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Momodou
Denmark
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 Posted - 09 Nov 2007 : 18:34:30
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FOCUS ON POLITICS
IN THE 1988 KUKOI SCARE, ACCUSED PERSONS ALLEGED SEVERE TORTURE UNDER DURESS
With Suwaibou Touray
We have been focusing on politics in this column and this compels us to follow the narration of political events from the Pre-colonial period to the Post-Independence era. We have successfully covered the narration of events up to the year 1988.
In the last issue, we have stopped where we said Mr. Sisoho expressed his concern, among other things, that for Foroyaa to associate Mr Tombong Saidy and Amadou Kabir to MOJA may make things difficult for them.
Let us continue from where we stopped
The treason trials concerning one Musa Sanneh, Amadou Badjie, Adrian Sambou and Ousman Sanneh continued. The concern of the PDOIS supporters at the time was the alleged link that was being portrayed in court by the prosecution appearing to link Kukoi to PDOIS.
However, the trial revealed glaring allegations of torture by the accused persons. The allegations made were so serious as to attract the attention of the international media. For example, by about 9 May, the BBC attended the trial and reported on the allegations of torture by the accused persons. According to the BBC report, all the accused persons alleged that their statements were obtained under severe torture on several occasions. The prosecution objected to the allegation, which led to a trial within a trial to determine whether the accused persons were indeed tortured.
In his testimony in court, Amadou Badjie ,one of the accused persons, told the court in minute details how he was tortured by Deputy Commander Sainey Mbye and six other officers, all of whom he pointed out in court, one after the other. Badjie said Mbye ordered him to be stripped to his under-pants, which was done. He also said a Jola officer was chosen (since he was a Jola) to tie his hands together at the wrists. Badjie said Mbye then ordered the same officer to push an iron rod between his knees and elbow joints, saying the officer does not need to worry whether Badjie was hurt or not in the process.
Badjie alleged that after the rod had been forcefully inserted through his knees, each of the two ends was placed on a chair with him thus trussed up and dangling above the two chairs. He said that whilst in this position, Sainey Mbye had a small blue machine brought and placed on a nearby table. Justice Ayoola who presided over the trial within a trial did not give a ruling on the case at the time.
In the case of Musa Sanneh, who also alleged the same torture, Ayoola dismissed his statement and upheld that of the statement of the police. The police demanded for the examination a private medical doctor to establish whether Badjie was indeed tortured or not. Interestingly enough, the period coincided with the Second Conference on Human and People’s Rights organized by its Secretariat and was to be held in the Gambia to consider the progress made since it was adopted by the many African heads of State that attended it. That conference was preceded by a demonstration involving Mr. Jabel Sallah, who at the time had just won the Banjul South Seat in the 1987 general elections. Mr. Jabel Sallah during this conference boldly appealed to participants to have due regard for human rights and to stop the practice of persecution of those with opinions different from that of the ruling parties and governments, freedom of the press, human rights and the means of survival.
By April 1988, reports of an agreement between the United States of America and The Gambia Government reached the news stands that Banjul International Airport was to be used as an emergency landing site for the US space shuttle. This not only infuriates some Gambians but also frightened many and became a subject of intense debate.
Observers had also noticed that just within a short time after the agreement, the US Assistant Secretary of State for Security arrived in Banjul on an official mission. Some believed that the two events were related. They expressed suspicion that the Americans were concerned about their own security and global strategy. They further suspected that the whole thing might have been part of the East/ West struggle for global domination, which could entangle small Gambia in that imbroglio. They asked what guarantees did the Gambia had that the Americans would not utilize the facilities as a military surveillance, and listening centre and whether such a centre would not become a military target by the Russians or any other belligerents in times of conflict.
Many questions were equally raised as to what Gambia could benefit from such a facility, apart from, maybe a few dollars for rentage and possibly putting our regime in the good books of the US government.
