Mr Kebba Dibba, 
   
  This is REALLY SADISTIC, REALLY BESTIAL TO SAY THE LEAST as portrayed in your posting. FELLOW GAMBIANS SINKING SO LOW TO PERFORM ACTS THAT EVEN THE LOWEST OF THE ANIMALS IN THE ANIMAL KINGDOM WILL NOT PERFORM.... Just some days after Nov-11, the news was rife in The Gambia as to how Saye's legs were cut-off because he could not fit into the mass "grave".
   
  A real massacre in peace-loving Gambia. Undoubtedly, on Nov-11 '94 the Smiling Coast of W/Africa was turned into the Slaughtering Coast of the African continent. I remember that one man who was close to Fajara Barracks on the night of Nov-11 compared the sound of gun fire and mortar to Operation Octopus that he also experienced in Liberia. 
   
  Operation Octopus was Charles Taylor’s last assault on Monrovia, when he and his colleagues turned the social fabric of that country on its head. As I am writing, he is said to be on the run. However, justice or death in disgrace always catches up with the human being who makes it an enterprise of his conscious life on earth to unleashed suffering on other human beings in this world. 
   
  However enormous the amount of blood that a leader has on his hands, it is never too much for the sea of Justice to judge. Although Justice cannot restore the lost lives, it can forever, put such leaders in perpetual shame even long after they have become part of history, albeit a most inglorious part of human history. 
   
  Their names will forever be mentioned by the current generation and generations yet unborn with utter distain and deserved disrespect for it is unthinkable how a human person who is born and bred by and among fellow human beings can just turn into a monumental beast over night clamping and savoring all that which wants to remain human and humane around him. For him, being bestial is being human and being humane is being against him, that is, being bestial in his own definitions under the yolk of arrogance and intolerance.
   
  Again on April 10&11, the Youth Monument was turned into the Youth Massacre Moment. Certainly, we have when the APRC is thrown into the dustbin of Gambian politics, the country would have so many days to fly our beautiful flag on half-mast to observe these dark days created and perpetrated by the APRC. The Gambia needs such urgently to restore the image of the country as being peace loving and peace keepers. The APRC is massacring both human lives and our economy. Imagine that the so-called Youth Monument was constructed at a cost of D482,000.00, 
  according to KMC. 
   
  Mr Kebba Dibba, do continue as I want to know how this man who was all in jujus on 22nd July '94, came to be named as the Chair of the Junta. One part of the story is that when one of the four asked as to who should be their chair, Yaya Jammeh just jumped and nominate himself. If true, it is very interesting, isn't. Such actions expose the psyche of such people and never ever trust such self-proclaimed chairs - as we are witnessing in The Gambia currently. 
   
  Such people do not have confidence that their colleagues have confidence in them in the first place. As a result, when such people occupy the chair, their first agenda is not the development of their people but the purging of such colleagues so that he is surrounded by jalibas and gewells. This is the current state of our State House in Banjul....
   
  Have to catch up with work now..... Long Life NADD and the Gambian People!!!
   
  Abdoulie Jawo
  UNDP Malawi
   
    
Kebba Dibba <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

  Again we are withness Yahya Jammeh leveling the ground to murder our brothers and sisters 
We are equally saddened about Gibril Saye or Lieutenant Saye. 

Pleased in the sense that his case needs to be told which I shall attempt to do the way I understand it. But am also quite sad to remember every thing about this fine soldier who was too good to die the way he did. Everything you mentioned about this soldier, especially his devotion and love to promote sports in the GNA-had a keen hand in football, basketball, volleyball and everything-made him more so a victim to be mourned and wept for until that day when his body is exhumed from that toilet pit and given a decent burial. We can classify Saye as the real soldier with difference. He was nice, respectable and highly competent. But above everything, the young man was soft hearted, couldn't hurt a fly when it comes to killer instincts that we saw among the ranks of the army since 1994. The guy had conscience and would rather die than see the truth twisted and remain indifferent to it like so many APRC lackeys we see today. One of the reasons I later learnt for the AFPRC's decision to
eliminate him was among other things his constant challenge to all of them over our detention at the central prisons without any credible reason or explanation for it. I understand he had openly and constantly protested to the council members to try us if they had anything against us or set us free. But death row at Mile Two prisons was not, as far as he was concerned, a place for good officers like us. He had even gone against all odds one day by coming to the prisons to see us with encouraging words to the effect that they were working hard for our freedom. He had brought us provisions and toilet articles as well. It was shocking to learn few days later that Saye was dead.

