Seedy Keita, Minister Of Finance and Economic Affairs
By Fatou Sillah
Seedy Keita, the Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs, clarified in a recent interview that no government employee in The Gambia receives a salary below D6,000 per month, including drivers and messengers. Speaking with Peter Gomez on the popular “Coffee Time” show, Keita also provided details on the upcoming 2025 salary increases, emphasizing that the adjustments will not be uniform but rather graduated across various grades.
“The 2025 salary increase is not across the board, but rather has been graduated, and we came up with a floor of minimum D6,000 per month. No government civil servant is paid less than D6,000 monthly.,” he said.
The minister highlighted that the salary increases were designed to address the needs of lower-grade civil servants, with over 75 percent of these workers seeing an increase in their pay. He added that the government distributed the salary adjustments based on grades to ensure fairness and equity throughout the civil service.
“So long as you are on the government payroll, you are not below D6,000. And the salary increased, the lower grades increased. When you take into account more than 75 percent. So we cascaded according to the grade in order to address the issue of equity,” he said.
Keita also stressed the government’s commitment to both the country’s development and the welfare of its citizens, despite ongoing economic challenges. He noted that, under President Adama Barrow’s administration, civil servant remuneration has seen a substantial rise in recent years.
“The government of His Excellency Adama Barrow is focused on developing the country and the people and that is why, if you look at our personal emoluments, I cannot put the ranking of where we do stand as a country. But in spite of all the economic challenges in the region and globally, in the last eight years, remuneration of the core civil servants has increased by 110 percent. In 2019, 50 percent. In 2022, 30 percent, In 2025, another 30 percent,” he said.