The torture regime of former president Jammeh’s intelligence agency has been laid bare by the first civilian witness to testify before the Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission in Banjul yesterday.

Batch Samba Jallow, a former headteacher at Kafuta Primary School, gave a harrowing account of his arrest and torture by the then infamous National Intelligence Agency (NIA). Jallow said his Orwellian nightmare started on 12 October 1995 when a group of four officers of the NIA made a force entry into his house at around 4am in the morning and dragged him out of his bed naked.

“I was lying in bed with my wife when they entered my room. I was dragged to the floor. My children were lying on floor few feet away from my bed. The kids panicked and started crying for help. I asked what was going on and I was told I was wanted at the NIA.”

Jallow identified the four NIA officers that arrested him as Daba Marenah (late), Musa Kinteh, Foday Barrie and Baba Saho. He said the NIA officers were armed with pistols and accompanied by two armed soldiers. He added that he recognised Daba as they were former neighbours in Kaur.

He said the beating started in his room when Foday Barrie and Baba Saho kicked him in the back. He added that Saho hit him in the face with his pistol and he lost one of his teeth. Jallow further said that when he was about to be dragged out of his room, he refused to be taken away naked. He pleaded with them for him to put on his clothes. They agreed but denied him footwear.

“I told my wife they’re taking me away. So take care of my sons because I don’t know if I am coming back. When I got to the gate I received more kicks on the ribs and I was forced into a white van. I was seated at the back sandwiched by Musa Kanteh and Baba Saho as the van drove to Banjul.”

Jallow said the NIA accused him of a plot to bring American soldiers in The Gambia to overthrow the newly formed AFPRC junta and killed Gambians. He said he denied knowledge of such a plot as he was not a military person.

He said he was taken to the NIA offices in Banjul at the old GPMB building and they arrived at 7am due to the heavy rain and mud. At the NIA, he said he was seated on a wooden chair and asked to undress himself.

“I refused to undress and then Daba Marenah slapped me in the face. The four NIA officers forcefully removed all my clothes. I was left completely naked. My hands and legs were tied with electric cables. Then they repeated their claims again: ‘you were working to bring the American soldiers. Before they kill us, we we will kill you. When we are done with you, you’re not going to be a man again.’

“Baba Saho came with a rock and hit me on my genital. It was very painful. Then they tied my fingers, toes, mouth, ears and genital to electrical cables connected to a socket. They switched it on and I was receiving electric shocks all over my body. It was very painful and I was pleading for them to stop. It continued until the lights in the room went off and that’s when they stopped. As you can see my toes are all dead because of the electric shocks.”

When Jallow thought the torture was all over after the beating and the electric shocks by the four NIA officers, it turned out that was just the beginning of a long and sustained torture sessions. He said another NIA officer entered the room in military boots and stamped on his small finger. Jallow cried while recalling the painful experience. His distressing account brought tears to many of the people present at his testimony including some commissioners.

Jallow continued: “He broke my last finger and the bone was protruding from the flesh. I lost the use of this finger. My finger now has no life, it’s plastic. It was surgically replaced in the USA while I was in exile there.”

He said after that painful experience he was very thirsty but was denied water. In the evening,he said, when he wanted to pee and that’s when two NIA officers (one tall and hefty and another short) entered the room carrying with them a cup of urine. They asked him to drink the urine and when he refused they tried to force him to drink it.

“One of them block my nose so I couldn’t breath while the other forcefully opened my mouth. I was slapped and beaten for refusing. I told them that I could only drink my own urine and not someone else’s. So I eventually drank my own urine.”

Jallow later identified the tall and hefty NIA officer as Abdoulie Bojang who was now deceased. He said he identified Bojang when he returned to torture them after he was transferred to the Fajara Barracks detention centre. He said Bojang was cruel pointing out “he was the most wicked human being I have ever seen.”

“He brought out a blue sponge and shoved it into my mouth. He wrapped a grey duct tape around my mouth. I couldn’t cry or shout. I was praying to God to die and rest in peace because the pain was unbearable. Frankly, I preferred dead at that moment

“I was removed from the wooden chair and forced to lie on the concrete floor. Bojang brought out a knife and told me ‘you’re going to die today.’ He told me to open my legs and told me ‘we don’t play and we will show you we mean business.’ He sliced me in the buttocks and legs with his knife. I was bleeding all over my body. Daba Marenah was present and the master mind of the torture. Musa Kinteh was trying to force me to confess but I couldn’t talk as I was in severe pain.”