So you were right Dampha in stating that the 11th November event found me in jail. About thirty-five of us were detained for nothing we did. But I can still remember how devastated Saye's family was over the death of the man who solely provided for them. They even had to send a secret inquirer at Mile-Two prison to find out whether Saye was detained with us. His father cannot still get over what he new was a murder of his son, because he saw his son when he was leaving for work the morning after the so-called abortive counter coup. Soldiers who were present at the camp that day also took the trouble to go to the family house and explained to them what happened at Yundum that weekend afternoon.

I personally conducted my private investigation over the case and came out with the concrete evidence that these men were murdered when they least expected it from these cowards. A man like Saye would have never dreamt about Sana Sabally taking a direct role in his slaughtering. They were very close job associates, sharing the same office where Saye was his deputy in the heavy-weapons platoon. They were always together in their small office by the fuel storeroom. Before the coup one would easily mistaken them for brothers given the way they used to hang closely together. On the flip side however I think that was the reason why Sabally freaked out after the 11th November massacre. Killing a human being out of no justifiable reason could be psychologically very traumatic to the mind of the killer but when the relationship between the killer and the victim was bonded by that human factor bordering on friendship and love, the tragedy turns into a clinical nightmare. 

Anyway, that's another trivial story that I may come back to in later discussions. But as I said I started my investigation about 11th November in the jail with special interest in Saye's case. The first opportunity I had to know what exactly happened was when in February surviving soldiers arrested and accused of complicity in the counter coup were brought to Mile-Two prisons under heavy armed guard. The notorious Staff Sergeant Kanyi was part of the guards. They had to be transferred from the Yundum cells to death row at Mile Two. They were WO-2 A Trawelleh, Sgt. N kabareh, Sgt. S. Manjang Cpl. A.Jallow, Cpl. M. Saidykhan, L/CPL M.O. Njie, L/CPL K. Kamara and PTE. B. Manneh. When they were first brought in, they were so much convinced of being lesser criminals than we were that for a while they refused to say anything pertaining to what bought them there. Every one of them thought his arrest or detention was a mistake because, as far as they were concerned, they did not have a
clue about any organized counter coup as such. As a result they all thought sooner rather than later they were going to go home.

Then on the22nd February, 1995, each of them received a letter from Baboucarr Jatta's office (then army commander) warning them to brace up for a general court martial scheduled to start on 25th February 1995. That was to say that they had barely thirty hours to face a court martial on charges of treason. For their defence, they were not allowed to have any representation from professional legal officers or practitioners. The following officers' names were forwarded to them as the only available persons they could choose their legal representatives from: Captain M.B. Sarr, Captain S. Fofana, Captain JP Jasseh and Lt. Seckan. These were men who were big time legal illiterates. For the prosecution however, Justice B.Akamba a Ghanaian solicitor was the head of the team. It was clear to all the accused that it was after all a kangaroo court martial that awaited them and they also knew that Baboucarr Jatta was a genius at it. It was a lost course to all of them. That was the time they
really started talking. By the time they were hastily tried, found guilty and all sentenced to nine years imprisonment with hard labour, they had told us everything they witnessed and knew about the murder of their colleagues. Most of them were arrested after Barrow, Faal and Nyang were killed but well before Saye was arrested. They were in the Yundum cells when Saye reported for work the following morning and was placed under arrest by the military police. Every clothes he was wearing (he was in working uniform) was taken off him and was left with only his underwear before the military police forced him to join them in the cells. He was stunned and tried to ask for explanation but was simply told that the orders came from the council members of the government. Who were they? Of course the cowards: Yaya Jammeh, Sana Sabally, Edward Singhateh, Sadibou Haidara and Yankuba Touray. Anyway like all of them who were detained Saye had felt that the error would be corrected and that he
would soon be set free.

Then the next day while Major Frazer Joof, commander of the military police unit was taking their statements at the military police office, they received orders to stop the investigation and send them back to the cells. They were informed that the council members were at the officer's mess discussing their fate. It was lunchtime, so they decided to have their meals. Half way in their eating they heard some strange movements out side. Then a voice they could not recognized started calling for all those officers arrested to come out now. Sorting out the officers from the other ranks was, according to them, very scary. All the officers were handcuffed the moment they stepped outside. Then they loaded them like sheep in the back of an army Land Rover and covered them with tarpaulin.

The windows of the cells at Yundum were not quite high, so those in the cells could clearly view the activities going on outside. It was from there that they saw the convoy of council members departing with the officers including Saye. Baboucarr Jatta was with them too. For two to three hours they sat in silence praying and hoping that things were not really what they thought they were, until they heard the convoy roaring back into the camp with the green tarpaulins all soaked in blood. They drove them back to the toilet area where they stayed for another twenty to thirty minutes. Then they came back and called for Sgt. E.M. Ceesay and Sgt. Basiru Camara to follow them to the back. Few minutes later they heard burst of automatic gunfire twice. They were the last two to be murdered. It was a nightmare of unprecedented proportion that shocked every person with human emotion that evening. The second part of my investigation, which filled in the blank spaces left by the accused men,
was completed when I was freed from detention after ten months. After being released and reinstated back to the army, I eventually became very close to Baboucarr Jatta who in his non-stop effort to clear himself of any wrong doing that day told me the missing details. 

