KB,

You have got it right again. This report is a tragedy and a shame to the
Gambia as a nation. I mean how can a suppossed group of intellectuals, after
what is suppossed to be a rigorous inquiry, turn up with a report that the
students are to be blamed for the massacres of april10 and 11. Lets assume
for a second that Gamsu is responsible. But who ordered the service people
to opeb fire? That question is the one people need answered. Now the lives
of 12 innocent students have been wasted. Their families and friends have
lost. No one will pay for their deaths. This, clearly is a tragedy.

Several witnesses before the commisssion, identified people who fired at the
demonstrators. So some people should have been prosecuted. I remember one
gentleman who asked the police operations chief as to whether they received
any orders from jammeh or any of his superiors to use real bullets. The
chief justice intervened quickly and declared that such questios were not
welcome. Is this investigation or thwarting the course of justice.

One of the terms of reference of the commission, as jammeh proudly declared,
was to find out what led to the deaths of students. Jammeh shamelessly
declared that no stone will be left unturned to get to the bottom of the
issue. I guess one of the stones, that should have been turned, involved the
question of who gave the orders. Now that stone has not been turned. So
according to jammeh's own standards, we have not got to the bootom of the
issue. This is double standards.

Gambians are not sleeping. I am quite confident that this file will be
reopened even if it will be in the next millenium. Before that, lets hope
that the government will see sense and do the right thing. That is
prosecuting whoever gave the orders and whoever carried out those stupid
orders.

Meanwhile, i pray that the departed souls of the april incidents continue to
rest in peace.

Sulayma Jobarteh.


>From: Dampha Kebba <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list
><[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Commission Blames Gamsu Leadership for the April Massacre
>Date: Tue, 26 Sep 2000 09:51:32 EDT
>
>As we get piecemeal newspaper reports about the contents of the toothless
>commission of inquiry report the picture is becoming clearer everyday. The
>ineptitude and corruption of this illegal regime can turn the dumbest man
>into a clairvoyant. Months ago, we said that the commission report will
>succeed at nothing but blaming the students for their death. We have been
>vindicated. The shameless commission of inquiry blamed the students for
>exercising their constitutional right to stage a peaceful demonstration.
>How
>can one blame the students for not conforming to the Public Order Act? The
>Constitution which guarantees every Gambian the right to assemble and
>demonstrate against tyranny, is a higher order. If the commission was
>looking for someone to blame, it should have blamed the authorities that
>administer the Public Order Act. It should have blamed the police for not
>ensuring an orderly demonstration after giving the students the required
>permits to stage a demonstration. You don't deny the students a permit and
>then blame them for not getting one. That is absurd. What is wrong with
>demonstrating against the torture and murder and rape of fellow students?
>Is
>the chief justice saying that the Gamsu leadership should have called off
>the demonstration in order to avoid the massacre? I put to the chief
>justice
>that no Gambian, except Yaya and his cohorts, could have anticipated such a
>heinous act. The students never thought that the security forces would turn
>their guns on fellow Gambians. It might be the order of the day where the
>chief justice came from, but in The Gambia, we have seen numerous
>demonstrations that did not turn out bloody. So, to put the responsibility
>on the Gamsu leadership to have anticipated such barbaric acts is grossly
>unfair. The students never intended to get into a violent confrontation
>with
>the authorities. If that was the case, they would have been armed; albeit
>with sticks and rocks. In my book, no blame should be leveled on the
>students. They had a very legitimate reason to demonstrate. They followed
>all legal avenues opened to them prior to the demonstration. It was only
>when the authorities would not reciprocate the goodwill of the students,
>that things turned for the worst. The insensitivity and lack of mental
>sharpness demonstrated by the chief justice is inexcusable. The Gambians
>that sat in that commission should also be ashamed of themselves. When the
>day of reckoning comes, they will be sorry for their actions. How can these
>Gambians sit down and let foreigners like Lartey come in and impose on us
>the morally bankrupt standards of societies where the Larteys and the Wowos
>of this world came from? In Gambia, it would never be all right to massacre
>15 innocent and defenseless children.
>Again, am yet to see the full report, but I will repeat my prediction that
>no trigger man will be named. Naming people like Momodou Ceesay of the PIU
>is neither here nor there. What the chief justice is saying is merely that
>Ceesay's unit was present at a location where students were murdered.
>According to reports that I saw on Gambian newspapers, the commission did
>not say that Ceesay pulled a trigger. The commission did not also say that
>Ceesay gave orders to the people that pulled the triggers. So, these
>findings are bogus. Yeah the guy was there. So was Badjie as well. We need
>findings saying that the guy pulled a trigger or ordered his men to fire at
>the students. Better still, we need findings about the chain of command.
>Who
>gave the orders to Ceesay? What transpired between Yaya and his ministers
>while the former was in Cuba? That is what we are interested in. Not
>blaming
>our children. The chief justice can call us all sorts of names (detractors,
>spiteful etc.), but we assure them that we will forever be on their backs
>until justice is done in this matter. If they are confident in their
>findings, let them publicize it for the whole world to see. The only
>definitive findings we are aware of so far, dealt with the assaults at St.
>Augustine's. Not to minimize what happened to Ousman Sabally, but we have
>15
>children dead and the murderers are still roaming the streets with
>impunity.
>Where is Momodou Ceesay and the five security men that were linked to the
>massacre at Brikamaba? Are these people still in positions of authority
>where they can orchestrate another massacre? This is insane. The recipient
>of this bogus report is the major culprit in this case. His inhumane orders
>from Cuba is the reason the students were massacred on April 10 and 11.
>KB
>
>_________________________________________________________________________
>Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.
>
>Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at
>http://profiles.msn.com.
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L
>Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html
>You may also send subscription requests to
>[log in to unmask]
>if you have problems accessing the web interface and remember to write your
>full name and e-mail address.
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------

_________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at
http://profiles.msn.com.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L
Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html
You may also send subscription requests to [log in to unmask]
if you have problems accessing the web interface and remember to write your full name and e-mail address.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------