The Gambia & No Fracking: Two protests on Monday 26th January 2015 were both taking place at lunchtime in Old Palace Yard opposite the Houses of Parliament. One was by Gambians against the brutal repression in The Gambia and the other a protest against government support for fracking.
Gambians protest brutal repression
Old Palace Yard
The Gambia is the smallest country in mainland Africa, a long strip around 10 miles on each bank of the Gambia River for around 200 miles inland from its Atlantic mouth, surrounded on land by Senegal. Originally colonised by the Portuguese traders it later became a part of the British Empire, while inland from the river was under French control. After the UK 1807 act to abolish the slave trade, ships from the Royal Navy brought slaves from ships they intercepted to settle on the river. The Gambia became independent in 1965.
A military coup in 1994 led to Lieutenant Yahya Jammeh becoming President, and under his dictatorship any opposition “faced exile, harassment, arbitrary imprisonment, murder, and forced disappearance.”
The protest in January 2015 took place after the arbitrary arrests, detentions, tortures and summary executions of those who took part in the 30th Dec uprising against dictator Yahya Jammeh – and their innocent family and friends.
Despite the severe repression in the country in the following year Jammeh lost the December 2016 presidential election; his reluctance to leave the post led to military intervention which resulted in the victor Adama Barrow assuming power.
Gambians protest brutal repression
No Fracking Anywhere!
Old Palace Yard
Hundreds of campaigners from across the country protested as MPs were due to vote on a proposal to ban fracking and also on a controversial proposal to allow fracking under people’s homes without permission in the Government’s Infrastructure Bill.
The protest was two days before Lancashire County Council were due to decide on whether to give the go ahead for Cuadrilla to frack in Lancashire which would set a precedent for the rest of the UK. Tina-Louise Rothery from Frack Free Lancashire was one of those who had come to speak at the protest.
There were many other speakers too, including Bianca Jagger, Vivienne Westwood and Caroline Lucas MP, Vanessa Vine, the Founder of Frack Free Sussex and BIFF! (Britain & Ireland Frack Free), John Ashton, the Former UK Government Special Representative for Climate Change, Hannah Martin of Reclaim the Power, Norman Baker MP amd Labour MP Joan Walley, chair of parliament’s Environmental Audit Committee which that morning had come out against fracking .
Greenpeace had come with their model ‘Frack-free Home’ and a petition with 361,736 signatures to Parliament.
Despite the widespread opposition t it took several more years of campaigning before the UK government finally announced a moratorium on fracking in November 2019.
More at No Fracking Anywhere!
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