Flag of the Gambia
The Gambia’s flag has red, blue and green horizontal stripes, the blue edged with two narrow white stripes. A government leaflet issued for independence in 1965 said the red stands for the sun, the blue for the Gambia River, the green for the country’s agricultural resources and the white stripes for unity and peace.
How to read it
The First Schedule of the Constitution of The Gambia sets the flag at 27 units across and 18 down, with stripes from top to bottom of red, white, blue, white and green. Louis Lucien Thomasi, an accountant in Bathurst who was born in what is now Mali, designed it. Queen Elizabeth II approved the design in October 1964, and at midnight on 18 February 1965, independence day, it replaced the Union flag in Bathurst.
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How the flag was chosen
Jos Poels, a flag historian who has worked through the cabinet papers in the National Records Office in Banjul, gives the story. In June 1964 the governor and the Prime Minister, Dawda Jawara, put two ways of getting a flag to the cabinet, and it chose a public competition with a £50 prize. The cabinet pointed to Sierra Leone’s flag, which had “green for its agricultural resources, white for peace and blue for its natural harbour”, and the selection committee suggested to entrants, for example, “green for agricultural resources, blue for the Gambian River”. That rainy season 238 people sent in 504 designs. On 1 September 1964 the cabinet provisionally chose design No. 147, and on 21 December Jawara presented Thomasi with his prize.
The colours were first given a meaning in the independence leaflet, six months after the design was chosen. Poels writes that it remains unclear who devised that explanation.
Proportions: 1:2 at first, 2:3 now
The drawing approved at the College of Arms in London, dated 18 October 1964, shows the flag at 1 to 2, as did the independence leaflet; the stamps issued for independence showed it at 2 to 3. The constitution now fixes 27 units by 18, a ratio of 2 to 3.
Read next
- Next in African flagsFlag of GhanaGhana’s flag has red, gold and green horizontal stripes with a black five-pointed star in the centre of the gold. Ghana’s mission to the United Nations says the red is the blood of those who died in the struggle for independence, the gold the country’s mineral wealth, the green its forests and the black star the symbol of African emancipation.
- The same shape in Laundry symbolsDry flatThe item is meant to be dried lying flat.
More african flags
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols drawn with lines or squares and rectangles.
Sources
- Gambia (The) 1996 (rev. 2018) Constitution, Constitution of the Republic of The Gambia, 1997, section 3 and First Schedule (Constitute Project), Constitute Project, section 3; First Schedule
- Where the Gambia River gives life (Jos Poels, ICV 27, 2017), Jos Poels, “Where the Gambia River gives life: a tribute to Louis Lucien Thomasi”, paper to the 27th International Congress of Vexillology, London 2017, International Federation of Vexillological Associations (FIAV), pp. 7–12
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 13, 2026. How we research
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