By Tabora Bojang
Former Interior Minister Mai Ahmad Fatty, now special adviser to President Barrow, has said reports linking him to the signing of an alleged deportation agreement between the Gambia government and European Union during his time as Interior minister are ‘false’ and part of a campaign instigated by enemies to tarnish his political image.
Fatty who is also the leader of the Gambia Moral Congress, a member of the governing coalition government is referring to a widely spread video on social media showing him at a signing ceremony with EU officials purportedly for deportation of Gambians from Europe.
Mr Fatty said the video were real but the occasion and purpose of the ceremony was deliberately distorted by enemies who claimed it was for deportation of Gambian migrants.
“It is very necessary for me to come out and clarify myself on these allegations. The signing ceremony was on the 3rd November 2017 and it was between The Gambia and the EU to help transport stranded Gambian migrants who were subjected to slavery and other maltreatments at the hands of smugglers and other syndicates. It was never for deportation of migrants already in Europe. And any case none of that money even went to my ministry. Rather it was used by the EU itself to hire airplanes among other things to bring back our stranded and frustrated citizens to their families,” Fatty claimed.
The agreement, he went on, was signed publicly in the presence of the media and the purpose was to help our citizens back from deplorable conditions in Libya and who themselves asked to be voluntarily sent home to safety.
