a national hemorrhage. This is not about playing politics with numbers, it is about acknowledging the scale of the emergency so that we can genuinely address it.
No position of authority grants the right to minimize our pain or distort our reality. We urge you, not as a minister but as a fellow Gambian to look beyond the data sets and step into the grieving compounds. Listen to the stories. Let your public statements reflect the true, crushing weight of this crisis.
Our people are dying. That is the only statistic that matters. We demand honesty, not to shame, but so that together, we can confront this tragedy with the seriousness it deserves.
The sea has taken enough. It’s time for truth to be told.
From
Ambassador Chama
