The opening in Germany of the trial of a Gambian for crimes once morest humanity raises hopes in Gambia that justice will one day be done for the victims of Yahya Jammeh’s 22-year dictatorship, but this fight remains far from won .
Accused of having participated in two assassinations, including that of journalist Deyda Hydara, AFP correspondent in Banjul, Bai Lowe is to be tried from Monday in a German court for “crimes once morest humanity”, murders and attempted murder between 2003 and 2006.
He is accused of having been the regime’s death squad driver, and in particular of having escorted the assassins of Deyda Hydara, shot on December 16, 2004.
“I trust that justice will be done for my father following Bai Lowe’s trial because Germany is a neutral country, and I expect a fair trial,” says Baba Hydara, 45 years old, son of a man considered until his death as the oldest journalist in Gambia.
Recalling the “tenacity” of his father, also a representative of the NGO Reporters Without Borders (RSF) in Banjul, Mr. Hydara evokes “almost 18 years” of “difficulties” and “challenges” during which his family struggled. is “beaten for justice”.
With the trial in Germany, “there is a lot of hope”, he says, but “it’s just a first battle won, the war continues”.
“The hope is to see the court decide in favor of the victims and hold (the accused) accountable for the crimes once morest humanity he has committed,” said Ayesha Jammeh, co-founder of the Gambia Center for Victims of Human Rights Violations.
Came to power in a peaceful putsch in 1994, Yahya Jammeh – now in exile – was widely elected and re-elected without interruption until his defeat in December 2016 once morest current President Adama Barrow.
– Truth and Reconciliation –
Particularly fierce, his regime was characterized by a multitude of atrocities: assassinations, enforced disappearances, rape and castration, torture…
From January 2019 to May 2021, the “Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission” (TRRC), charged with shedding light on these crimes, collected a multitude of damning testimonies, which Gambians discovered during televised hearings.
In December 2021, the TRRC delivered a 17-volume report to Mr Barrow. The Commissions “recommends the prosecution of Yahya Jammeh and his accomplices before an international tribunal, in a West African country other than The Gambia”, for “murders, arbitrary detentions, disappearances”, among others.
The decision to prosecute rests with Mr. Barrow, who must make his choice known before the end of the first half. In December, during his re-election, he declared: “I take part in the decision, but it is not entirely my decision”, this one having to be taken, according to him, in consultation with his government and following consultation with experts.
The executive also promised the publication of a white paper on the recommendations of the TRRC, no later than May 25.
But the appointment on April 14 by the deputies, with the agreement of Mr. Barrow, of a former ally of the dictator, Fabakary Tombong Jatta, at the head of Parliament, raises doubts and fears on the fact that the families of victims obtain one day repair.
– “We will never give up” –
“The speaker of parliament and his deputy (…) have shown their opposition to the TRRC from the start,” said political analyst Essa Njie.
This professor at the University of Gambia expects that members of Mr. Jammeh’s party will sit in the new government to be formed following the legislative elections of April 10, which did not give Mr. Barrow an absolute majority.
“If these people are recycled (…) I am extremely pessimistic that justice can be done,” he adds. “The criminals who live here might probably (…) for some of them escape any punishment.”
“But those who are outside The Gambia (…) will ultimately have to answer for their actions in court,” he said, recalling that “some countries are ready to have recourse to the principle of universal jurisdiction” to try those responsible for certain serious crimes committed abroad – such as Germany.
For Ayesha Jammeh, niece of the dictator whose father and aunt are presumed to have been eliminated by the regime, the fact that these trials do not take place in Gambia is explained by a “lack of capacity” of the judicial system, but above all by “the absence of political will”, which is “the main obstacle”.
Baba Hydara wants to “use the Bai Lowe trial to show the Gambian government that even if they don’t come out with the white paper and don’t implement most of the recommendations (of the TRRC), we will use other means for them to be implemented, by having recourse to other courts” outside the country
“We will never give up,” he said.
