Lieutenant
Landing Sanneh, a former State Guard Commander and cousin to former president
Yahya Jammeh has described former President Jammeh as one of the “worst
citizens Africa ever had”, vowing he will shoot Jammeh if he happens to returns to the country anytime.
Born
in Kanwally village in the Fonis in 1964, the former army lieutenant was
enlisted into the then Gambia National Army in 1984.
It
was in July 2000, when Lt. Sanneh alongside late Almamo Manneh were accused of
trying to overthrow Yahya Jammeh. He was eventually sentenced by a
court-martial to a 16-year jail term. However, he spent 15 years seven months
in prison before his eventual release through a presidential pardon in 2015.
In
a recent exclusive with the famous Coffee Time aired on West Coast Radio, the
former State Guard Commander made it categorically clear that he shall never
forgive Yahya Jammeh.
“Anybody
who is campaigning for Yahya Jammeh to come back to the country, I will put on
my uniform and I will take up arms and I am going to shot Jammeh.”
He
added: “I don’t mind to die. I have my daughters and my boys who are grown up
now. I am here waiting for Jammeh to come. I am going to raise arms against
Jammeh if he returns to the country. You don’t know me but go and ask people
that are in the army,” he said during the interview.
Sanneh
claimed that he was brought up together with Yahya Jammeh when both of them
were going to school at St. Edward’s and they were staying in the same village
at Dobong under one guardian.
According
to him, he was part of group of soldiers that escorted former President Yahya
Jammeh to State House in Banjul during the 1994 Coup d’ etate. Shortly after
the takeover in 1994, he was promoted to Second Lieutenant and sent to the
Second Infantry Battalion in Farafenni as an Adjutant.
In
1995, he stated, he was recalled and posted at the State Guard Battalion as an assistance
to Lang Tombong Tamba, who was the then State Guard Commander at the time.
“Eventually Lang Tombong Tamba was sent on a
course to Ghana, then I took over as the state guard commander on the 16th of
April 1996 to 14th of July 2000, when I was alleged together with Almamo Manneh
of trying to overthrow Yahya Jammeh.”
He
continued: “Subsequently, Almamo was killed during the process and I was
detained at the Mile Two Central Prison for 16 years. If I had accepted the
allegation of trying to overthrow Jammeh, I was not at the first place going to
take a lawyer.”
Recalling
the days of his arrest back in 2000, the ex-army officer claimed that former
President Jammeh was part of the soldiers that arrested him in his compound.
He
recalls: “Yahya Jammeh, personally came to my home together with Babucarr Jatta
and others to arrest me. They didn’t tell me anything during the process of
arresting me. They surrounded my compound and Jammeh gave orders and they
started shooting. They shot inside my compound and eventually they shot me in
my arm.”
Upon
his arrest, he said, he was taken to Yundum Barrack where he was given a
medical support. “From the Yundum Barrack, I was taken to the Mile Two Central
Prison where I stayed for 15 years seven months before I was pardoned by
Jammeh. After my release from prison, I tried all efforts to see Jammeh as
cousin, but proved futile. I went to Kanilai to see him on several occasions
but only to be told that Jammeh is busy on telephones and that he can’t see
me.”
On
some of the hard experience some of the inmates underwent during their time at
Mile Two, Lt. Sanneh stated: “Nobody leaves the prison without being tortured.
I was tortured physical and mentally. How can you be in a prison for 16 years
without being torture? The prison is not a hotel and it’s not a place where
someone can relax.”
Recently,
Concerned Gambia Social Welfare, a group whose members are mostly living in the
Diaspora conferred peace award on former President Jammeh, which was widely
criticised by Jammeh’s victims.
The
former army officer has this to say about the award: “Anybody who awarded Yahya
Jammeh a certificate of peace is because he Jammeh has never touched you.
Therefore, people awarding Jammeh certificate claiming that he maintains peace
and stability in the country is all rubbish and it’s a mockery to the people
that suffered under him.”
He
said: “If Jammeh is thinking about coming back in the country and rule the
people, it is ‘totally madness and Jammeh is a mad man, hence he should be
taken to a psychiatric or a prison.”