Campaign launched to bring exiled Gambian leader Jammeh to justice

22 Octobre 2017

Banjul, Gambia, October  22 (Infosplusgabon) -  Victims of the government of Gambia's exiled President Yahya Jammeh have started a campaign to bring him and his accomplices to justice.

Jammeh fled into exile in Equatorial Guinea in January this year after losing presidential elections to current president Adama Barrow.

Human rights group say in 22 years of autocratic rule, Jammeh’s government used killings, disappearances, torture, intimidation, sexual violence and arbitrary arrests to suppress dissent and preserve its grip on power.

“We will do whatever it takes in the pursuit of justice, no matter how long it takes,” said Ms Fatoumatta Sandeng, daughter of opposition leader Solo Sandeng, whose murder in April 2016 galvanized opposition to Jammeh's rule.

“All that matters is that Jammeh and his accomplices are held accountable for what they did to the Gambian people,” said Ms Sandeng, who is spokesperson for “Campaign to Bring Yahya Jammeh and his Accomplices to Justice.”

The objective of the Campaign is the fair trial of Jammeh, as well as those who bear the greatest responsibility in the abuses of his government.

The Coalition pointed out that it would also seek to strengthen the voice of the victims in Gambia’s current transitional process and to help the Gambian government recover assets illegally acquired by Jammeh.

“Given what so many of us experienced and the depths to which Jammeh took The Gambia, we have a moral duty to ensure that justice is done,” said Amadou Scattred Janneh, who was sentenced to life imprisonment under Jammeh for making T-shirts with the slogan “End Dictatorship Now.”

“By bringing Jammeh to justice, we also serve notice to tyrants across the continent that we the people are determined to fight impunity,” Janneh said.

Some victims at the Campaign’s inaugural press briefing included Imam Baba Leigh, a Muslim cleric, who was tortured and detained incommunicado for five months in 2012 – 2013 and Baba Hydara, son of  Deyda Hydara, editor of The Point newspaper and president of the Gambia Press Union, who was murdered in 2004.

Others were Nana-Jo Ndow whose father, Saul Ndow disappeared in 2013 and is presumed to have been killed, and Ayeesha Jammeh, whose father Haruna Jammeh, and her sister Marcie, cousins of the ex-president, disappeared in 2005.

Also speaking at the conference were Tutu Alicante, head of EG Justice, a leading organization campaigning for human rights in Equatorial Guinea, and Bénédict de Moerloose of TRIAL International, which was instrumental in the arrest of Jammeh’s former Interior Minister Ousman Sonko in Switzerland, where he faces trial on charges and crimes against humanity.

“As a people living for almost four decades under brutal dictatorship, we Equatoguineans feel compelled to try to help our Gambian brothers and sisters get the justice that we have been denied,” said Alicante. “The success of the Gambian victims will be the success of all Africans.”

The Campaign said that it would seek Jammeh’s extradition to stand trial in The Gambia, but admitted that this could take several years as political, security and institutional concerns must first be addressed for Jammeh to get a fair trial.

Groups participating in the Campaign include: The Gambia Centre for Victims of Human Rights Violations, the Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa, Article 19 West Africa, Coalition for Change in Gambia, TANGO, EG Justice (Equatorial Guinea), TRIAL International (Switzerland), Human Rights Watch, Guernica 37 International Justice Chambers,   Aids-Free World and La Fondation pour l'égalité des chances en Afrique.

Reed Brody, the Human Rights Watch lawyer instrumental in the campaign to bring to justice the former Chadian dictator Hissène Habré, is advising the Campaign.

FIN/INFOSPLUSGABON/AIO/GABON 2017

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