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| Yahya Jammeh, the defeated Gambian president in elections, was seen at the main airport shortly before leaving Gambia |
Gambia is selling several planes and a fleet of luxury cars bought by former president Yahya Jammeh as it seeks to reduce a mountain of crippling debt contracted during the authoritarian leaderโs decades-long rule.
Jammeh, who seized power in a 1994 coup, fled Gambia early last year as West African neighbours were poised for military intervention to topple him after he refused to step down following an election loss to current President Adama Barrow.
While most of his people struggled in poverty under one of West Africaโs most oppressive regimes, Jammeh acquired vast wealth, much of which he packed into planes and carried with him into exile in Equatorial Guinea.
However, a fleet of vehicles, including several Rolls-Royces with Jammehโs name embroidered in their red leather headrests, were left behind on the tarmac.
โThe fleet of expensive vehicles at State House and the three planes bought by former president Yahya Jammeh have been put on sale,โ Finance Minister Amadou Sanneh told Reuters. โMy ministry will soon start publicising the sales.โ
The International Monetary Fund warned Gambia on Wednesday against any new borrowing after its debt stock reached 130 percent of gross domestic product at the end of last year.
Most of that debt was contracted under Jammeh, either through borrowing or the governmentโs taking on the liabilities of state-owned enterprises.
โLet me be very clear … it may even go higher because we have not opened the books of the state-owned enterprises,โ said Jaroslaw Wieczorek, who led a recent IMF mission to Gambia. โIt could be a lot of liability.โ
Since taking office and discovering government coffers were largely empty, Barrowโs administration has worked to disentangle Gambiaโs state finances from Jammehโs sprawling personal business empire.
Sanneh said last year that around $100 million – more than a third of the governmentโs annual budget – had been siphoned from state firms.
Barrow set up a commission that visited Jammehโs many properties – one estate boasts a mosque, jungle warfare training camp and a vast private safari park – to establish an inventory of his possessions with the aim of recovering looted assets.
Investigators have also sought to establish what wealth Jammeh may have stashed abroad.
The process has faced opposition from Jammehโs political party and supporters, who have accused Barrowโs government of carrying out a witchhunt against the ex-president.
