By Tabora Bojang
A former registrar general Alieu Jallow yesterday faced accusations from the parliamentary enquiry committee on the sale of former president Jammeh’s frozen assets that he was concealing information about his involvement in the handling of the assets.
It followed Jallow’s denial that he ever wrote a letter to the Janneh Commission and the Chief of Defence staff, only for Counsel Kah to confront him with a letter he himself wrote to the two institutions regarding certain properties forfeited from the former president.
“We can confidently say you are intentionally concealing information because you vehemently denied ever writing to the commission or the chief of defence staff but these are letters you wrote and signed,” Counsel Kah told Mr Jallow, who took time to review the letters bearing his signature.
“With all honesty, I cannot remember this. I have forgotten it completely. This was eight years ago.
There is nothing that is special about this to conceal. This is my honest answer,” Jallow responded.
Counsel Kah further accused Jallow of not taking the work of the parliamentary committee seriously. “I am under oath. I really take the work of this committee seriously and that is why I decided to cancel my trip overseas. This has been a while and I really forgot,” Jallow assured.
The former registrar general also denied ever setting eyes on an additional court order freezing additional properties in Banjul and six other bank accounts under the former president.
He further claimed he never discussed these court orders with former Justice Minister Ba Tambadou.
Jallow was also asked to explain how, out of 107 frozen properties of the former president, only 37 were visited and identified by him and his team.
He replied that he was operating as a one-man army since the majority of his team members ceased taking part in the second phase because there was no motivation or payment given to them.
“We had PIU officers accompanying us in the first phase but everybody dropped in the second phase. We were not paid. I could not maintain people because there was no motivation,” Jallow stated.
He accused former minister Tambadou of failing to give due attention to his work.
“For most times I was on my own. I was supposed to have a secretariat and staff working with me but I was limited and I was not even designated a vehicle. This requires proper coordination, staff, logistics and team. ” Jallow said.
He said these and many other issues prompted him to defer some of their responsibilities to the Jammeh Commission.
Inventory at Kanilai
Jallow informed the enquiry that his team also visited Kanilai on several occasions and took inventory of all items found at Jammeh’s residence there including household materials like 1 TV flat screen, 3 gas cookers, 4 refrigerators, 4 wooden wardrobes, 4 giant air conditioners, 1 deep freezer, 3 cartons of solar panels, 203 big mattresses, 374 small mattresses, 8 cooking stoves and 6 wooden tanks.
Other items he said, include 126 borehole gravel, 6 bags of anti sulphur boreholes, 35 seeders, 40 hoes,
1 horse cart, 1 donkey cart, 1 mobile toilet, 26 executive chairs, 32 chainsaw blades, centre tables, over 100 barbed wires, 60 shipping containers and 5 Pfizer containers.
On livestock, Jallow revealed that they have recorded 634 heads of cattle, 8 horses, 9 zebras, 7 hyenas, 37 sheep and two crocodile pools.
Hearing continues.
