Teacher Arrested, Detained for Baby Dumping

Confirmed reports reaching The Point have it that one Mariama Sillah, a teacher currently undertaking her Primary Teachers Certificate (PTC) course at the GambiaCollege, Brikama, was last Friday arrested by the police and currently detained at the Old Yundum Police Station.

Ms. Sillah, 26, a native of Sambakalla in the North Bank Region but resident in Bakoteh, was said to have been arrested following the reported dumping of her newly born baby into a pitch latrine.

According to Inspector Sulayman Secka, Public Relations Officer of the Gambia Police Force, the incident happened on 8th October 2008 at Old Yundum but the information came to the attention of the police on Friday 17th October 2008 and investigations were then mounted and the lady was subsequently arrested.

PRO Secka added that despite spirited searching mounted by the Fire and Ambulance Services, the body of the baby could not be recovered because according to him, the body, which was dumped for almost a week, had already decomposed.

Police Spokesperson Secka, however, called on the general public to be vigilant in reporting what he described as "such inhuman acts". "We should be very careful and always report such incidents to the police because such acts are becoming rampant in our society. Landlords should also be very careful with strangers most of whom only travel when ever they have unwanted pregnancy so as to avoid embarrassment in their communities," he said.