{"id":94443,"date":"2026-02-19T09:33:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-19T09:33:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/uncategorized\/udp-prepares-early-for-2026-election-says-alagie-s-darboe"},"modified":"2026-02-19T10:02:21","modified_gmt":"2026-02-19T10:02:21","slug":"udp-prepares-early-for-2026-election-says-alagie-s-darboe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/udp-prepares-early-for-2026-election-says-alagie-s-darboe","title":{"rendered":"UDP Prepares Early for 2026 Election Says Alagie S Darboe"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"ap-article-header-tag\"> <strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Gambia. <\/strong> <\/span><b>The United Democratic Party (UDP) has taken an unprecedented step in its electoral strategy, selecting its 2026 presidential candidate a full year before the polls, party officials announced this week.<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Alagie S. Darboe, the UDP\u2019s Senior Administrative Secretary, highlighted the early selection as a signal of the party\u2019s readiness and strategic planning. Speaking on the political talk show Bitilo, Darboe said, \u201cThis is the first time we have selected our candidate a year before the elections. Usually, we select our candidate during an election year, but this time we\u2019ve selected ours before the election year.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Darboe emphasized that the move reflects a broader commitment to a disciplined and organized campaign. \u201cThat demonstrates our readiness and preparedness for the 2026 presidential election. We\u2019ve put our plans in place in a way that we never have before,\u201d he said, adding that the party had developed \u201cconcrete plans&#8230; that we\u2019ve never had in UDP\u2019s political history.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The party official also underscored the stakes of the upcoming election, drawing comparisons to the 2016 vote that ended nearly three decades of authoritarian rule. \u201cThe way The Gambia is going, if we don\u2019t stand and rescue the country, it will sink,\u201d Darboe said. \u201cThis election is more critical than rescuing The Gambia in 2016. Given the state of the country, we shouldn\u2019t joke with it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"ap-article-footer-note\">Find more news and analyses on <span class=\"ap-highlight-country\">Gambia<\/span> on the <span class=\"ap-highlight-brand\">Africa Press<\/span> website<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Gambia. The United Democratic Party (UDP) has taken an unprecedented step in its electoral strategy, selecting its 2026 presidential candidate a full year before the polls, party officials announced this week. Alagie S. Darboe, the UDP\u2019s Senior Administrative Secretary, highlighted the early selection as a signal of the party\u2019s readiness and strategic planning. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":94442,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,10],"tags":[260],"class_list":["post-94443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-parties","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>UDP Prepares Early for 2026 Election Says Alagie S Darboe - Gambia<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"-article-header-tag&quot;&gt; Africa-Press - Gambia. The United Democratic Party ( ...\" \/>\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\/udp-prepares-early-for-2026-election-says-alagie-s-darboe\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"UDP Prepares Early for 2026 Election Says Alagie S Darboe\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"-article-header-tag&quot;&gt; Africa-Press - Gambia. 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