By Nick Tattersall Sun Sep 24, 4:41 PM ET
BANJUL (Reuters) - Gambian President Yahya Jammeh signaled no let up in
his iron-fisted rule after an election win the opposition rejected,
saying he would ban any newspaper that offended him and would not be
dictated to by donors.
The
41-year-old former coup leader, who has said he wants to rule the tiny
West African country for at least another three decades, won a third
five-year term in Friday's presidential poll with 67 percent of the
vote, a larger majority than before.
His
main challenger, human rights lawyer Oussainou Darboe who polled 27
percent, rejected the result, citing widespread voter intimidation by
the security forces and local officials.
At
his first news conference since being re-elected, Jammeh was asked
about press freedom in the former British protectorate, where rights
groups say journalists and political opponents have been imprisoned
without trial. "Let
me tell you one thing. The whole world can go to hell. If I want to ban
any newspaper, I will, with good reason," Jammeh said late on Saturday,
dressed in his trademark white robes and holding a Koran and ceremonial
sword.
"This
is Africa and this is the Gambia, a country where we have very strong
African moral values. ... If you write Yahya is a thief, you should be
ready to prove it in a court of law. If that constitutes lack of press
freedom, then I don't care."
International
watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) says press freedom in Gambia
is "catastrophic," with death threats, surveillance and arbitrary
night-time arrests the daily lot of journalists "who do not sing the
government's praises."
Gambian
journalists were shocked by the murder in 2004 of Deyda Hydara, joint
editor of privately owned newspaper The Point and Banjul correspondent
of Agence France Presse (AFP) as well as RSF. Hydara was shot dead at
the wheel of his car.
After
two investigations, RSF said the killing was part of a "series of
attacks against journalists" and that Hydara was under security service
surveillance minutes before he was shot, a few hundred meters (yards)
from a police barracks.
Official Gambian investigations have been inconclusive.
"I
don't believe in killing people. I believe in locking you up for the
rest of your life. Then maybe at some point we say, oh, he is too old
to be fed by the state, we release him and let him become destitute,"
Jammeh said when asked about the case.
"Then everybody will learn a lesson from him."
"ALLAH IS MY WORLD BANK"
Officials
from Darboe's camp told a news conference on Sunday that some of their
supporters had been arrested and others intimidated in the run-up to
the vote. Some had been forced to swear on the Koran they would not
vote against Jammeh.
Commonwealth
observers said that while polling day itself passed off smoothly, overt
support for Jammeh from public officials, particularly the security
services, during the run-up to the vote may have made the playing field
uneven.
Jammeh
seized power in 1994 as a young army lieutenant and his thundering
charisma permeates Gambian political life. Some privately disapprove of
the authoritarian nature of his rule but say he has done much to
improve schools, hospitals and roads.
Jammeh
said he had managed to develop the country over the past 12 years
despite donors curbing funding after the 1996 polls were dismissed as
unfair by the Commonwealth. He said development remained his priority.
"My
World Bank has always been the almighty Allah and he will always remain
my World Bank. I don't look up to anybody but the almighty Allah to
develop this country," he said.
"The mere fact that we are poor does not mean that we have lost our
sovereignty. The mere fact that we are poor does not mean that we can
become somebody's stooge or poodle," he said.