The Gambia’s National Intelligence Agency (NIA) detained a United States-based journalist as she arrived home on holiday in connection with stories criticising the government, relatives and security sources said on Friday.
Authorities in mainland Africa’s smallest country periodically detain journalists critical of President Yahya Jammeh, a former coup leader who said after his re-election last year he would ban any newspaper that offended him.
Fatou Jaw Manneh was detained on Wednesday on arrival at the tiny West African country’s main airport, and her father Ismaila Manneh was taken in by the NIA on Friday for questioning, family members said.
Another journalist, Sheriff Bojang Junior, was also briefly detained by the NIA, but fled to neighbouring Senegal as soon as he was released, despite an order to report daily to the agency, the security sources added.
Manneh, who is in her late 30s, worked on The Gambia’s pro-government Daily Observer newspaper in the late 1990s before going to study in the United States.
She now lives in Washington, from where she has written stories for opposition websites critical of Jammeh’s government.
Security sources told Reuters she was arrested in connection with stories in which she criticised Jammeh.
Press freedom watchdogs have criticised The Gambia’s government for detaining journalists, often without charge, and demanded further investigation of the 2004 killing of prominent journalist Deyda Hydara, who was shot dead at the wheel of his car. Official probes have so far been inconclusive. – Reuters