By Kebelo Demba Nyima
The government’s public position is that its appeal follows legal assessment and that the state owes obligations to victims, the surviving officer, and the public, while urging restraint to avoid prejudicing proceedings. Yet where executive or police actions appear to diverge from the trial court’s operational orders (or where the legality of re-arrest is itself publicly disputed by the justice minister), the statutory framework becomes a battlefield of interpretation, fertile ground for political messaging and mobilisation.
Security-sector implications are equally serious. First, the unresolved substantive question, who killed the officers if the prosecution failed, remains central to public safety and police morale. Second, the judgment critiques reported by the domestic press highlight investigative weaknesses: lack of forensic linkage, failure to verify alibi claims, and unreliable identification/confession processes. Third, because the case included terrorism-related counts, the quality control of anti-terror procedures becomes a strategic issue: the Anti-Terrorism Act contains provisions on detention procedures, including custody records and the making/keeping of video recordings for certain detentions. When a high-profile terrorism-linked prosecution collapses amid process critiques, the downstream effect can be broader skepticism toward counter-terror policing, especially in a context where early official messaging invoked cross-border rebel narratives.
Comparative lessons from established democracies near elections
A central lesson from consolidated democracies is not that they avoid crises during election periods, but that they build institutional “restraint architectures” to reduce the temptation to convert sensitive legal-security matters into partisan capital.
In the United Kingdom, the “pre-election period of sensitivity” is framed as a time when ministers typically observe discretion over announcements or decisions that could influence voters and where public resources must not be used for party campaigning. Parallel Cabinet Office guidance for civil servants is explicitly about conduct during the pre-election period and the maintenance of impartiality.
In Canada, the Privy Council Office’s election-period guidelines articulate the “caretaker convention”: after dissolution, governments should act with restraint because they cannot assume renewed confidence, restricting activity to routine/non-controversial/urgent matters or those reversible or agreed with opposition, while still preserving safety and security in emergencies and even taking steps to preserve legal options (such as appeal rights). Australia’s Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet similarly explains caretaker conventions as guardrails for agency conduct on major policy decisions, appointments, contracts, and avoiding public service involvement in election activities.
A second lesson is structured, non-partisan public communication protocols for election-threatening incidents. Canada’s Critical Election Incident Public Protocol (CEIPP) is designed to communicate to the public “in a clear, transparent and impartial manner” if an incident threatens election integrity, specifically to ensure coherence and consistency in the government’s approach during the writ period. While the Bojang case is not an election-interference incident, the design principle matters: when events risk destabilising the public sphere, democracies often separate operational security/legal processes from partisan contestation by building communication channels that are procedurally insulated.
Finally, consolidated democracies retain norms (and sometimes enforceable rules) aimed at protecting court processes from prejudicial public commentary. Scholarship on the sub judice rule emphasizes that the core concern is publication or statements that may prejudice proceedings, reinforcing why politicians treating an active appeal as campaign material can be institutionally corrosive.
A forward agenda for government and opposition ahead of the December 2026 poll
The risk is not that “security” is discussed during elections—security is inherently political, but that this specific case becomes a proxy battlefield that incentivizes interference narratives, escalatory policing, and grievance mobilisation, thereby destabilising the election environment. The calendar already signals that the election cycle is structurally underway: the IEC sets presidential election day for 5 December 2026 and defines the campaign period in November–early December, with voter registration activity running earlier in 2026.
A credible non-distraction agenda requires both sides to treat the case as a rule-of-law test rather than a campaign instrument.
For the government, the minimum credibility package follows from its own stated commitment to judicial independence and lawful process and from the NHRC’s findings. This includes (i) disciplined sub judice communication—one authoritative legal spokesperson, no insinuations about political opponents’ culpability, and strict avoidance of statements that could prejudice appeal proceedings; (ii) strict compliance with court orders and warrant/bail requirements, given the NHRC’s allegation of warrantless committal and the Attorney General’s own reported assessment that the re-arrest was unlawful; and (iii) an evidence-led security response focused on investigatory capacity (forensics, chain-of-custody, identification protocols) rather than rhetorical securitisation.
For the opposition, “not sleeping at the wheel” means refusing the temptation to turn a live appeal into a loyalty test (pro-Bojang vs pro-state) and instead proposing institutional reforms that prevent recurrence: police accountability and oversight, prosecution quality-control, and public order policing standards aligned with the Basic Principles on Use of Force.
Both government and opposition should redirect political energy toward three empirically grounded priorities that better match voter incentives, especially youth incentives, than a single criminal case. First, youth livelihoods and social stability: recent data place youth unemployment around 10.86% (2025) using World Bank/ILO modeled estimates disseminated via FRED, while domestic commentary notes youth demographic dominance and a median age around 18—conditions that make election-year frustration more likely to be expressed through protests and rapid mobilisation. Second, electoral credibility and administration: the IEC’s published timeline (registration, nominations, campaign period, cooling-off day) implies concrete operational tasks, logistics, transparency, and dispute-resolution readiness that cannot be crowded out by reactive crisis politicals. Third, security-sector reform tied to public trust: the Africa Center analysis of the 2026 election context underscores the fragility of democratic consolidation and the importance of institutional checks and balances, precisely the terrain damaged when policing is perceived as disregarding court authority.
A practical way to operationalize “de-politicisation” without suppressing legitimate dissent is a cross-party election-year restraint compact, borrowing the logic (not the constitutional form) of caretaker conventions: restrict inflammatory announcements, consult across party lines on urgent security/public order actions that cannot wait, and create a non-partisan incident-communication protocol for events likely to trigger unrest. Comparative guidance from Canada and Australia is explicit that restraint is compatible with emergencies and with preserving legal rights, meaning the state can pursue appeals while still avoiding discretionary escalation.
Conclusion
The Bojang case began as a profound national security tragedy: two officers killed, one wounded, and the state’s obligation to deliver accountability and protect public safety plainly engaged. Yet the post-acquittal sequence of re-arrest controversies, street mobilisation, tear gas/water cannon use, and elite political escalation has converted a criminal-justice process into an electoralised legitimacy struggle.
Calling this a “distraction” is not to minimize the victims or the public’s demand for justice. It is to insist that the appropriate arena for determining culpability is the appellate process, and the appropriate arena for democratic competition is policy: credible elections administration, youth opportunity, accountable policing, and security sector capacity. Where the case becomes campaign material, it risks prejudicing proceedings, deepening mistrust, and normalising cycles of protest and force outcomes that weaken both security and democracy in a decisive election year.
The end.
The author is a Gambian scholar and political commentator based in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. He is a legal and national security analyst whose work focuses on governance, rule of law, and democratic accountability in The Gambia. He holds several advanced academic degrees, including a Master’s in Intelligence and National Security Studies. His research and writing focus on governance, and his writings have been published in several media outlets, where he engages critically with public policy, security issues, and political developments.
