Sillaba Samateh, the first prosecution witness in the ongoing criminal trial of the former IGP, Ensa Badjie, Lt Colonel Mam Mattaar Secka and Major Kuluteh Manneh has told the High Court in Banjul, presided over by Justice Emmanuel Amadi that the first accused, Ensa Badjie instructed him to use the name of the president of the Republic to trade in hard drugs.

The first prosecution witness made these revelations during the criminal trial of the three accused persons when he was being cross-examined by defence counsel, Borry S. Touray. It could be recalled that the accused persons are standing trial on 50 counts of criminal offences ranging from conspiracy to commit felony, to conspiracy to commit sedition, abuse of office, official corruption, and economic crimes among others. Meanwhile, before continuing his cross-examination, Lawyer Borry Touray informed the court that the DPP, Richard Chenge yesterday morning called him into his office and gave him a CD, which the DPP said is the recorded version of the conversation between the PW1, Sillaba Samateh, PW1's son and the recorder of the tape.

Touray further informed the court that the recording is not very clear, but however applied to tender the said CD in evidence. He stated that the content of the CD would be transcribed and that by the time the court gets the transcribed version of the CD, he would apply to recall PW1, Sillaba Samateh for cross-examination. The presiding Judge, Justice Amadi admitted the said CD in evidence and it was marked as Defence exhibit one. As the cross-examination continued, PW1 told the court that he collected the sum of ?3150 (euros) from one Omar Ndow for the purpose of drugs and precious stones.

PW1 explained that he knew Omar Ndow through Edrissa, but said one Mohammed Ceesay from Freetown did not give him any money. The witness said he has never met with anybody called Francis in Holland and never collected money from him. He further said he doesn't know Frank and Emmanuel and denied claims that they were introduced to him by the said Omar Ndow. The witness further denied claims that he never received one Aaron David Bright at the Banjul International Airport and that his uncle, Kawsu Kassama and Edrissa never accompanied him to the airport to receive the said Aaron Bright, nor did he lodge him at Baobab Holiday Resort.

Sillaba Samateh also denied claims that he never stated in his statement that he gave Aaron Bright 8kg of Cocaine, but cannot remember telling Edrissa that Aaron Bright had travelled to Dakar on a fishing expedition, because there was a delay in the drug transaction. The witness also denied claims that he told Edrissa that the second accused, Lt. Col. Mattaar Secka was a helicopter driver. The witness said he doesn't know one Sunny Boy and was not aware that it was t he said Sunny Boy who sent Aaron David Bright. He also said that most of the payments made by Edrissa were witnessed by some of the accused persons.

PW1 explained that the first payment made by Aaron David Bright, which was D40,000, was taken by the first accused, Ensa Badjie, but the second payment of D40,000 was shared among the first accused, Ensa Badjie, the second accused, Mam Mattaar Secka, Edrissa and himself. PW1 further explained that he has paid what he took from the said Salim, but the first accused, Ensa Badjie was left to pay what he took from Salim.

He said the reason he took an undertaking to pay Salim the sum of $28,000 at the material time was because the first accused, Ensa Badjie was in charge of The Gambia Police Force and he had told him he doesn't want his name to be mentioned in any of the transactions. The witness said he wants the court to believe that it was the first accused who took $14,000 out of the $28,000 that Salim paid because the first accused took the said $14,000 in the presence of Edrissa.  

The witness denied claims that the money he used to build his storey building in Tranquil was not his hard earned money but money he tricked from people and he cannot remember how much money he came with from Europe as he was working in Europe. He said though he cannot remember how much money he came with from Europe, he has evidence that he effected bank transfers from Holland and he has been in The Gambia for almost two years now.

Sillaba Samateh told the court that he transferred some of his monies through Western Union and Moneygram, but cannot remember the various outlets. He added that he has documentation to show that he came with money.

Defence application to tender receipts
At this point, Lawyer Borry Touray told the court that the witness hasn't answered his question and applied for the witness to produce his Moneygram and Western Union receipts from 2008. The DPP, Richard Cheng objected to the application on the ground that the witness has not been charged with the offence of money laundering and that the receipts of money transfer is absolutely irrelevant in the case.

He advanced that what is relevant before the court is what the witness did with the accused persons in The Gambia. The DPP said whether the witness came with one billion dollars into The Gambia from Europe is irrelevant in the case, and pointed out that what is relevant is his dealings or transactions with the accused persons.

He therefore urged the court to overrule the application.  Lawyer Touray submitted that the DPP's objection is baseless and since the witness had given evidence that he came from Europe with a lot of money and the accused persons are facing criminal charges, the witness should provide documentations as to his source of wealth.

Touray cited section 202 of the Evidence Act and urged the court to dismiss the DPP's objection. DPP in his reply on point of Law, cited section 3 of the Evidence Act and pointed out that it would be ridiculous for the defence to test the witness on wide ranging issues to ascertain the veracity and credibility of the witness, noting that the veracity of the witness's evidence is not relevant to the charge and that such application by the defence would delay the court proceedings.

In his brief ruling, the presiding Judge declared that if the purpose of the defence application is to test the credibility of the witness, the witness is not charged with any offence before the court and he does not see the relevance of such documents before the court.  The application was then rejected.

The witness revealed that he over the past two years sold some of his properties. He denied claims that he made a statement that he sold one of his properties to pay the president of the Republic the sum of 500 000 Euros and said he never told Edrissa that he had to settle the "big man" (the president). The witness confirmed that he collected "15,000  from one Ikemefuna Izuchukwu and shared the said money among all the accused persons in the presence of Edrissa.

The witness further denied the defence claims that he had told Edrissa that the president had transported 600kg of cocaine from the Republic of Mali; he also denied telling the same Edrissa that the president also brought 10 tons of cocaine into The Gambia and that he had been specifically engaged to market the said cocaine.

The witness denied defence claims that he created fabrications to deceive people. He told the court that it is not true that he made falsehood to appear real, by lying to his customers that he has the support of the IGP and senior Army officers at his service in his transactions in the cocaine trade. The witness further told the court that the first accused and some NIA operatives raided his house and conducted a search, and that though he was arrested, he was never charged, because the first accused had earlier informed him about the said raid. He said the first accused told him that he would be detained for three days and it was during the period that he gave the sum of D800,000 to the first accused to terminate the problem, even though he (first accused) had requested for  D1 million.

The witness denied being convicted at the Brikama Magistrates' Court, saying that he never stepped his foot into the said court premises to answer to any charge. He stated that he got the said D800,000 from the proceeds of the sale of his lease property in Latrikunda but cannot remember the name of the person who bought the said property. The witness revealed that it was Lawyer Antouman Gaye who prepared the Deed of  Assignment between the buyer and himself.

He insisted that he had paid monies to all the accused persons and that most of the electrical equipment in the house of the first accused were bought by him and that the police went to most of the shops he bought the items from to obtain their statements, disclosing that it was the driver of the first accused that was collecting the items. The witness denied being a drug dealer and reiterated that he had meetings with the first accused, Ensa Badjie at Tranquill where the first accused explained the mode of operations to him.

He denied claims by the defence that the accused persons never asked him to tell his customers that he was doing the drug trade for the president. The witness finally said it was only the first accused, Ensa Badjie that used to tell him to say that he is doing the drug trade for the president. Hearing continues on Thursday, 17th of June, 2010, at 1:00pm.