Halifa Sallah

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Halifa Sallah is a Gambian political leader. He is the Leader of Opposition in the National Assembly and a member of the Pan-African Parliament. He represents the constituency Serrekunda Central.

Sallah is the leader of the People's Democratic Organisation for Independence and Socialism (PDOIS) and one of the main figures in the opposition coalition National Alliance for Democracy and Development (NADD).

In June 2005 Sallah was, along with the other 3 opposition MPs, expelled from the National Assembly on the grounds of dual party membership. NADD had been registered as a political party and the Supreme Court of The Gambia judged that it went against the Gambian Constitution to belong to two parties at the same time. Critics claimed that the move was nothing but an attempt to silence the parliamentary opposition, as there was nothing in the Constitution regulating political alliances. On September 29 a by-election was held, in which Sallah was reelected with a huge margin.

On November 15, 2005 Sallah was arrested along with two other opposition leaders on the grounds of subversion, accused of having collaborated with the President of Senegal.