Ebrima
Sillah, a former BBC correspondent in The Gambia, has been appointed director
general of the Gambia Radio and Television Services (GRTS).
Mr
Sillah, a communications for development consultant, will fill in the
directorship, which has been vacant since the dismal of Malick Jones last week.
Sillah
has also worked for The Point newspaper, Citizen newspaper, and Citizen FM
radio. He was BBC correspondent in The Gambia before he fled to Senegal. While
in Senegal he also worked for Al Jazeera news agency and a number of media
houses, including radio and online services.
Analysts
said his main task, as the director general, would be to reform and increase
public trust in the state broadcaster, which was largely seen as a propaganda
tool of the previous regime of Yahya Jammeh.
He
fled to Senegal in August 2004 after surviving an attempt on his life by
purported agents of Jammeh’s regime, due to his reporting on a number of
unexplained disappearances and allegations of the widespread torture of
political detainees.
He
is also said to have survived two abduction attempts while living in Senegal,
after he demanded an investigation into the case of two Gambian nationals who
were allegedly kidnapped by Gambian security operatives in the Senegalese
capital.
