MARR IS NOT CONFLICTED AND WHY HIRING HIM AS A CONSULTANT DOES NOT DISQUALIFY GAMBIA PARTICIPATE.
By: Baldeh Banna (Politician)
To start with from what we learnt, GEP was looking for a Campaign manager but Marr preferred A consultancy Job as a consultant and GEP Accepted the deal. That exonerated Marr and to be fair to him, he must be treated as a consultant not a Campaign manager.
With that, still a lot of confusion still being spread online, especially with that of What’s On – Gambia taking these two terms as the same- Campaign Manager and Political Consultant.
Let’s set the record straight.
1. CAMPAIGN MANAGER: THE PARTY SOLDIER
A Campaign Manager is part of the party’s internal structure.
Key features:
1. Automatic Party Member: You cannot manage a party’s campaign without being a member. Loyalty is assumed.
2. Chief Strategist & Operator: Runs the day to day campaign. Message, mobilization, field operations, candidate schedules, volunteers. The entire war room reports to them.
3. Loyalty over Payment: They are there because they believe in the party’s ideology and mission. Salary may be low or none. The goal is to make the party win and govern.
4. Analogy: A soldier fighting for a specific course. Win or lose, they wear the party colors.
5.Motivation: Ideology and victory.
The Campaign Manager’s job is permanent until the election is over. Their credibility is tied 100% to that party.
2. POLITICAL CONSULTANT: THE HIRED SPECIALIST-( Role played by Marr).
A Political Consultant is an external expert hired for a specific task.
Key features:
1. Not a Party Member: Consultants work across parties, NGOs, and governments. Neutrality is their business model.
2. Project-Based: Hired to achieve one objective: polling, message testing, media training, data, strategy memo. When the contract ends, the job ends.
3. Paid for Expertise: They are mercenaries for hire. They sell skills, not loyalty. They can work for Company A this month and Company B next month.
4. Analogy: A mercenary. Paid to deliver a specific job with professionalism, then walk away.
5. Motivation: professional fee and reputation.
Consultants do not attend party CEC meetings, do not vote in party primaries, and do not hold party positions.
ALSO;
1. There is nothing in that partial exposed consultancy agreement that made him a GEP party member.
2. He was contracted for specific professional work, not to run GEP’s campaign or sit in their strategy meetings.
3. Being a consultant is work for pay. It does not transfer party membership, nor does it make his organization ( Gambia Participate) partisan.
That is the same as hiring a lawyer, accountant, or pollster. The service does not make you partisan.
Therefore, Marr’s consultancy with GEP does NOT disqualify Gambia Participate from conducting opinion polls.
Gambia Participate’s mandate is civic, data-driven, and non-partisan. A paid consultancy for technical expertise is standard practice worldwide and is not the same as being a campaign manager.
Campaign Managers are party soldiers. Political Consultants are hired professionals.
Conflating the two is either ignorance or deliberate mischief.
