By Mafugi Ceesay
Dr. Ismaila Ceesay, a political science lecturer and activist yesterday told journalists that former Gambian President Jammeh cannot be cleared in the rape allegation of Toufah Jallow.
Ceesay, who was speaking on the sidelines of a protest march to condemn rape in the wake of mounting allegations, said it is easy to see that Yahya Jammeh was the most powerful man in this country both politically and economically, and could get away with things.
“But again in every problem there are apologists, there must be people who would always be in denial. The fact that Jammeh was using is powers to oragnise these beauty pageants using girls is itself a problem,” he said.
Dr Cessay added that yesterday’s rape awareness procession was a very important step in the campaign to educate the people on this issue.
“Anybody who helped the dictatorship to flourish should be held accountable, whether you help him (Jammeh) sexually exploit our girls, or misused our funds or whether you helped him abuse girls,” he said.
He said he was disappointed none in the political leadership or politicians and even people known to have championed girls’ rights in this country bothered to attend the procession.
“Today we are sending strong message that in this 21st century it is not acceptable to sexually harass or rape a woman.
There is no excuse, we have to stop it and we have to go back and come up with a proper strategy.
We need a strategy to fight this menace, and we have to go back to our education system which is failing us, as it is not even producing good citizens anymore,” Dr Ceesay said.
“Women are sexually exploited in our offices, because we don’t take rape and sexual harassment very seriously. Whenever it occurs, we blame the women,” Dr. Ceesay added.
