{"id":85700,"date":"2025-09-09T08:40:56","date_gmt":"2025-09-09T08:40:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/uncategorized\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race"},"modified":"2025-09-09T08:52:57","modified_gmt":"2025-09-09T08:52:57","slug":"mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race","title":{"rendered":"Mayor Bensouda Withdraws from UDP Presidential Race"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Gambia. <\/strong><\/span><b>Talib Ahmed Bensouda, Mayor of the Kanifing Municipal Council, has announced withdrawal of his candidacy for the United Democratic Party (UDP)\u2019s 2026 presidential flag bearer. <\/b><\/p>\n<p>In a televised video message, he also stated that he has resigned from his position as the party\u2019s National Organizing Secretary.<\/p>\n<p>The announcement comes less than a week after Bensouda was among 11 aspiring candidates to apply for the position. All applicants were scheduled to participate in a consensus-building exercise to select a final candidate to lead the party.<\/p>\n<p>Bensouda explained that his decision came after a one-on-one meeting with UDP Secretary General, Ousainou Darboe. Prior to the application process, Bensouda had publicly committed that he would not challenge Darboe for the flagbearer position if Darboe decided to run.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI took it upon myself to meet with Mr. Darboe on a one-on-one basis to let him know my desire to lead the UDP and my confidence that if selected, I will become victorious in the December 2026 presidential election,\u201d Bensouda said in his video address.<\/p>\n<p>He added that Darboe also confirmed his commitment to being the UDP flag bearer for 2026.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTherefore, I have told him, and I am here to tell my supporters, that effective immediately, I have withdrawn my candidacy for the flag bearer of the United Democratic Party 2026,\u201d he stated. \u201cAlso, I have told Mr. Darboe that, in good faith and in principle, I will, therefore, resign as the National Organizing Secretary of the United Democratic Party. Mr. Darboe will need an organizing secretary whom he will trust and who can deliver to his expectations.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Bensouda concluded by advising Gambians to practice \u201cdecent politics.\u201d He urged citizens to recognize that \u201cpolitics is not a game of insults, division, personal attacks, or defamatory comments,\u201d and that it should be a tool to foster national development and community unity.<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Gambia<\/span> Follow <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Africa-Press<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Gambia. Talib Ahmed Bensouda, Mayor of the Kanifing Municipal Council, has announced withdrawal of his candidacy for the United Democratic Party (UDP)\u2019s 2026 presidential flag bearer. In a televised video message, he also stated that he has resigned from his position as the party\u2019s National Organizing Secretary. The announcement comes less than a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":85699,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,12],"tags":[260],"class_list":["post-85700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-policy","tag-gambia"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Mayor Bensouda Withdraws from UDP Presidential Race - Gambia<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Talib Ahmed Bensouda, Mayor of the Kanifing Municipal Council, has announced withdrawal of his candidacy for the Unit ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Mayor Bensouda Withdraws from UDP Presidential Race\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Talib Ahmed Bensouda, Mayor of the Kanifing Municipal Council, has announced withdrawal of his candidacy for the Unit ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Gambia\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-09-09T08:40:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-09-09T08:52:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/gambia\/sites\/19\/2025\/09\/sm_1757395350.99518.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1280\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"720\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Mayor Bensouda Withdraws from UDP Presidential Race\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-09-09T08:40:56+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-09-09T08:52:57+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race\"},\"wordCount\":322,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/gambia\/sites\/19\/2025\/09\/sm_1757395350.99518.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Gambia\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"policy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-bensouda-withdraws-from-udp-presidential-race\",\"name\":\"Mayor Bensouda Withdraws from UDP Presidential Race - 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