Yahya Jammeh should be extradited to Ghana to face Justice - Emile Short

Former head of the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) Emile Short has insisted that the Ghanaian court summon Gambian President Yahya Jammeh to answer to accusations of spearheading the gruesome murders of about 44 Ghanaians in the Gambia.

According to Martin Kyere, a sole survivor of the happenings of that fateful day, he and over 50 others, 44 of them being Ghanaians were subjected to bloody torture and massacre after the Gambian military men mistook them for mercenaries.

Martin Kyere narrated his painful experience at a news conference organised in Accra by the Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana) to bring Yahya Jammeh, the Gambian President who is believed to have ordered the ghastly murder to justice.

Speaking on how justice can be served on the heinous crime, Emile Short enlightened that the international community has consolidated the idea that the nature and seriousness of certain crimes can be the responsibility of a particular sovereign state.

He explained that, the doctrine seeks to empower courts, “no matter where the offence was committed, no matter who the accused persons are” in order to hold accountable or sanction people who commit the crimes.



Emile Short thus averred that since the doctrine gives Ghana the mandate to pursue the crime, the president Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and the Attorney General Gloria Akuffo must not take the issue lightly but must ensure that the former head of state is prosecuted according to the laws of Ghana.

“The courts in Ghana, the Attorney General can invoke in order to bring Yahya Jammeh to justice. Because the last hurdle is the extradition. We have to get Jammeh into this country and that also is a political matter. But it is my hope that if government takes seriously, and I hope it does, that the president will do well to make sure that Yahya Jammeh is extradited into this country to face the law

Meanwhile, President Yahya Jammeh initially denied knowledge of the crime, but after intense diplomatic pressure, admitted that his soldiers were behind it, but failed to tell the international community that he himself ordered the killings.



Again, given the evidence that has been compiled and the gravity of the offences demonstrated by those who have testified, Emile Short was of the belief that a “momentum can be gathered to ensure international support for a request of the extradition of Yahya Jammeh to Ghana to face trial.”