Anyhow taking stock of what Jatta had in mind could be extremely elusive. Sometimes he would echo as if Lt. Barrow had really planned a coup; but at other time it is as if, the AFPRC government, in order to eliminate the officers and soldiers who felt they betrayed the nation and the army, framed everybody. For example when Lt. Barrow was arrested that night, Jatta's explanation was that he had found him surrounded by Sabally and his guards after he was severely beaten up. He said that Sabally showed him a list of names of government officials Barrow and his partners had planned to execute if they had succeeded. His name Jatta was on top of the list. But he said upon scrutinizing the paper he had discovered that the list was forged to justify their desire to execute them. As a matter of fact, he confirmed the forgery in the paper when he noticed that his own name on top was quickly scribbled in pencil while the whole list was in ink. He said he took the list from Sabally and walked
up to Barrow and asked him why he wanted to kill him. But as soon as Barrow started swearing that he did not mean to kill anybody, Sabally turned around and hit him on the mouth with the wooden butt of his AK47 rifle, breaking all his front teeth.

"The torture they subjected Barrow and Faal to", Jatta had said, "even if they were not shot and killed finally, they would have most likely died from their injuries". Jatta also explained how all those arrested were later taken to Mile-Two prisons first and then to Fajara Barracks that night for execution during which a good number of them took the risk and ran away into the dark. Almost all of them escaped to Cassamance including Lt. Minteh, Lt. Jarju Lt. Bah Lt. L.F. Jammeh, Sgt Jadama, Sgt. Joof and others. The dash for freedom happened when the captives were forced in line at the middle of the field and then ordering some selected soldiers to open fire on them in a typical military execution style. Three times the order was given, and three times the soldiers aimed and fired above the heads of the victims. 

Then Edward Singhateh soon got frustrated with the firing team, walked up to where Barrow was standing, held him by the wrist, pulled him away from everyone and then fired two shots at him. One bullet hit Barrow on the leg and the fatal one went through his ribs. He fell down on the ground kicking and moaning until his whole body was reduced to weak involuntary twitching of his muscles here and there. "It was then that everybody woke up to the reality that they were dealing with real killers", said Jatta. There was total chaos. Some running for their lives others dumb founded by Singhateh's action while most of the soldiers suffered total shock. However, Faal was unable to move because of the injuries he had sustained that crippled him altogether. The bullet that finished him was fired from the late Sadibou Haidara's handgun. After that Staff Sergeant Kanyi was left with his sadistic pleasure of pumping more brass into poor Faal's body.

However let us not forget that in the heat of all this commotion, Lt. Gibril Saye was at home perhaps helping his wife nurse the three-week old son they just had. So to even say that he was seen that night around anywhere the coup was staged was ridiculous much more being killed in a firefight that night as the cowards tried to sell to the world. With the number of soldiers supposedly killed in that single incident that night, it is practically impossible or mind boggling to imagine that it was a fire fight where all the enemies were shot and killed while no one in the friendly forces got a scratch on him. That must have been the cause of the bitterness from Saye's family members especially from his dad. It should have also been a wake up call to the entire Gambian population that the so-called soldiers of difference were nothing but sadists with death. But as Dampha rightly put it the civilian population in most cases hardly show any interest in what happens in the army or have
little sympathy to the soldiers in active service. The general concept is that they are all the same, so whatever may happen among them good or bad is their own business. On the contrary, most soldiers are ordinary people, the typical Gambian type who sees his work as a source of earning income. Although the salary is very limited, the majority work hard to manage their lives with it, get married, raise and support good families hoping to survive the danger of being killed in the job or avoid the evil of killing unnecessarily until such time when they finish their signed contracts and leave for something better.

However, talking about the summarily execution at Yundum in which Saye was murdered Jatta had explained it all in the way he experienced it. As it was weekend, he said he was at home when he received a call from an officer at Yundum Barracks reporting the presence of the council members at the officers' mess. And the way things appeared they did not seem to mean any good towards the arrested officers and soldiers in the cells. He immediately drove to the camp and found them in the mess as reported. When he entered, they instantly stopped talking. But after a short while they informed him of their decision to execute everybody in the cells for their role in trying to overthrow their government. According to Jatta, he tried to talk them against the idea in every way to no avail. At one time he said he almost got Sabally, the vice-chairman then, to understand, but Singhateh called Yaya at the state house to inform him about the situation. When Singhateh returned from making the call
at an office close to the mess, he said that Yaya's decision was final-death for all the officers.

