By An Ex- Security Officer

Thanks P. Mbai and Hamadi Maasinah. I disagree a bit about your DONE DEAL piece on  journalist  Fatou Jaw Manneh. In fact it is the other way around here on the ground. The government is looking for anything that will save them from this case. Yaya will sneak to Fatou and say he is sorry if he has the chance. We never have this kind of a case here.I think you are giving verdict very fast here. It is not that easy for Magistrate Buba Jawo neither for any of us, security agents who have been on this case. She is your colleague but know that  you are not helping the matter by coming up with those write-ups. Actually the NIA started hunting her in  Dakar when you published that she was in Dakar dishing out  gifts which was not true. Remember?. She has big connections in Dakar that we learned and that was why the NIA did everything to seal all her routes. So please watch out for what you write sometimes. It does not help her.

A little info: I was part of her interrogation team at the NIA. After we searched, thoroughly all her items and  she advised that or warned us that we should not plant anything in her luggage.We told her that the security of the country is not going to be compromised and she also replied saying to us  that  she is not playing with us either; neither is she going to compromise her Gambian citizenship  or birthright. From then on we knew she is a different kind of person . She said it will not matter to her whether she is a Gambian or us citizen.
 
We wake her up from sleep and bombard her  with questions and little threats but her answers are always exactly the same. The first 3 days she was very tired due to lack of sleep, she slept on the floor. Mosquitoes did not help her . Her face was completely red due to the  mosquito bites.She was grilled about her relationship with Freedom Newspaper, She responded  that her name is not Freedom newspaper and all our queries about Freedom should be directed to the editor, Mr.  Mbai, and not her. Her contributions to Freedom were vetted and scrutinized but she said"if my name is on the article, then i wrote it including all the commas". She drinks a lot of water and attaya,(green tea) and she requested some porridge at some point.
 
We tried to pin her on opposition, which might be easier for us thinking she is a Lawyer Darboe supporter but going through her articles we realized that she is not kind to Darboe either. So we chose this particular article were she attacked the government crew.When she was asked if she will continue writing after this   she replied in the affirmative  and made it categorically clear that she is not a praise singer or song writer. And events happening will dictate what she will write. Maybe you can get the whole account from her.....We were inundated  with journalists ,relatives , concerned  citizens and foreigners coming from all over to check her. We all became very careful and made sure she is treated right.She can be very reserved but extremely funny when she is comfortable.
 

She is extremely quiet and focused in court. What I'm trying to get at is that it is a very difficult case for all of us including Yaya Jammeh. Maybe her ambassador ( US ambassador in Banjul )  and other powerful friends of The Gambia  should broker a deal between them. Going to jail is not on the radar at all;  you all be rest assured. The witness they concealed  is Aziz Hydara who did everything possible not to come to the dock.Kemo Kinteh the first state witness is fired, on a different matter . Almost everyone at the NIA liked Fatou . One time one of the officers wife delivered and he wanted to name his daughter after her but was scared. Also an NIA driver too wanted to name her baby  after her. This was not communicated to her as we were  all pretending to be tough but she was not having none of it.Behind closed-doors we all laugh it off.

Jammeh and his friends know that they are gaining nothing out of this except very bad publicity. Fatou  is receiving high profile  visitors including marabouts  from  Mauritania, Senegal and Casamance almost everyday   . And even if government decide to send her to jail she will be fine there and that will not help the government except to further soil the image of this country. Since  her arrest a lot things have been going on at the NIA . Most of the security agents have moved to other units , some have been fired while others  just abscond. She is not going to jail. that i know.