Today, July 7, 2010 marks four years since the disappearance Journalist Chief Ebrima Manneh. At the time of his disappearance, Chief Ebrima Manneh was a senior reporter with the Daily Observer newspaper.
In June 2008, the ECOWAS Community Court ordered the Gambia Government to immediately release and compensate him with US$100,000. The Gambia Government remained mute over the matter until March 2009, almost two years after his disappearance and a ten-month silence following the ECOWAS Court verdict to make public mention of their stance on the issue of Chief Ebrima Manneh’s disappearance.
The then Justice Minister Marie Saine Firdaus declared that the State did not have Chief Manneh in their custody and that “the State can only release a person from custody, if he or she is in fact in the custody of the State”.
Nonetheless, today, we again take the opportunity of the 4th anniversary of Chief Manneh’s disappearance to remind the Gambia Government and its relevant security apparatus that it is the responsibility of the State to ensure the protection of life and property, thus the disappearance of any Gambian should be an issue of paramount concern. We therefore urge the relevant authorities to do everything within their power to ensure that investigations into the disappearance of Chief Ebrima Manneh commence forthwith.
The Union also calls on its membership at home and in the Diaspora to help sustain the campaign on the disappearance of Chief Ebrima Manneh.
So far, all efforts by the Union, the Media Foundation for West Africa who took the case to the ECOWAS Community Court, friends of the Gambian media and the Manneh family has borne little or no fruition.
We once again call on the global media community, human rights groups and concerned individuals and institutions to join us in our quest for justice for Chief Manneh. JUSTICE IS LONG OVERDUE.
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