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Gambia: One Man Killed In Tussle with Police

Youth at the central Serekunda-suburb of “London” on Wednesday May 9th went on the rampage, burning vehicle tires and attacking public property after some members of the Security forces stabbed and killed one young man who was suspected to be carrying cannabis. Some witnesses told The Gambia Journal that police raided a suspected compound where the police say they had been tipped cannabis was being sold. After failing to find any in spite of a thorough search, the witness said, some members of the Police Intervention Unit, better known locally as Paras, stopped one young man who then tried to resist being stripped and searched in public. “It was during that tussle that one of the officers took out a knife and stabbed the young man in the chest. And when the youth got to know that the young man had died, they went wild,” an informant told The Gambia Journal. Many traders in Serekunda’s marketing district closed their shops on Thursday morning out of fear for looting and anxiety filled the air of the main Serekunda market. 

As we post this to the web, the authorities are yet to admit the killing. In a press statement released on Thursday, the Divisional Security Task Force, a body that little had been heard of earlier, stated that “security forces had clashed with a group of robbers and drug peddlers in possession of substantial “bundles” of cannabis.” The statement added that the police arrested eleven of the “bandits.”  Contrary to what The Gambia Journal was told, in the statement the Task Force claims that one Sheriff Minteh who was among the arrested people, died while trying to escape. According to the authorities while trying to escape Mr. Minteh had “fell down on a sharp-edged object and got wounded.” He was first taken to the Serekunda hospital but died while being transferred to the RVTH in Banjul. The statement also said that the police were investigating the matter and asked the general public to keep calm and exercise restraint.  Many had earlier feared that the country was in the brink of another coup now that President Jammeh was away on state visit in Latin America.