National Council for Cultural and Historical Preservation
When we do not write our own story, others write it for us
Documenting the Gambia’s Culture & History
A nation that does not write its own history allows others to write it for them. The Gambia's story has been told in fragments: in colonial records that served colonial purposes, in oral traditions that have never been systematically documented, and in gaps where documentation should exist but simply does not. There is no single institution with the mandate, the resources, and the professional capacity to research, document, verify, preserve, and disseminate the full story of the Gambian people across all periods and all dimensions of national life. Children leave school with a truncated understanding of where they come from, shaped more by colonial-era narratives than by a rigorous, Gambian-produced account of their own history. The oral traditions that carry much of this knowledge are held by practitioners whose numbers are declining and whose repertoire has never been systematically archived. A language that is not documented cannot be recovered after its last speakers are gone. A musical tradition that is not recorded exists only in the memories of those who carry it. And the recent political history of The Gambia, including the Jammeh era and the Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission's findings, must be documented honestly and in full if Gambians are to understand their recent past and guard against its recurrence. The National Builders Party will build the institution that closes every one of these gaps.
A National Council for Cultural and Historical Preservation that is the authoritative centre of Gambian cultural and historical knowledge: staffed by professional scholars and archivists, governed by people who understand the responsibility they carry, equipped with the technology and the physical infrastructure to preserve what it collects, and connected to the schools, the communities, the diaspora, and the international scholarly community in ways that make its work genuinely useful. Where every oral history in danger of being lost is recorded before the person who carries it is gone. Where the school history textbook reflects what Gambian scholarship has established rather than what colonial records assumed. Where a researcher anywhere in the world who wants to understand Gambian history can access a comprehensive, rigorously maintained, publicly available archive of primary sources. Where Gambians know their own story.
The NBP will establish the National Council for Cultural and Historical Preservation through a dedicated Act of the National Assembly, giving it the legal independence, the governance structure, and the protected budget that a credible national cultural authority requires.
The Act will define the Council's mandate as the research, documentation, verification, preservation, and promotion of Gambian cultural heritage and national history across all periods, communities, and dimensions of national life. An independence of findings provision will prohibit any government minister, official, or political party from directing, amending, suppressing, or delaying the publication of any Council research output on the basis of political interest. The Council Board will comprise distinguished Gambian historians, archaeologists, linguists, cultural practitioners, community elders representing the major ethnic and regional traditions of The Gambia, a representative of the University of The Gambia, a representative of national diaspora organisations, and independent members with expertise in archival management, heritage law, and cultural policy. All Council research publications, archival collections, and educational materials will be publicly accessible free of charge.
The NBP will build a National Archive facility to internationally recognised archival standards, creating the physical and digital home that Gambia's historical documents, oral records, photographs, artefacts, and cultural materials have never had.
The National Archive will be purpose-designed with climate-controlled storage for physical documents and artefacts, a digitisation suite capable of scanning, recording, and preserving documents, photographs, audio, and video materials, a public reading room for researchers and members of the public, and a digital platform providing global remote access to the archive's collections. An active acquisition programme will pursue the recovery of Gambian historical materials held in overseas institutions, colonial archives, and private collections, bringing them into Gambian custody. A Research Grants Committee, funded from the Council's annual budget, will award grants to Gambian and international scholars conducting research on Gambian history and culture, building the scholarly base that the archive and the educational mission depend on. All finished works will undergo peer review to ensure accuracy, reliability, and academic integrity.
The NBP will launch a National Oral History Programme as a priority action in Year 1, deploying trained field researchers to every administrative region to record the oral traditions, eyewitness accounts, and living cultural knowledge that exist only in the memories of those who carry them.
Griots, elders, community historians, traditional practitioners, and eyewitnesses to historical events will be interviewed, recorded, and documented before the knowledge they carry is irretrievably lost. The programme will prioritise recording the holders of traditional knowledge who are oldest and most at risk of passing without their repertoire being preserved. All recordings will be archived in the National Archive and, with the consent of the individuals concerned, made accessible to researchers and the public. A Griot and Oral Tradition Documentation Unit, operating in partnership with the National Performance Theatre, will specifically focus on capturing the musical, narrative, and performance repertoire of master griots and traditional practitioners. Traditional languages that are endangered by declining speaker numbers will receive specific documentation and linguistic analysis support from the Council's linguistics research team.
The NBP will commission and publish standardised, peer-reviewed Gambian history books for schools, libraries, and research institutions, replacing the colonial-era narratives that have shaped Gambian children's understanding of their own past with a rigorously Gambian account of their own story.
