THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, October 28, 1994 TAG: 9410280063
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Profile
SERIES: HAIL TO THE CHIEFS
There's much more to student body presidents that their titles. While
they lead students, they also leaf full lives that are as diverse as
their institutions.
SOURCE: Stories by VALERIE CARINO
Campus Correspondent
LENGTH: Medium: 79 lines
VIRGINIA WESLEYAN College student body president Jeggan Grey-Johnson is disillusioned with politics. Politics in Africa, that is.
A native of Fajara, a small town in Gambia, Grey-Johnson wants nothing to do with politics later on. And the fact that his father works for the Economic Commission of Africa, a United Nations agency based in Ethiopia, doesn't sway him. The 22-year-old junior said he would not get involved ``unless conditions get so drastic whereby I have no other choice.
``I understand that politics in Africa is a dirty game, a do-or-die situation, but it should be civilized. Politics in Africa isn't,'' Grey-Johnson said. ``Politics in Africa is completely corrupted and primitive.''
Grey-Johnson attributes many of his country's problems to the politicians themselves and the ``lack of basic formal education for the masses.
``Education in Gambia is appalling. . . .The illiteracy rate is 75 percent, and that's a joke. We've had some geniuses in politics, but they didn't effect change because they used the rates of ignorance and the appalling illiteracy rate to their advantage.
``That's African politicians using a bad situation and making it good for them,'' he said. ``Look at Rwanda, Somalia.''
Gambia, whose government recently underwent a military takeover, should look ``inward'' to find solutions to its problems, Grey-Johnson said, even if that means implementing an ``interim government with honest civilians'' to lead it.
``I don't think Africa knows what it wants, and that's sad,'' he said.
Despite his disillusionment with African politics, he entered campus politics at Wesleyan because he thought he could improve students' lives. Grey-Johnson plans to provide better entertainment for the students on campus and transportation to off-campus sites. He is also asking the administration to allow more students to live off campus.
Grey-Johnson arrived in the United States in the spring of 1992. He is the only one of five children in his family to attend school in the United States. His eldest sister works as a lawyer in London and a younger brother and other sister attend Oxford. His youngest brother attends school in Gambia.
Old Dominion and Norfolk State universities were also on his list of prospective colleges, but he found Virginia Wesleyan the most impressive.
He remembered that the tour guides were ``pretty corny.'' He was surprised they were so informal. In Wales and England, where he had gone to boarding school, the atmosphere was more formal. Students were never addressed by their first names.
His professors at Wesleyan were informal, too. ``I was surprised to find out that the classroom was extended to the home,'' he said. ``The professors gave you their home phone numbers.''
That sense of informality characterizes his style as student body president. Grey-Johnson thinks that constant dialogue has helped increase student involvement ``from really low to about mediocre.''
A communications major, Grey-Johnson hopes to return to Gambia to film documentaries and, eventually, commercial movies. Although he never studied film formally, he writes scripts.
He and a friend have already written one, titled ``Coming Soon,'' a caper about three college students looking for their big break in film.
The documentaries he hopes to film would be related mainly to political and social conditions in Africa.
``I think that Africa is usually depicted in a negative way,'' he said. ``Not everyone's a savage. Not everyone's politically incapable. I think that through film, I'd bring to light things that people don't think about when they think about Africa.'' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photos by JOSEPH JOHN KOTLOWSKI
by CNB