Gambian dictator was ‘sexual predator’
Yahya Jammeh used his position to rape women, according to a new Human Rights Watch report
Yahya Jammeh, a brutal dictator who ruled the Gambia for more than two decades, was forced out of office in January 2017, despite his best efforts to rig an election and then to hang on to power.
Since then, journalists, researchers and prosecutors have been combing through previously hidden documents and speaking to people who were previously too scared to speak out, in an effort to understand the scale of the corruption and abuses committed by him and his regime.
Thanks to the work of the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project we know that Jammeh — or, as he styled himself, His Excellency Sheikh Professor Alhaji Dr Yahya Abdul-aziz Awal Jemus Junkung Jammeh Naasiru Deen Babili Mansa, commander in chief and chief custodian of the sacred constitution of Gambia — orchestrated the theft of nearly $1-billion. The report documents how the former president siphoned money from government departments and laundered it through the central bank and an international network of business partners and offshore shell companies.
From testimony emerging at the
Gambia’s Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission, we know that Jammeh is implicated in ordering abuses, including the murder and torture of anyone who was deemed a threat to his power. “Kill them all, the ringleaders,” Jammeh said, according to his own chief of staff, in response to a coup attempt in 1994.
Now, thanks to a harrowing investigation by Human Rights Watch and Trial International, we know that Jammeh allegedly operated a highly sophisticated system of sexual exploitation and abuse. According to the investigation, Jammeh was a serial rapist, and used the resources of the state to commit and conceal his crimes.
A spokesperson for Jammeh’s political party has denied the allegations against him.
One of Jammeh’s alleged victims was Fatou Toufah Jallow, who was just 18 when she won a national beauty pageant sponsored by the ministry of education. The pageant, held in 2014, was supposedly designed to provide young women with the financial means to pursue further education. But Jammeh had other ideas.
He began to court Jallow, inviting her to dinner and showering her with gifts and attention. He even asked her to marry him. She refused, but this did not deter him.
In June 2015, Jallow was invited to a ceremony at State House in Banjul. This was a pretext. “It was clear what this was going to be,” said Jallow, describing how she was led into a room with the president, who told her: “There’s no woman that I want that I cannot have.”
Jallow said Jammeh then slapped her and injected her with an unidentified liquid. “He rubbed his genitals in my face, pushed me down to my knees, pulled my dress up and sodomised me,” said Jallow. She later fled the country, seeking refuge in Senegal.
Although Jallow was the only woman prepared to speak on record, Human Rights Watch and Trial International spoke to two other women who accuse Jammeh of rape and sexual assault.
The researchers also spoke to aides and officials in Jammeh’s administration, who confirmed that he forced or coerced young women into having sex with him. This included offering cash and scholarships in exchange for sex.
“Jammeh appears to have been a serial, sophisticated sexual predator,” said Human Rights Watch researcher Marion Volkmannbrandau. “Over the years Jammeh had created a sophisticated system, using state institutions and resources to satisfy his appetite. He recruited young women as civil servants, officially to work in protocol. The ministry of education was used to organise beauty pageants. He even created a foundation for the empowerment of women that selected girls for scholarships to study abroad. And he used his bodyguards to get the contact details of young women he fancied.”
Jammeh is in exile in Equatorial Guinea. There is no extradition treaty between the two countries, but Human Rights Watch remains hopeful that the latest revelations will increase the pressure on Jammeh to face justice.