Gambia Armed Forces defence and security in The Gambia was the responsibility of the Field Force. The Field Force was a paramilitary unit of the police, consisting of roughly 140 men at independence and rising to around 500 in 1980. It has been formed in 1958 following the disbandment of the Gambia Regiment, part of the British Army. There was little concern about security in The Gambia due to its small size and the safety provided by being totally surrounded by Senegal, with which it had signed a mutual defence pact in 1965. This lax attitude to defence changed following the 1981 coup
Constitution of the Gambia Constitution of the Gambia The Constitution of The Gambia is the supreme law of The Gambia. The Gambia became a nation independent from the colonial rule of the British Empire in 1965 and adopted a constitution. The constitution was suspended by a military "coup d'état" in 1994. A revised constitution that came into effect in January 1997 then marked an official return to civilian control of the government, although the leader of the "coup", Yahya Jammeh, remained in power as President for another 20 years and exercised strong "de facto" personal control over the country. Following the presidential election of