By Nelson Manneh
The Chairperson of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Lawyer Emmanuel D. Joof, on Tuesday 10th August 2021 informed the media that they have written to the Inspector General of Police questioning the return of police Commissioner Gorgi Mboob to the Police Anti-Crime Unit.
“Commissioner Gorgi Mboob was involved in a human rights abuse activity. A joint panel made an investigation and recommended for the Inspector General of Police to redeploy him (Mboob) which was done. We learned that he is now back to the Anti-Crime Unit. We wrote to the IGP as to why he is brought back, but the IGP is yet to respond,” Joof told the press.
Commissioner Joof said his commission is striving hard to build a culture of human rights in The Gambia, adding that Gambians are selective when it comes to human rights issues. However, he said as far as they are concerned, they look at all issues relating to human rights.
“As elections are fast approaching, we have started meeting political parties to discuss with them on issues relating to human rights. We have already met with NPP, CA, PPP, and Gambia for All party, and we will continue to meet other political parties,” he said.
In reviewing the achievements of his-led commission, Joof said they have prepared a code of conduct for the police and that they have trained police officers on how to consider issues relating to human rights, especially when dealing with the public.
“We are planning to open regional human rights offices in each of the regions in The Gambia in order to decentralize our activities and make our officers accessible to the public,” he said.
With regard to the Truth Commission, Joof said there are two camps that are already established by the public. He said one of the camps is a group of people who referred the TRRC report that is yet to come out as a tissue-paper. He advised the public to wait for the TRRC’s report, saying the truth should be first established before reconciliation takes place.
“Some people also have the fear that the findings of the TRRC will not be implemented,” he said. “There are some of our activities that we don’t do publicly, like in the case of Ba Kawsu Fofana’s recent statement, we have written to him privately because we felt it has to do with human rights abuses.”
Commissioner Joof also took the press through some of the achievements they registered and their visitation to some of the detention centres including the police custodies.
