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Momodou
Denmark
11645 Posts |
 Posted - 30 Jun 2007 : 23:12:01
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FOCUS ON POLITICS
1980s POLITICAL CRISIS
COULD THE COMMISSION GLANCE AT THE PRESIDENT’S ASSETS?
With Suwaibou Touray
We have been focusing on politics in this column. We have analysed the political experience of The Gambia from pre-colonial to post-independence era. We have just completed analysing issues that arose in 1982.
We have stopped at where we said many were concerned about the curfew and the state of Emergency which was imposed on the people. Let us continue from where we stopped.
Continued from: http://www.gambia.dk/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3905
The treason trial which had saddened many a conscientious person continued to drag on, but by the end of 1982, the trial had experienced a considerable set back because the Bar Association made a complaint that their remuneration was low compared to their work, as well as what is given to the foreign lawyers. They protested by saying that they would not take up any case unless their pay was increased. The trials, however, eventually continued and by 5 August 1983, the following people, Ousainou Jawo, Foday Dampha, Bolong Sanneh, Sutayring Jaiteh and Ex-PC, Lamin Jabang were arraigned in court for their alleged role in the 1981 rebellion.
According to the Senegambia Sun, the law required that treason charges in connection with the rebellion were to be brought to the court within a mandatory period of two years which fell around 31 July 1983. If that law is anything to go by, then it was expected that these five people would be the last batch of detainees to be tried for treason.
The country was embroiled with many things. The ordinary farmer and even the Government began to be concerned about the drought which has afflicted the country. It was beginning to look like it was going to affect The Gambia as it did to Northern Senegal. The Minister of Water Resources, Mr. Omar Amadou Jallow, went on a tour of the provinces in connection with the National Tree Plant Week, a measure meant to combat desertification and control drought.
However, the president refused to sit on his laurels, as far as security was concerned. Speaking at what was then dubbed “State Opening of Parliament,” the president centred his speech on what he called, “A dependable National Security” . This he said was a major pre-requisite for political stability. He added that a properly organized and dependable National Security and an intelligence system, working in close collaboration with the re-organized military and other Agencies of law and order, would be the answer. Citing events of 30 July 1981, Sir Dawda said it has shown that if any thing, our security and intelligence services and law enforcement agencies must be properly re-organized and allowed to meet the new challenges of Nationhood, particularly the politics of destabilization, terrorism and violence. This was the time the Government was planning to build a new Gambian army, because it was believed by some that the July 30 events got easily sparked off because of the lack of a well constituted army and security apparatus.
The announcement by Captain Thomas Sankara on Sunday 7th August 1983 in a broadcast message that a National Council of the Revolution (NCR) had over thrown the regime of president Jean Baptiste Oueadraogo of Upper Volta had to be a hard reminder that to just constitute an army was not necessarily a panacea to the avoidance of coup d’etat or the maintenance of stability.
The other most talked about issues in the year 1983 were the Commissions of Enquiry into the External Aid Funds and the Commission of Enquiry into the Assets of Public Officials. With the commencement of the former, the country began to witness how people could abuse office and got rich quick. This enraged many outspoken critics. The general feeling was that the so-called graduates were the cause of corruption which affects almost every fabric of The Gambian society. One of the critics wrote that graduates who were usually swollen with arrogance sneer at everything African; that they would feel that the society owed them something following their academic achievement and expect the Public Service Commission or the body concerned with appointments to, without delay, absorb them into the civil service; that their first priority was usually egoistic and unnationalistic; that to them, education was, if anything, a means to an end; to amass wealth, secure a good post, buy a fashionable car, build a mansion and thus live a grandiose life; that all else was contingent upon the attainment of these objectives. And this feeling of the ordinary people towards the intellectuals, created a feeling of hopelessness, among the populace.
As the inquiry moves on, heads began to roll. By Thursday 13 October 1983, Mr. Kebba Jawara, the Minister of Local Government and Lands, resigned and mentioned ill-health as his reason, but as the Senegambia Sun observed, speculation has it that Mr. Jawara was forced to resign by the president on grounds other than ill-health. He was then replaced with Mr. Amulai Janneh.
The people also came to learn that the resignation of Mr. A.S Mboob was infact in connection to not only Kebba Nyama Leighs’ exposure but that he was found faulty with an imprest of D15, 000 dalasi which was issued to him for the maintaining of Senegalese soldiers, which disbursement the commission found unsatisfactory and recommended that he be held accountable for it. The Commission of Enquiry on External Aid Fund also found Mr. Ebou M. Taal liable for issuing imprests without the approval of the Accountant General in complete contravention of Financial Instructions No. 5/2. It was recommended that he be made to retire the three imprests without delay and be censured for infringing the financial instructions No.5/4 of the Ministry of Finance and Trade. Many officers were asked to retire imprests without delay and which they did, such as Mr. Bolong Sonko D500, Alhagi A.M Drammeh (Review tribunal) D5000, Mr. Hassan Harding D5000, another unretired impersts of D5000 plus another D15, 000; Inspector General of Police, D15, 000 imprest, etc. As we go along, the list became a long chain of big and small liable infringers.
CORRUPTION ON THE INCREASE
Even though, the two commissions have intensified their work, which was published for public consumption meant to help to curb the practice, by about the 30th November 1983, over D130, 000, a fortune at the time, was said to be missing at the Treasury Department. According to records of Newspapers, the money was said to have been surreptitiously obtained through forged cheques bearing fictitious names of people supposedly being paid insurance claims against Government. According to the Senegambia Sun, this was the second time that such a major case of fraud had been detected at the Treasury.
Even the CID officers who were employed to enforce the law were themselves arrested in connection with stealing a sum of 50 million CFA but later were bailed with a bond of D20, 000 each. As the old saying goes, “The rope meant to rescue the pail was itself dropped in the well”.
This 50 million CFA was said to be the property of The Gambia Commercial and Development Bank.
WOULD THE COMMISSION GLANCE AT ASSETS OF THE PRESIDENT?
For the Commission of Enquiry into the Assets of senior civil servants, the NCP leader, who must have been following the parliamentary debate as to whether the Assets of the president himself was going to be inquired into, called a rally at the Odeon cinema in Banjul on 14 August 1983 and in his address asserted that the basic purpose of an opposition party is to make constructive criticism; that in the same vein, it is also the duty of the Government to respond positively to such criticisms.
Mr. Dibba maintained or claimed that had the Government heeded to some of the constructive criticisms by the NCP from its inception, this country would not have been in such an economic mess. He finally called on the members of the NCP in the house to insist that all the politicians, in general, and members of parliament, in particular, should under no circumstances be exempted from investigations.
The debate as to whether the president was exempted from Assets Evaluation became intense. The commission however made it clear to the press that the Act was clear when it said, any public officer could be investigated. The commission’s chairman, Justice Isaac Aboagye added that, “While the commission must report to someone, if anyone has any evidence against the president, he or she was welcome to send his/her written and signed report to the commission’s office.
Justice Aboagye, however, indicated that section 5 of the Act imposed on anyone who would give false or malicious information about his neighbour, to be punished if found to be a malicious information. He said they were mandated to look into the conduct of such officers in the performance of their duties; that it was not limited to the physical acquisition of property; that it covers all forms of corrupt practices. Many questioned why the president would not just volunteer and allow the commission to glance at his Assets.
Continued: http://www.gambia.dk/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3949
Source: Foroyaa Newspaper Burning Issue
Issue No. 75/2007, 29 June – 1 July 2007
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A clear conscience fears no accusation - proverb from Sierra Leone |
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