Jallow said he was moved to Bambadinka Number Two, another torture chamber. He mentioned that Bambadinka was the worst of the torture chambers adding that it was dark and it smelled awful.

“When you’re taken there, you prayed to God to die and rest in peace. Lots of blood in there and blood smells everywhere. It’s slippery and completely dark. I’m only aware of the passage of time by a pinhole in the door. The floor was dotted with tiny pieces of metals, glasses, stones and they dragged me around the floor after tying me in a ball shape. All my body was bleeding and they use cold water to clean the blood.”

Jallow noted that the torture continued the whole night. He said he found two other detainees in Bambadinka and they refused to talk to him fearing it might get them in trouble.

He said on the second day of his detention at the NIA, the beating continued. Officers would use electric cables, pipes and batons to beat them. He stated that the cable was the most painful. He said the officers used small torchlights to locate the detainees in the dark room when they were about to beat them.

“Anytime you see the light then you should expect a whip on your body.”

He claimed he was held incommunicado with no contact to his family or lawyer and was denied food, water and shower.

Jallow said the torture continued on the third day of his detention. He was still denied food and water. He said he pleaded with them but they refused saying that they were ordered not to give him food and water. However, one of the NIA officers whom he identified as Abdur-Rahman Jallow took pity on him and provided him with water and paracetamol.

He said he couldn’t recalled what happened to him on the fourth day of his detention.

But on the fifth day, he was transferred to Kotu Police Station on a garbage truck.

“Two NIA officers came to Bambadinka and told me I was to be transferred to another location. I couldn’t stand as my whole body was numbed with pain. They held me as I limped to a waiting garbage truck. I was put in the garbage compartment with two other people. You couldn’t differentiate us with the rubbish.”

He said the torture decreased at Kotu Police Station and he was put in solitary confinement.

He mentioned an incident on his second night at the Kotu Police Station, when the same NIA officers (that arrested him) returned at 2am to take him out of the station. He said the detention officer at the time refused to allow him to be taken away until the NIA officers presented him with a formal document authorising his transfer.

Jallow said he was later transferred to Fajara Barracks where he met other high profile detainees like OJ, Ousainou Darboe, M.C. Cham. He said most of the detainees were in worst shape as a result of torture.

“I saw OJ bleeding in the eye, Ishmael Jawara was almost dead, Yahya Darboe had scratches on his body.”

He said they were detained in a disused military garage with no window or ventilation. The facility had no toilet for the 72 detainees. They had to sleep on the concrete floor without bedding and they had to use their palms to rest their heads on when they sleep. Jallow said they had no shower for 32 days and the stench were unbearable.

Jallow highlighted a surreal moment when vultures and maggots descended on where they were detained due to the smell of death and decay. He said he believed a set of tarpaulin in the garage where they were detained had human remains because of the amounts of maggots and stench emanating from there.

He said their conditions only improved after the visit of a delegation from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Then they were treated better as political prisoners but with some restrictions. He said he was denied lawyer during his 14 months of detention.

Jallow accused Fatou Bensouda, the current chief prosecutor at the ICC, of complicity. He said Bensouda, who was the then state prosecutor, upgraded his earlier charge of sedition to treason when he appeared at the Kanifing Magistrate Court. He noted that he was accused of organising a demonstration against the AFPRC junta an act deemed illegal and seditious. He praised lawyer Sheriff Tambedou for representing some of his co-accused and fighting for their release.

He said the case was eventually dropped due to lack of evidence but they were still detained. He claimed he was sacked from his teaching job which he had done for 40 years without compensation.

Jallow clarified that he was not a member of the ousted PPP government but supported the party’s leadership and their policies. He said he believed he was arrested because he had voiced his disapproval of the AFPRC junta and had also refused to join their political party, the APRC in his hometown of Niamina Dankuku.

He said after his release he was able to smuggle himself out of the country and was resettled in the U.S.A as a political refugee. He said he received medical treatments in the U.S.A to treat the injuries and traumas sustained at the hands of Jammeh’s security personnel.

Jallow in his closing statement said he couldn’t believe Gambians were capable of “such inhumane and depraved acts.” He urged Gambians not to ever repeat that dark chapter. He told the commission that he was a teacher for 40 years and that he wanted his life back.