The prospect of succeeding at home is hard to fathom if you ask thousands of young Gambians who stubbornly cling on to the worldview about Europe as the land of hope and honey, in spite of what anybody else might think.
Even after numerous failed attempts to leave The Gambia by way of illegal routes which have claimed thousands of young lives, many among them can’t still think beyond the forlorn hope of reaching Destination Europe at all cost and turning their fortunes around overnight.
However, one returnee bucking this trend among Gambia’s desperate youth is Mamadou Jallow, who was recently repatriated to begin plotting the course of his life all over again.
He was among dozens of voluntary returnees from Libya courtesy of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM).
Jallow 32, is channeling his zeal to succeed in life into farming in his home village of Darsilameh, 304km east of the Gambian capital Banjul.
“I have cleared the field and done the nurseries ready for transplanting” Jallow, a sturdy young man with the gaze of a sage told the African Press Agency.
“If it goes well, I am expecting least D70, 000 ($1,400) from the sale of my vegetables including onions” he said more in optimism than the certitude of a prophet foretelling the future.
“I will water the field for four months before harvesting” he added, leaning left then right in the front seat of the speeding passenger vehicle heading in the direction of the east of the country where agriculture is a rite of passage for most rural families.
Jallow said the income, that will emanate from his vegetable garden project will provide the turning point for him and family in the search for prosperity at home, an alternative to the unfulfilled dream of a better life in Europe.
“My father died when I was very young and I had to drop out of school for lack of funds. The idea of the backway journey to Europe beckoned and in my desperation I embraced it. But it was not for me…I was not lucky” he added.
Jallow who claimed his escapade away from The Gambia had opened his eyes to the vagaries of irregular migration said although he would be sure of succeeding if he try the route again, he feels there is something better to occupy his life with and it’s pursuing farming opportunities at home.
Pausing briefly in his narrative perhaps to ponder the prospects of his project, Jallow instinctively pulled his hat down to protect his face from the wind whizzing its way through the vehicle’s window to cause him some discomfort.
The weather in that January evening was colder than usual but Jallow forgot all about it as he alighted from the vehicle upon reaching his destination a few minutes past 9pm.
But he did not leave without a parting shot about swinging into action with his lofty horticultural dream the next day.
Through the course his a four-hour journey, Jallow recounted the risky rough and tumble chasing a dream in Europe beginning in faraway Libya where political instability provided another challenge of its own aside from the strains of traveling.
“Arab gangs who rule whole neighborhoods in Libya torture and even kill those luckless enough to be held in their camps” he explained.
Jallow began sharing stories of his escapades in the migration trail on a fairly cold Wednesday evening in the seaside town of Barra, located on an estuary 7km from Banjul.
The IOM’s Banjul office in partnership The Gambia government and other partners have since been facilitating the voluntary repatriation of Gambian migrants like Jallow who were stranded in Libya.
After repatriation the organisation and partners also facilitate reintegrating the returnees both socially and economically, considering the stress, trauma and financial dire straits most of them find themselves in.
IOM and other stakeholders have been conducting series of sensitisations in the country regarding the illegal migration menace since the opening of the North Africa route to Europe more than fifteen years ago.
Jallow was among those initially lured to the backway syndrome migration, but the IOM campaign discouraging irregular migration has left some impression in him.
Europe is not the only answer to their economic challenges, a fact which leads to the realization that many of those who made it to the promised land are said to be jobless and undocumented migrants for long periods, taking years before they could live normal lives.
Thousands of African migrants have not been so fortune, many of them perishing in high seas and in unforgiving desert temperatures in their desperate bid for a better live elsewhere other than their home continent.
Last December’s boat disaster off the coast of Mauritania is offers a reminder that the risks are real.
At least 50 young Gambian lives and over a dozen Senegalese were lost as their dingy capsized with 150 people on board.
The incident shocked Gambia’s collective psyche and prompted the government to scramble for answers.
Meanwhile, Jallow hopes that through his horticultural project, he would be able to inspire others mired in the same economic difficulties.
Gambian officials believe such ventures could serve as a direct test to inform why young people should take on the land and its endowment with the same maniacal zeal with which they readily hop on inflatable dinghies bound for risky journeys into the unknown.
EJ/APA