Well, as expected, nothing much came from the latest sitting of the
commission of inquiry looking into the massacre of our children on April 10
and 11 by Yaya's security forces. Yeah, Ousman Jammeh (coroner) testified.
But if in fact he talked about the coroner's report, that fact was not
reported on the Observer Newspaper I read. Instead, Ousman Jammeh was
talking about vandalism of some government vehicles. So even though the
headlines cried: "Coroner testifies before commission", the coroner's report
was not mentioned anywhere. I hope before Ousman Jammeh leaves the stand (if
he has not done so already) someone will do us a favor and ask him to talk
about the report he prepared in connection with the massacre of our
children.
As usual, government security officials went before the commission to tell
blatant lies. They are still insisting that blanks (as opposed to live
ammunition) were used by the murderers on those fateful days. Even when
confronted with autopsy reports and ammunition recovered from the crime
scenes, government officials are still scrambling to search for silly
explanations. New in their armory of lies, is the allegation that the live
ammunition might emanate from Casamance rebels (who apparently are now
terrorizing Gambian citizens according to Captain Keita). This is
outrageous. The captain should have been grilled about the chain of command.
Who gave him orders? Rather than talking about the people the captain gave
orders to. Like we keep saying, very little is going to come out from the
commission. In the meantime, the government is perfecting its lies.
There is another development that should be instructive to the people
dragging their feet about the appointment of an independent prosecutor. The
new prosecutor appointed in the Ebrima Barry case (the one that missed the
first court date) is apparently asking for another autopsy and questioning
people that should have already been questioned by the authorities. Starting
all over again. Where is the fact finding capabilities of the earlier
autopsy? This is what we said months ago. If a new prosecutor is appointed
to prosecute the April massacres, he/she would conduct another investigation
different from what the coroner and the toothless commission did. So why not
cut the chase and go straight to a prosecutor that will be able to gather
evidence he/she can use in court? We wonder why politicians back home cannot
see this simple logic.
I will leave the UDP problem with the lawless July 22nd Movement to be
tackled by some of our numerous subscribers that espouse the notion that our
salvation lies at the bottom of a ballot box. Instead of coming here to
attack other people's programs, they should be engaging people like Mr.
Manneh from the IEC to ensure that there is a free and fair elections.
Instead of trying to score cheap political points against former opponents,
they should be monitoring the lies the APRC government are feeding to the
electorate. Instead of being preoccupied by our program (which they know
nothing about) they should seek ways of getting unimpeded access to their
supporters. Instead of coming here to further arguments on behalf of Yaya
(arguments the moron himself cannot think about) they should be setting up
strategies that would enable them to defeat Yaya in an election free from
rigging. Instead of claiming that their programs are significantly different
from other political parties' (and therefore they cannot form meaningful
alliances), they should come out and lay their programs in the open for
everyone to see and work towards a consensus. We can go on and on about
people's misplaced priorities. But we are not in that business. If we cannot
help genuine people further their programs, we stay out of their business.
KB

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