On Monday, the lawyer representing Yankuba Touray has asked the High Court to order the arrest of Dr Baba Galleh Jallow, the executive secretary of the Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission.
Abdoulie Sisoho said the court should arrest Dr Jallow for his failure to honour a summon to provide the July 28 testimony of Ensa Mendy.
Mendy was a witness before the Truth Commission who testified in connection to the murder of Ousman Koro Ceesay, a former finance minister killed in June, 1995.
Mendy is the second prosecution witness in the murder trial of Touray who was charged with the murder of Koro.
The TRRC said in a statement on Tuesday that they have in fact submitted Mendy’s statement at the court.
Below is the entire statement:
The Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission (TRRC)takes note that on the 4thNovember 2019, during theYankuba Touray Trial, Counsel for Mr.Yankuba Touray requested that the Court issue a Bench Warrant against the Executive Secretary of the Commission Dr Baba Galleh Jallow, for failing to appear and present certain documents requested by the Defence.
Without delving into the merits of the application of the Defence, the Office of the Lead Counsel of the TRRC wishes to inform the general public that the TRRC, in fact, sent a representative who was present in Court during the hearing. It is sufficient in this particular instance that an authorized official of the TRRC was present in Court in pursuance of the Summons to Produce Documents. The Court was also notified of this fact by the Prosecutor in charge of the case.
As such, the TRRC is of the view that the application of the Defence for a Bench Warrant against Dr Jallow was unnecessary. In any case, Section 25 of the TRRC Act 2017, grants immunity to the Executive Secretary and other staff of the Commission from civil and criminal proceedings for any act or omission done in the official performance of their functions. In this context, a Bench Warrant against the Executive Secretary or any other staff of the TRRC would be unlawful.
The TRRC wishes to inform the general public that it will always comply with all lawful orders of the Courts addressed to it, including orders to produce any documents that it may be lawfully requested to produce. In this case, the documents that the Executive Secretary of the TRRC was requested to produce before the court were not produced by the representative of the Commission because of the arguments between the parties which are yet to be ruled upon and also the absence of an order by the judge for that person to take the witness stand and submit the documents to the Court.
The TRRC wishes to further inform the general public that all the available materials requested by the Defence to be produced during the hearing were in fact already provided to Mr Yankuba Touray as required by the TRRC Provisional Rules of Procedure. As such, the submission of the same set of documents to the Court as requested by the Defence of Mr. Yankuba Touray would have just amounted to a duplication of the process. Nonetheless, the TRRC was represented in Court by an official of the Commission who possessed the relevant documents and was available to produce them to the Court if asked to do so.
Finally, the TRRC assures all concerned that it will always endeavour to comply with the law.