1. Adama Barrow is a Gambian politician and real estate developer who has served as President of The Gambia since 2017.
41 Facts About Adama Barrow
1. 2.
Adama Barrow became the treasurer of the United Democratic Party, an opposition party, and then became party leader in September 2016 after the previous leader was jailed.
3.
Adama Barrow was then chosen as the UDP candidate in the 2016 presidential election.
4.
Jammeh initially accepted the result, but later reneged on this, and Adama Barrow was forced to flee to neighbouring Senegal.
5.
Adama Barrow was inaugurated at the Gambian embassy in Senegal on 19 January 2017, and Jammeh was forced to leave the Gambia and go into exile on 21 January.
6.
In November 2021, Adama Barrow announced his candidacy for the 2021 presidential election, and was re-elected.
7.
Adama Barrow was born on 15 February 1965 in Mankamang Kunda, a small village near Basse Santa Su, three days before the Gambia achieved independence from the United Kingdom.
8.
Adama Barrow is the son of Mamudu Barrow and Kaddijatou Jallow.
9.
Adama Barrow attended the local Koba Kunda primary school, and then Crab Island Secondary School in Banjul.
10.
Adama Barrow then received a scholarship to study at the Muslim High School.
11.
Adama Barrow returned to the Gambia and in 2006, he established Majum Real Estate, and from 2006 to 2016 was the chief executive officer of the company.
12.
Adama Barrow started his political career with the National Reconciliation Party headed by his current Minister of Tourism and Culture, Hamat Bah together with the current Gambia Democratic Congress leader, Mamma Kandeh.
13.
Adama Barrow lost the election to Kandeh and maintained a low profile until his election as President of the Gambia in 2016.
14.
On 30 October 2016, Adama Barrow was chosen by a coalition of seven opposition parties as their endorsed candidate for the 2016 Gambian presidential election.
15.
Adama Barrow resigned from the UDP on 3 November in order to contest the election as an independent, with the full backing of Coalition 2016.
16.
Adama Barrow promised to reform security forces, pledging to increase professionalism and separate them from politics.
17.
Adama Barrow said that he would set up a temporary transition government formed of members from the opposition coalition and would step down within three years.
18.
Adama Barrow was then sworn in as President of the Gambia at the Gambian embassy in Dakar, Senegal, on 19 January 2017.
19.
Adama Barrow asked for the ECOWAS troops to stay for six months.
20.
Adama Barrow was greeted by military officials and members of the coalition government.
21.
On 18 February 2017, Adama Barrow took the oath of office a second time, within the Gambia, at an inauguration ceremony held at Independence Stadium in Bakau outside the capital Banjul.
22.
On 28 January 2017, Adama Barrow announced that his cabinet choices would have to declare their assets before taking up their posts.
23.
On 28 January 2017, Adama Barrow announced that the official long-form name of the Gambia would be reverted from Islamic Republic of The Gambia to Republic of The Gambia, reverting a change made by Jammeh in 2015.
24.
Adama Barrow said that he would ensure freedom of the press in the country.
25.
Adama Barrow pledged to have the Gambia end human rights violations and cancelled the pending withdrawal of the Gambia from the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.
26.
Adama Barrow dismissed General Ousman Badjie, the Chief of the Defence Staff, along with 10 other senior staffers in February 2017.
27.
On 21 September 2017, a few hours after his maiden speech at the UN General Assembly, Adama Barrow signed a treaty abolishing the death penalty as part of the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
28.
Adama Barrow signed the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families, the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, the United Nations Convention on Transparency in Treaty-Based Investor-State Arbitration and the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.
29.
On 28 January 2017, Adama Barrow announced that he would rename and restructure the country's intelligence agency, the National Intelligence Agency, pointing out its association with the oppressive regime of Yahya Jammeh.
30.
Adama Barrow said the NIA was "an institution that has to continue", but added "the rule of the law, that will be the order of the day".
31.
Adama Barrow said that additional training would be given to NIA operatives.
32.
Adama Barrow stripped the NIA of its law enforcement functions and temporarily occupied all NIA detention centres with police officers.
33.
Adama Barrow appointed Landing Kinteh as the new Inspector General of Police, removing Yankuba Sonko who was appointed by President Jammeh in 2010, with Sonko being redeployed to foreign and diplomatic missions.
34.
Adama Barrow responded to the protests by saying "No one can force me to leave the presidency before 2021," and a group known as "Five-Years Jotagul" supports Adama Barrow to stay for a full five-year term.
35.
Jason Burke reported in The Guardian that Adama Barrow now says he believes the constitution requires him to serve a full five-year term.
36.
Adama Barrow has been reported to be a member of the Mandingo ethnic group, which is the largest ethnic group in the Gambia.
37.
Adama Barrow has been reported to be Fula, based on his mother's ethnicity, mostly identified with Fulas in social and cultural terms.
38.
Adama Barrow himself declared in a meeting at state House that he is a Fula.
39.
Adama Barrow grew up speaking the Fula language in a village and district that are primarily Fula, and both of his wives are Fula.
40.
Adama Barrow is a Muslim and says that his faith guides his life and politics.
41.
Adama Barrow is a fan of the English football club Arsenal.