Critics of the Agreement said Gambia purports to be a non-aligned state and as such, we should keep clear of all super power rivalries. According to the Nation, the Gambia had the trend to lean on the West on certain fundamental issues when it had been clearly established that the West’s stance was purely on political rather than moral grounds. They cited some cases when the Gambia voted at the UN and other international forums condemning the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan whilst Gambia never publicly condemned the American invasion of Grenada or Libya or their aggressive policies in other parts of the world.
The rumour of Kukoi coupled with the treason trials of the four men linked to Kukoi made many observers to feel that the threat made by Kukoi could indeed be true. The Nation Newspaper reported several incidents in Banjul, which stunned many people. According to them, just in the span of a week, people they described as desperadoes had ransacked the Anglican Church in Serrekunda and got away with silverware as well as goods in some Mauritanian shops in Banjul. They also succeeded in robbing many shops of hundreds of thousands of Dalasis as well as carjacking a land rover headed for the National Library and fired on the door of its store. This pattern of crime, which was said to be repeated throughout the city of Banjul and the environs, was said to have been extended, albeit, slowly to the rural areas, thus introducing a new phenomenon.
The Nation observed that this was a situation that was very reminiscent of the crimes and violent deaths just few months before the coup d’etat of 1981. The Government was said to have appeared to be indifferent to this situation because of the fact that they want to assure world, donors and tourists that The Gambia was a peaceful country where nothing of the sort, like violent crime, happened. The incident at the library meant a lot of challenges to the security forces, the Nation newspaper warned.
The issue of Foroyaa, the organ of the (PDOIS) which was refused entry to the State House after the last interview that Sam Sarr had with president Jawara, compelled the Nation to make an assessment of its performance and thus concluding that the paper was barely a year old but it seems to have made a tremendous impact on the regime’s attitude towards the press. Its appearance, the Nation wrote, had resulted in the regime adopting a somewhat defensive posture towards the local press in general and the Foroyaa in particular. As a result of such a defensive posture assumed by the regime, certain things that everyone took for granted had either been stopped or undergone some changes. For example, it had been customary for the president to call a press conference whenever he returned from an overseas trip involving all local journalists and to discuss not necessarily everything but issues pertaining to the trip in question. But this, the Nation stated, has even changed.
According to the Nation, they have also observed that whether it is as a consequence of the appearance of Foroyaa or a mere co-incidence, but the president seemed to have abandoned the idea of calling press conferences every time he returns from overseas, and when he does, questions are restricted to the trip in question. It also appeared that they want to exclude Foroyaa reporters from all press conferences organized by the State. The Nation also cited another circumstantial victim of the Foroyaa syndrome appeared to have been the popular radio Gambia programme “press Review” in which they used to broadcast a sampling of editorial comments of the various local papers and some international publication. This programme was stopped shortly after the appearance of Foroyaa, apparently because they did not want to quote an opposition paper like the Foroyaa on the air. The Nation opined that they would have been comfortable if they had continued the programme and excluded Foroyaa from the review but that they thought the easiest way to solve their problem was to discontinue the programme altogether. As regards the president’s press conferences, there appeared to be a conspiracy to bar Foroyaa reporters from attending. The Nation recalled that the last time a Foroyaa reporter attended such a press conference, the president seemed to have been personally offended by his style of questioning and at one stage, he even requested an apology from the reporter for a remark he had made.
Since that day The Nation observed there appeared to be an orchestrated campaign to exclude Foroyaa reporters from all press conferences. It was reported that during a press conference organised by Dr. Asamoah, the Ghanaian Foreign Secretary, during his recent visit to Banjul, the Foroyaa reporter was refused entry to state house to attend the press conference. When the press attaché at the president’s office was approached, he said it was the minister of External Affairs who organised the press conference and he, could not do anything about that.
When the president called his last press conference and invited all accredited journalists the Foroyaa reporters, Mr. Sam Sarr and Halifa Sallah were again refused entry to state house. There was no reason given for refusing them entry, despite the fact that both reporters were accredited journalists. This was the time when the PPP used to complain why the PDOIS was putting on both the political and journalist caps.
Source: Foroyaa Newspaper Burning Issues
Issue No. 132/2007, 9 - 11 November, 2007
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A clear conscience fears no accusation - proverb from Sierra Leone |
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