Mayor Ahmed Talib Bensouda has claimed that the former ruling APRC party turned Kanifing Municipal Council into  a political bureau and wasted resources on funding party events and hotel bills. 

Mayor Bensouda made the revelation during a campaign meeting in Serekunda London Corner on Friday. 

“What happened at KMC before we came in  was a joke. It was a political bureau and resources were squandered on parties and paying hotel bills.

“There is no hotel in this country that the council didn’t owe money to and those debts were not in line with service rule. They were [accrued] by bringing in people from Casamance and hosting them in hotels just for political purposes” he said. 

He added that the council even funded former president Yahya Jammeh’s birthdays

“Just for the birthday of Jammeh, the council would pay one million plus dalasi.”

Bensouda said he’s saying this to highlight the work he has done to transform the council into a professional institution. 

The incumbent mayor is seeking a second term in next month’s local government elections.   

He is facing tough challenges from the ruling NPP party who are seeking to oust him from office.

Bensouda, who is a senior member of the main opposition United Democratic Party, 

has been at loggerheads with the government over the running of the council. 

Reporting by Adama Makasuba