The Council will lead a comprehensive review of the national history curriculum in partnership with the Ministry of Education, identifying the gaps, inaccuracies, and colonial framings that need to be replaced with Gambian scholarship. New curriculum materials covering pre-colonial kingdoms, the transatlantic slave trade, colonialism, independence, and the democratic journey will be developed to the standard the Council's research supports. Official history books, produced to internationally recognised scholarly standards and distributed to all schools and public libraries at no cost, will give every Gambian child access to an accurate and complete account of their heritage for the first time. The Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission's findings will be integrated into the historical record and the curriculum with the rigour and the care that recent and sensitive history demands, ensuring that the documented abuses of the Jammeh era are remembered and understood.
The NBP will use the Council to preserve and revitalise the living cultural traditions of The Gambia, recognising that a musical form not recorded, a craft technique not taught, and a language not documented are all lost the moment their last practitioner is gone.
The Council will spearhead initiatives to document and support traditional music, dance, crafts, textiles, architecture, oral literature, and folklore across all of The Gambia's ethnic and regional traditions. Partnerships with schools and universities will encourage cultural research, artistic development, and creative expression rooted in Gambian traditions. A nationwide cultural mapping exercise, completed in Year 2, will identify all living cultural traditions across the country, assess their vitality, and prioritise those most at risk of disappearing for urgent documentation and support. Grants for cultural innovators, traditional practitioners, and researchers will be funded through the Council's Research Grants Committee, supporting both the preservation of existing traditions and the creation of new cultural work rooted in Gambian heritage. Nationwide awareness programmes will embed the value of cultural preservation as a foundation of national pride and unity.
The National Builders Party will make the Council the intellectual backbone of the cultural tourism sector, setting the standards that govern how Gambian history is presented to visitors and ensuring that every guide, every museum, and every heritage site tells the Gambian story with accuracy, depth, and pride.
A National Heritage Interpretation Standards framework, developed and published by the Council, will set out the principles and practices that all publicly funded heritage institutions must follow in developing interpretive content, educational programmes, and public presentations of Gambian history and culture. An independent review process will assess all new museum and heritage site interpretive content against the Standards before opening. Training for tour guides, heritage site staff, and tourism operators on Gambian history and cultural heritage will be developed and delivered by the Council in partnership with the National Hospitality Training Institute, ensuring that those who interpret Gambia's history to visitors do so with knowledge and respect. The Council's research publications and archival collections will be made available to tourism operators as the primary reference source for all interpretation, establishing the Council as the scholarly authority that the cultural tourism sector is built on.
For Every Gambian
Your history, told by Gambians, for Gambians, with the academic rigour and the cultural sensitivity it deserves. A national archive you can visit or access online. History books in every school that are accurate, complete, and Gambian. A Council that records oral traditions before they are lost, documents languages before their last speakers are gone, and preserves the cultural knowledge that defines who your people are and where they come from. A nation that knows its own story stands on a foundation that nothing can shake.
For Young Gambians
You deserve to grow up knowing your history. Not a colonial version of it, not a partial version of it, but the full, complex, remarkable, painful, triumphant, and honest story of the Gambian people across all the centuries that shaped the country you inhabit. The Council's curriculum reform, its school history books, and its public archive mean that the knowledge your elders carry will still be available to you. And the careers it creates in history, archaeology, archival science, linguistics, and cultural preservation are careers that belong in The Gambia, not somewhere else.
For Every Family
Pride in who you are begins with knowing where you come from. The griot in your family, the elder who remembers, the grandmother who sings the old songs: the Council will record what they know before the knowledge is gone. The history your children learn in school will be the history of your people, told honestly and completely. And the living cultural traditions that connect your family to the generations before you will be documented, supported, and celebrated rather than left to disappear without a record. The Gambia's story is your story. The Council will protect it.
The New National Standard is a Gambia that knows its own story. A nation cannot rise into its future without first securing the truth of its past. The National Council for Cultural and Historical Preservation will ensure that The Gambia's story is researched honestly, recorded permanently, taught accurately, and passed to the next generation with the pride and the rigour it deserves. Every oral history recorded before its carrier is gone. Every curriculum textbook reflecting Gambian scholarship rather than colonial assumption. Every traditional language documented. Every cultural practice preserved. Every chapter of national history, including the painful ones, held honestly in the national record. This is not a cultural luxury. It is the foundation of the national identity that holds a people together and gives them the confidence to build everything else. The National Builders Party will build this foundation. Through this initiative, The Gambia will stand alongside nations that have mastered the art of preserving their past while forging their future.
When we do not write our own story, others write it for us. The National Builders Party will build the institution that ensures The Gambia's story is written, preserved, and taught by Gambians, for Gambians, in the full truth of everything this nation has been and everything it is becoming.
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