When Yahya Jammeh fled to Equatorial Guinea in January 2017 under Senegalese military pressure and an ultimatum from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), it looked like a definitive break.
For 22 years he had ruled through fear, mysticism and ruthless control, ordering witch hunts, jailing journalists, torturing opponents and claiming to cure AIDS with herbs and prayer.
His exit was hailed as a democratic miracle
‘No one can stop me’
Nearly nine years on, the former president announced in October that he would return to The Gambia this month.
In a fiery address to supporters, Jammeh declared that “no one can stop me from returning to my homeland,” daring his successor, Adama Barrow, to prevent it – a threat that no longer sounds like empty bluster.
His allies followed with letters to the Gambian government, the UN, ECOWAS and the African Union, claiming his homecoming would “promote peace, unity, and security” and “dispel misinformation”.
It is a surreal twist for a man indicted by The Gambia’s Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission for murder, torture and rape.
For many Gambians, the words were vintage Jammeh – part threat, part theatre. Yet conditions that once made his exile secure are fraying.
A dictator in the wilderness
In Equatorial Guinea, Jammeh lives a strange blend of privilege and isolation.
He resides in Mongomo, the ancestral home of President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, in one of several opulent villas for visiting dignitaries.
ECOWAS in 2017 and ECOWAS of 2025 are completely different in terms of institutional confidence
According to Tutu Alicante, an Equatoguinean rights activist and executive director of EG Justice, Jammeh’s residence sits within Obiang’s presidential compound – a gilded gesture of fraternity among strongmen.
Far from power centres in Malabo and Bata, obscurity has become a slow death for a man who once ruled by spectacle.
The death of his mother, Aja Asombi Bojang, in 2018 marked a turning point; her body was flown home for burial – a symbolic rupture in Jammeh’s obsession with control and legacy.
Most of those who fled with him, including family members, aides and members of his feared Jungler unit, have since left, many returning quietly to The Gambia.
“He’s isolated,” says a former Gambian intelligence officer who once worked in his security detail.
“Those who used to feed his paranoia and stroke his ego are gone. What remains is silence and Jammeh doesn’t handle silence well.”
Equatorial Guinea’s changing guard
Jammeh’s exile relied on his personal ties to Obiang, Africa’s longest-serving ruler. But the president is ageing, and his son and vice-president, Teodoro ‘Teodorín’ Nguema Obiang Mangue, is steadily taking charge – with little interest in his father’s old loyalties.
“Unlike his father, Teodorín is not a statesman,” Alicante tells The Africa Report.
“He has zero interest in diplomacy, in building relationships with other leaders.”
Teodorín, entangled in legal troubles abroad and known for flamboyance, is driven by image and power rather than ideology.
“He has no relationship with Yahya Jammeh or his ilk, and therefore no interest and no reason to honour anything his father left behind,” Alicante says.
“With President Obiang increasingly ill and out of the picture physically and mentally, Teodorín has even less incentive to justify or maintain any arrangement his father made to shelter Jammeh.”
Equatorial Guinea is not party to the International Criminal Court, placing Jammeh beyond its reach even if Banjul sought prosecution.
His safety rests not on law but on the whims of a ruling family.
The deterrent has weakened
In 2017, ECOWAS – backed by advancing Senegalese troops – forced Jammeh into exile.
Then-president Macky Sall led with personal resolve and institutional clout. That deterrent has faded.
“ECOWAS in 2017 and ECOWAS of 2025 are completely different in terms of institutional confidence,” says Ovigwe Eguegu, a policy analyst at Development Reimagined.
“Its symbolic moral authority has been eroded after repeated failures to rein in juntas or prevent democratic decline. The region’s ability to project power is much weaker.”
Coups in Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and Guinea – with three regimes quitting the bloc – have dented ECOWAS’s authority.
Leaders elsewhere have turned inward, extending term limits and prioritising survival over regional norms.
“ECOWAS today is beset by intensified political and security challenges that make it challenging for West African leaders to decisively address prevailing tensions, or be proactive to limit an escalation of conflicts and various political crises,” regional security analyst Beverly Ochieng tells The Africa Report.
Many of them were victims of his regime. They would see his return not only as a threat to the nation, but to their own positions
Senegal’s stance has shifted too. President Bassirou Diomaye Faye, in office since April 2024, maintains cordial ties with Barrow but is no Macky Sall.
There is little sign that he – or his powerful prime minister, Ousmane Sonko – would deploy troops or spend political capital to block Jammeh’s return.
“Their focus is domestic; fiscal reform, fighting corruption and creating youth employment,” Eguegu explains.
“Regional leadership isn’t their priority. The Senegal of 2025 is not the Senegal of Macky Sall,” he adds.
The renewed political tensions in The Gambia, according to Ochieng, will likely be a “delicate balancing act both for Faye and ECOWAS due to his role in maintaining lines of contact with the Sahel where the rapidly evolving political and security crisis – irrespective of the split from ECOWAS – will deflect attention from a potential political impasse in Gambia”.
Consequently, she adds, the effectiveness of any measures or responses “will depend on how ECOWAS prioritises competing political and security interests”.
The ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs did not respond to The Africa Report’s request for comment.
A fragile security apparatus
That leaves one backstop: The Gambia’s own military. The government has vowed to arrest Jammeh if he returns, but security-sector reform has stalled despite years of donor support.
Many senior officers from the Jammeh era remain in uniform; others who suffered under his rule now serve alongside their former tormentors.
Gambian rights activist Madi Jobarteh says Jammeh still commands pockets of loyalty within the Gambia Armed Forces, especially among middle- and lower-ranking officers.
The top brass – including the chief of defence staff and force commanders – are unlikely to back him.
“Many of them were victims of his regime,” Jobarteh says. “They would see his return not only as a threat to the nation, but to their own positions.”
Barrow’s personal security is handled largely by Senegalese troops under the ECOMIG mission (ECOWAS Mission in The Gambia) – a fact that rankles many Gambians, who see it as a humiliation and a sign of mistrust in their own army.
Officials call it stabilising; critics call it a relic of the transition that exposes fragility nearly a decade on.
“To maintain foreign troops closest to the head of state and the state house in any nation could only mean that the national security apparatus is either incompetent or not trusted or both.
“This is the message Barrow is sending Gambians,” Jobarteh says.
A country haunted by its past
Jammeh’s influence lingers beyond politics. In rural areas, especially his native Foni, portraits still hang in homes; supporters wear his image on T-shirts and chant his slogans.
That nostalgia – fed by disillusionment with slow reforms and a frail economy – gives him oxygen.
Corruption persists, and trust in institutions remains low.
“His legacy is deeply embedded,” says the former intelligence officer. “
He ruled through fear, but he also made himself indispensable. Even in exile, he’s part of the national psychology.”
Whether the former strongman tests the border or merely the country’s nerves, the calculus has changed.
The regional shield is thinner, the domestic shield uncertain. Jammeh’s return is no longer unthinkable – only unenviable for those who would have to stop him.