On April 23, 1970, The Gambia declared itself a Republic within the Commonwealth of Nations. 

Then Prime Minister Sir Dawda Kairaba Jawara, assumed the new role of President of the Gambian Republic. 

President Jawara 
Republic Day set
Released by The Gambia in 1970
Designer: Laszlo Gyula (Julian) Vasarhelyi

The Gambia’s history is marked by almost as much cultural diversity as its current population. The Portuguese were the first traders in the 16th Century  who introduced peanuts and cotton before leaving a hundred years later, selling their trading rights to the British. Fort James, established by the British, soon had a rival fort at Albreda, built by the French. During the 17th and 18th centuries, these forts were the scenes of periodic battles between the countries striving for control of regional trade. Britain gained all rights to trade in 1783, and administered the territory from Sierra Leone until 1888, when The Gambia became a crowned colony, completely surrounded by French Senegal except for a small section of coastline.  The Gambia became an independent country with Sir Dawda Kairaba Jawara as first President. He retained power until the beginning of the Second Republic in 1994 under President H.E. Sheikh Professor Alhaji Dr. Yahya A.J.J. Jammeh.
The Gambia in brief – Gambia Embassy

The Gambia’s Historic Path to Independence: A Nation’s New Dawn –