By Arfang Madi Sillah, Washington DC
From London’s Fleet Street to New York’s Fifth Avenue, speculation and gossip have always been the fuel that powers the global media machine. Whether it’s the scandalous dalliances of a Capitol Hill power broker or the latest rumors from Buckingham Palace, no figure in public life is immune to a good old-fashioned tabloid takedown.
Yet, the story published by The Voice—suggesting that President Barrow had chosen businessman Muhammed Jah as his political heir—was barely a ripple in the tempestuous sea of media muckraking.
It was political conjecture at its most benign—a standard piece of reportage that wouldn’t even make it to Page Six in the New York Post, let alone catch the eye of the hard-nosed editors on Fleet Street. And yet, President Barrow’s response was an overblown display of indignation more suited to the tantrums of a medieval monarch than the measured demeanor of a modern democratic lea