ANALYSIS
The Gambia- Jailed British Couple, Corrupt Judiciary, Hellish Prison Conditions, Deaths and Disappearances
By Abdoukarim Sanneh, London, UK
In 2007 it was only in the NGO forum of the Commonwealth Summit in Kampala, Uganda that an issue of The Gambia was mentioned. In the Heads of State summit not much was noticed about The Gambia and yet today, The Gambia is a serious violator of the principles of the Harare Declaration, which bind the Commonwealth, as a family of nations, to uphold the rule of law, human rights and democracy.
There is massive erosion of the rule of law taking place in The Gambia as I write, and the judiciary is in cahoots with the ruling regime. It is the moral responsibility of Britain and the Member States of the Commonwealth to put pressure on Yahya Jammeh's regime to respect the human rights of all people in The Gambia, as well as non-nationals.
David and Fiona Fulton far right with adopted Gambian daughter
In 2006, the Human Rights Institute of the International Bar Association issued a report captioned "Under Pressure, on The Rule of Law in The Gambia" which details threats to the independence of the judiciary, the inability of lawyers to exercise their profession, the deterioration in respect for the rule of law, freedom of expression and the protection of human rights in The Gambia.
One important legislative instrument that Jammeh's regime uses to curtail freedom of expression is the charge of “sedition” and, in The Gambia today hardly a day goes by without either Gambians, or non Gambian nationals, such as the British, being brought into the courts on charges of “sedition” to which the only witnesses which appear in court are police and the NIA, Gambia’s dreaded secret police.
In one of his excellent determinative legal arguments on the merits and demerits of the charges of “sedition”, Barrister Lamin J. Darboe postulated how this contravenes the right to freedom of expression under the Gambian constitution and international human rights treaties to which The Gambia is a party, including the UN International Covenant of civil and political rights, and the African Charter of Human and People's Rights.
In the cases of Pap Saine and Halifa Sallah, the regime drags innocent people through the courts, and ends up re-branding its criminal actions in the name of a silly and stupid amnesty. Justice Minister Marie Saine Firdaus, looking like an innocent Virgin Mary, is part of the venal arrogant clique whose sole purpose is to line their own pockets. They have no professional ethics to put pressure on the mentally sick leader to respect the rule of law.
After dragging Journalist Lamin Fatty and several others into a kangaroo court, using all sorts of forms of dilatory tactics, the next victims were the British couple, David and Fiona Fulton. The Scottish missionary and his wife have worked tirelessly as humanitarian workers, against all threats from the regime, helping the poor and most vulnerable, even going to the extent of adopting a local girl. Today they are serving time in Africa’s most notorious prison, and for what crime? There are charged with sending emails to groups and individuals, criticising the country’s government.
This is a clear case example of Yahya Jammeh’s utter FEAR and intolerance of any form of criticism.
When David and Fiona appeared in court last November, the only witness to their trial was police officers. Given the wrong legal advice, they pleaded to what in US Law is called nolo contendere, which accepts conviction in the belief that they would be pardoned to join their loved ones in Britain. What they failed to realise was that our paranoid crack head had developed a hidden prejudice against western nationals. At this moment, a Dutch and German national are also facing charges of sedition at Brikama Magistrates’ court under sub-standard, so-called magistrate, Pa Harry Jammeh, who has recently developed feathers of arrogance due to his family connections, and also because Yahya Jammeh has been the main sponsor of his university education in the UK.
The Gambia’s judiciary is a mockery of the rule of law. With the frequent sackings of magistrates and judges, the system is now open to the perversion of corrupt judges and lawyers controlled by Jammeh.
David and Fiona have had many brushes with the regime, but their love of The Gambian people and their determination to help them, kept their hearts in the impoverished West African state. When David and Fiona were sentenced in December 2008, Magistrate Edrissa Mbai stated ‘I found the offences of the party to be very shocking and they have shown no respect for the country, the government and the president of the republic’. Well, it is shocking for us that such a statement should come from a trained lawyer who should know the morals and ethics of such a noble profession. David and Fiona worked tirelessly for the Gambian people, yet their names were slurred with reports of their preference of Christianity before Islam, which were entirely false. They stood for the downtrodden people of all religions, the people who could not defend themselves against the regime, and they are paying a heavy price for their love of the Gambian people.
What respect does Yahya Jammeh deserve? It is a mockery of the word “respect” to use it in the same sentence as the name of the Gambian tyrant. What respect does the Gambia deserve as a nation if it is not on the pathway to democracy and the rule of law and freedom of speech, which every corner of the globe longs for? Does this idiosyncratic form of Jammeh’s tyranny blind you, which is so outdated and unbelievably old world? Countless numbers of people are caught in the grip of repression in The Gambia, and are detained in undisclosed locations without trial. The Gambia Bar Association is a joke, muted by silence and afraid to take an advocacy role to challenge the criminal regime to observe the rule of law. Human rights lawyers have become systemic targets, with attempts on the lives of Barristers Ousman Sillah and Mai Fatty. The government shows no respect to court orders, and innumerable political prisoners are dying at Mile II Prisons under mysterious circumstances, without their bodies being subjected to autopsies or post mortem examination to determine the cause of death. People are dying at Mile 2 and their bodies are handed to their loved ones without even a coroner’s inquest, except in cases like that of Daily Observer journalist Chief Ebrima Manneh, where there is no body to give to his grieving parents because the state denies all knowledge of him since he was arrested by them almost three years ago.
I am appealing to the UK Government and the Commonwealth to send a human rights monitoring team to The Gambia. Yahya Jammeh’s regime must explain the mysterious and horrible deaths of 44 West African Nationals, the disappearance of Chief Ebrima Manneh, Kanyiba Kanyi, Momodou Lamin Nyassi, Buba Sanyang, Ndongo M’boob, Haruna Jammeh et al. and the shooting of Deyda Hydara and many Gambian schoolchildren. The Gambian Government is constantly violating the principles of the Harare Declaration, and the Commonwealth Secretariat cannot ignore the continuum of dehumanization prevailing in The Gambia, only to come to an end every five years, at election time, which is engineered for a “free and fair” endorsement to be stamped on the repressive and unending dictatorship of our country.
The prisons and numerous undisclosed detention centres should be opened to investigation.
I recently held a telephone conversation with a former prisoner of the notorious Mile Two Prisons, and he stated that the food is awful, health is poor, and the conditions are unhygienic. Prisoners constantly suffer from pneumonia and asthma in the small damp and badly ventilated cells, and many sleep on the bare cement floor with a blanket. The food is terrible and they are often given maize porridge and dishes served with small rotten fish. People are dying of dysentery or malaria.
David and Fiona Fulton are British nationals. How long can they survive under these conditions? No doubt, Jammeh and his regime are hoping for their demise, but only a sick and fearful mind could fail to see the consequences of such a circumstance, which would bring the wrath of the world around their ears and hasten what all Gambians, at home and abroad, desire more than anything, the end of the APRC regime. Maybe the Fultons, like Halifa Sallah, would rather sacrifice themselves for freedom than live as moral and spiritual slaves to Jammeh and his band of mindless thugs.
A lot of what is happening in The Gambia is indescribable and the struggle for the restoration of democracy requires urgent international intervention, like that of Mugabe’s Zimbabwe.