I join the voices of freedom calling for the release of the arrested members of the GPU.  This is a very bad situation for the country at large



NM



 





Date: Tue, 16 Jun 2009 18:41:52 -0400

From: [log in to unmask]

Subject: Re: I Condemn the Crackdown on GPU and Gambian Media!

To: [log in to unmask]



Thank you brother Yanks. I am proud of you for this vivid personal account of your time as a freelance journalist. You have helped put a face on the suffering of your coleagues and perhaps shared in your own way what motivates a journalist to engage in this time-honoured tradition of news gathering and information dissemination. Indeed, journalists in Gambia are your neighbours next door, your brothers and sisters, fathers and mothers and even grandparents. Sometimes they can appear far-removed from us simply because Yahya's cluelessness has helped mythify their work. In the grand scheme of things, and because journalists in the Gambia must rely on themselves for survival, with no assistance for either professional growth and sustenance, they must be accorded the greatest lattitude for error, and the largest presumption of innocence in their work. Their constant harassment and the incessant denial of access to news and information threatens the development of the profession itself and encourages other idiot Presidents in the immediate neighbourhood of Gambia to limit freedoms for journalists.



Thank you again Yanks. Haruna.





-----Original Message-----

From: yanks dabo <[log in to unmask]>

To: [log in to unmask]

Sent: Tue, Jun 16, 2009 5:30 pm

Subject: I Condemn the Crackdown on GPU and Gambian Media!











 

Dear all,

 

I wish to add my voice to all of you, who care enough to express your disgust against the continuing persecution of the Gambian journalists, under the current totalitarian regime of our Dictator, Yahya Jammeh. I condemn the recent arrest of our fellow brothers and sisters of the Gambia Press Union, who have been deprived of their liberty for the past 24 hours and continue, to suffer the same. Their continuing detention begs for our utmost condemnation, simply because, as I have been asking myself, why?

 

Few years ago, I had the opportunity to work as a reporter with the Daily Observer, or may be a journalist, freelance reporter, whatever fits my position. I loved the profess ion; I think it was the most peaceful job I have ever done. There was nothing evil about it to deserve the cruelty it has been subjected to under the Jammeh's regime. The profession is simply the spread of information to those who would not have otherwise been privileged to it. 

 

The people I worked with were the most peaceful people on earth. None of them could fight an ant. Many of them were there to make ends meet, that is the little money we get for the inside stories; some for the love of it, others for the profession. There was no big celebration for a story; it was never a victory against Jammeh or his government or anyone else. Every story was just another story. Nobody knows how many people read their stories; whether any body even bother. What was most exciting about it was going down stairs to Ebrima’s office, the cashier, knowing you would receive a Forty Five dalasis, for an inside story you have written last week. If you receive more than that then you are even happier.

 

We vie each other about stories and the eloquence of our expression in the language of not my mother’s, English Language. There was no war or vendetta with what or who was reported. If any such notion exists then it is done by coincidence and not deliberate. This is the simple profession of journalism that I came to know in the Gambia. For these reason, I wonder why are these benevolent people could be subjected to such a constant persecutions that we have witnessed in the past decade and half?

 

During my short spell at the Daily Observer, I had few encounters with the notorious NIAs. But even these were bad enough to have a lasting effect on my memory. Yet mine, was just music to what some of my colleagues had to suffer from them. It is crazy and disheartening, why journalists had to be subjected to this cruelty. This is wrong and brutal. For that reason, Jammeh must be stopped. Journalists must be free to practice in the Gambia without fear.  







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