That was when everybody moved out to get the officers from the cells. It was lunchtime just like the survivors inside the cells explained it later at Mile Two. Anyway everything was the same except that those in the cells missed what happened in the killing process. When the officers were handcuffed and covered with tarpaulin in the back of the Land Rover, Staff Sergeant Kanyi was ordered to ride with them at the back. By the time they arrived at the execution ground behind Njamby Forest, Kanyi had severely hurt most of them with bayonet stabs all over their bodies. He was that instruction to Kanyi originated from Singhateh. Jatta had claimed to follow them all the way to the killing field to put more pressure on them and to still try to talk them out of it. Well, he must have done a perfectly disgusting job in convincing them not to kill, anyway. The officers were as soon as they arrived at the ground lined up in a firing-squad formation to be shot. It was another tense moment
where it appeared as if everyone was waiting for the other person to commence the shooting. Then as if it was an accidental discharge from Kanyi's weapon who was standing very close to Singhateh, he fired straight at the officers hitting Saye and killing him instantly. After that, it was a matter of finishing the rest since one had already died. It was the final green light for the butchering orgy to start. Jatta went on to explain how confused the council members felt when the killing was all over. They were altogether confused with what to do with the bodies.

They finally arrived at the stupid decision to have their guards bury the corpse in the bushes somewhere. Jatta said he talked them against that for fear that people will soon find the bodies. That was how they were eventually taken to Yundum Barracks, to the toilets. He talked about how Sgt. E.M.Ceesay and Sgt. Basirou Camara were also killed that day. He could particularly remember Lance Corporal Batch Jallow, Singhateh's driver at the time pulling the trigger on those two. He further gave the gruesome details of how Saye's long legs (he was about 6ft. 8ins. tall) could not fit in the ditch together with the others and how Kanyi and co used a machete to cut off his legs before force-fitting the body in the mass grave. It was the mother of all evil that I know the culprits will account for someday. It is hard to comprehend how brutal these demons were on people who did not hurt anyone in their existence. Why was it impossible for anyone among them to stand up and say that this
must stop, for it is all wrong? Where was god in the hearts of these GAMBIANS? Jatta said Saye's father made a final attempt to know about the fate of his son after Sana Sabally and Sadibou Haidara fell victims of their own creation on the 27th of January 1995. 

He had gone to the ministry of defence to ask Singhateh but the old man was referred to his office at the army headquarters. All that the father wanted to know was whether his son was dead or alive. He said he frankly told him to give it up in ever seeing his son alive again because he was really dead. The old man, he said, thanked him for the information and left with high emotions. Now back to where I stopped in my last piece COUP IN GAMBIA. For a brief flashback, I was part of the team of the American guests visiting the vice president's office when a GNA officer at the state house told me about the soldiers at Yundum Barracks on their way to Banjul to overthrow the PPP government. However, because of my duty that day to escort the guests upstairs to Mr.Sahou Sabally's office, I tried to calmly perform it without raising any alarms. Yet I was very worried. The whole thing was really scary. Upstairs, Mr. Sabally welcomed the team in few nice words and then said. "Gentlemen, I am
afraid to inform you that we just received a report that the soldiers at Yundum Barracks were on a rampage again".

He had sounded as if the matter was a familiar thing that may die out soon. It was pretty much possible that Mr. Sabally had thought that it was one of those demonstrations from Yundum again which the TSG could stop like they did before. Whether Mr. Sabally understood the imbalance of power between the two forces caused by the Nigerians lately could be anyone's guess. Whatever he was thinking at that moment, he appeared very calm about the matter. Anyway Mr. Winters the ambassador before stepping into the office immediately asked whether it was not better for them to go back to the ship until the situation was under control then they come back. The vice president insisted that there was no need for that. He told them to stay indicating that it was possible that their help may be needed. While they stepped into the office, I took permission to go and find out what was going on. It was granted. Downstairs, the same officer who first announced the trouble at Yundum was still at the
spot I left him. I wanted him to tell me more about what he had heard and whether it was not mistaken for the exercise rehearsal the GNA was supposed to hold with the American marines that morning. It was not a rehearsal or anything like that. The way they got the report, the soldiers had broken into the armoury sharing all the weapons among them and were coming down to Banjul. Asked whether names of any leaders were mention in the report, he said no. I did not know whether it was only the other ranks again like the past two demonstrations before or whether the officers were part it this time. I looked at the state house environment again especially the security situation and felt very insecure there. I had my office there and had been working there for almost two years but the officers and other ranks of the presidential guards were like clowns. These people never trained, did not understand section, company or battalion battle drills. They did not know the difference between

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