I see the deposed President of the Gambia, Jammeh has decided on a strategy for clinging to power. As a result, many young Gambians are proposing to take to the streets to protest.
It is interesting that scenarios like this still exist. To any hardcore strategy gamer, the plan is merely entertainment, and seems rather simple and quaint. Jammeh has decided to promote key members of the military, denounce the impartial IEC who supervised the vote, and replace them with a corrupt, self selected version who will give him the result he wants.
As a formerly keen player of Tropico 3, I can tell you that this does not lead to long term stability. It does lead to a more violent form of government which employs increasingly immediate means to quash dissent. I have advised my friend in the Gambia to stay well out of it and read some politics in preparation for deposing the guy, rather than rushing out and getting himself killed.
It is unfortunately unlikely that there will be any international intervention. The Gambia has a small population of two million extremely poor people, and since Jammeh’s announcement that he now considers the Gambia to be Muslim, this makes it less likely that anyone will rush to the aid of the population, which is not a good thing if you happen to be Gambian.
What Gambians should bear in mind, is that nobody remembers a dead protester. They remember the great educationalists, the politicians, the social actors that survived.
Jammeh, unfortunately, looks physically healthy, but his current behavior indicates that his knowledge of history is lacking to the extent that he is using techniques that are as old as the hills. There are safer, and better ways of eradicating corrupt rule than getting killed. Look for free texts online and get them printed off or saved if you can, for reading up on historical ways of removing dictators rather than getting yourself shot.
Another nice snippet for this week, is that my blonde bombshell is considered to be acting out again. He has my so far undying admiration for this. Boris, so far, is turning out to be more interesting, more fun and far better looking than his predecessor. Nice one, Boris. We were admiring your powerful brand earlier this evening.
The artwork is not going too badly either. Jemima Khan is looking good, Iain Duncan Smith is on the way, and Darius Guppy is going as expected. I am not sure how many I will release at once when they are complete. Although it is not a taxing daily workload, the curing times mean that these pieces are very slow and space consuming, so I may yet be some time with the artwork.
The game is also progressing nicely, and I should be past graphics preparation and into writing after the weekend. This is the first of three that I want to release at the same time, preferably alongside Best Adventure Ever and Lucifer Ogilvie, so it will be a few months yet.
As you can see, I had to restart the blog again, as wordpress had some problems updating. I sincerely hope that this doesn’t happen again, but I will have to start backing up more often.