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Momodou
Denmark
11759 Posts |
 Posted - 01 Apr 2007 : 16:18:07
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Immigration Officers Brutalize Suspect
By Fabakary B. Ceesay
At the Wellingara Police Station on Wednesday, at about 11.30 am to be precise, when three immigration officers brought a young man into the station they physically and verbally assaulted him. The incident found this reporter standing inside the station who therefore witnessed the whole scene.
When the three immigration officers arrived at the station on board a taxi they hurriedly whisked a young man out of the cab. The three officers, who were sweating and looking very angry, lifted the young man and dropped him on the floor of the station verandah. One held him by the neck, the other sat on him holding his hands while the third was kicking and beating him. Some of the other police and immigration officers rushed to help their colleagues. The young man was dragged into the station. He was shouting at the top of his voice trying to explain something. But the officers would not listen or even care about what he was trying to say. He was put behind the counter sweating and breathing heavily in a torned shirt. A female police officer was trying to get a clue of what he was trying to explain whilst one of those officers who brought him, who was still sweating and raging with fury, kept on shouting on him, “Shut up! You think you can stand us; will you stand your officers in Nigeria? You have no papers and you want to fight us in our own country, we will jail you and see what comes out of it,” he uttered as he heaved. Another one also kept on hurling angry invectives at him. One officer, not part of the three also added, “You are lying, you think you can out smart us, you think we don’t know you Nigerians. We will charge you for assaulting officers on their duties.” The same officer rushed towards the counter as if he was going to attack the man. He halted himself and said, “Put him in the cell, we will deal with him later.” The young man, who was in his mid 30s was able to explain something to the female officer and a man in plain clothes.
According to the man, he was having documents, but that he was in a court case and the prosecutors in the case seized his documents. He added that the said prosecutors were at Bundung police station, mentioning some names. He explained that the prosecutors gave him clearance papers which indicate that they were holding his documents. He indicated that the clearance paper guaranteed his passage with the authorities. The man alleged that the said clearance paper was confiscated by the three officers and one of them tore it into pieces. He vehemently denied assaulting any of the officers and said that he was only trying to explain to them the importance of that tored paper to him. Most of the officers, both the immigration and the police insisted that the man was fabricating stories.
Source: Foroyaa Newspaper Burning Issue
Issue No. 37/2007, 30th March – 1st April 2007
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A clear conscience fears no accusation - proverb from Sierra Leone |
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Momodou
Denmark
11759 Posts |
Posted - 07 Apr 2007 : 18:49:04
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OPINION
THEY ARE NOT ALIENS, THEY ARE NEIGHBOURS
Dear Editor,
Please allow me space in your widely read newspaper. In your issue No. 37, 2007, your reporter succinctly captured what some immigration personnel do to foreigners or people they like to call aliens. To call people alien is to alienate them or to reject them all together.
This is a shame and no Gambian should support what they are doing to non Gambians. It is also very sad because what it depicts is the fact that our security personnel are badly trained. If a security officer has reasonable ground to believe that a person has committed an offence he may arrest him/her. He may also arrest him/her without a warrant depending on the circumstance and the nature of the offence. All that the officer needs to do is to inform the suspect by word or actually touch or confine his/her body. There is need to manhandle the suspect. This is the lawful way of going about things and it is also the civilized way of doing law enforcement.
If, on the other hand, a law enforcement officer wants to effect arrest and the suspect wants to resist, then the law enforcer has a legal right to use what is called “reasonable” force to effect an arrest. But once the person is arrested, there is no more need to use force against him/her such as slapping or kicking or even using foul language against the person. After all, a suspect is just a suspect until he or she has pleaded guilty in a court of law or is proved guilty by such a court.
In many instances law enforcers could be seen shouting at suspects or insulting them during investigation. In some instances also, they do not investigate with a view to ascertaining the truth. For example, when two people have a problem, the first person who reports to the police is usually accepted as the one on the side of the truth. Law enforcement officers should take reports and investigate them with impartiality, effect arrest only when it is absolutely necessary; otherwise they could engage in unlawful arrests. Sometimes the police do take a long time investigating a case before effecting arrest but many a time, the police will arrest someone, waste his/her valuable time, give him/her and his/her family unnecessary stress only to find out that the person has not committed an offence. But if they apply knowledge and skills in crime investigation and detecting crime, such unnecessary arrests could be avoided.
I have travelled in West Africa to such places as Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mali and Senegal, but I have never experienced immigration officers treating me as an alien. How can an African, let alone a West African be an alien in The Gambia? This is an insult to our intelligence when all the countries in Africa are clamouring for African unity, especially a country like the Gambia which has last hosted the African Union Summit, less than a year ago.
All law enforcement officers including the immigration personnel should see civilians as compatriots who are engaged in other endeavours to enable them to pay tax which is utilized to pay them (law enforcers) which in turn creates peace. We are not enemies to non Gambians who are mostly our neighbours. They are human beings too who deserve justice. Brutalizing people is not the just way of creating peace in a decent, democratic and civilized society.
Thank you very much
Yours Sincerely
Mawdo S. Touray
Source: Foroyaa Newspaper Burning Issue
Issue No. 39/07, 4th – 5th April 2007 |
A clear conscience fears no accusation - proverb from Sierra Leone |
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