International

Jammeh accused of ordering journalist’s murder

A Gambian army officer has accused ex-President Yahya Jammeh of ordering the murder of a journalist, AFP news agency reports him as saying in his testimony to a truth commission.

Deyda Hydara, who was the editor of the local daily The Point Newspaper and a correspondent for AFP, was killed in 2004.

“We opened fire, myself, Alieu Jen and Sana Manjang,” Lt Malick Jatta said at the public hearing, naming two other military officers.

Lt Jatta is quoted by AFP as saying at the commission that his commanding officer later gave him an envelope containing US dollars, which he said was a “sign of appreciation from the big man”, a reference to Mr Jammeh.

Pap Babucarr Saine, Hydara’s colleague and managing editor of The Point, told the truth commission earlier that Hydara was killed for writing about the rampant corruption that marked Mr Jammeh’s rule, AFP adds.

Mr Jammeh had said in an interview on Gambian state television that the government had “no stake” in the killing. He hinted that Hydara’s love life had led to the murder, says the news agency.

The Gambia’s Truth, Reconciliation and Reparation Commission was formed to establish a “historical record of the nature, causes and extent of violations and abuses of human rights committed during the period July 1994 to January 2017” – a specific period encompassing the 22-year rule of now-exiled Mr Jammeh.

Source: BBC

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