The
Chief Justice of The Gambia, Justice Emmanuel Fagbenle, has said that the
Supreme Court of the Gambia cannot determine the election petitions until May
2017.
Justice
Fagbenle made this announcement yesterday at his chambers, when the matter came
up.
Two
election petitions were filed for the APRC, one by Bala Garba Jahumpa general
secretary of the party, and another by Yankuba Colley, on behalf of five
thousand, three hundred and thirty voters, against the Independent Electoral
Commission (IEC), the Returning Officer for the election who is the IEC
Chairman, the president-elect Adama Barrow and the Attorney General.
He
said the judges were appointed in August 2016, but the Supreme Court is
handicapped due to the unavailability of judges for the sitting to hear the
petitions, among others.
He
added that his Nigerian and Sierra Leonean counterparts have communicated to
him that the judges would not be available to sit in the Supreme Court until
May or November this year.
The
Supreme Court requires at least five judges to form a quorum.
Justice
Fagbenle also disclosed that the APRC lawyer, Edward Gomez, informed him that
they had done everything possible to serve the defendants, but to no avail; and
that Gomez applied for substituted service on the defendants.
The
Chief Justice suggested that the Alternative Dispute Resolution Mechanism could
also be explored by resorting to the Interparty Committee or to make use of the
ECOWAS Mediation process.
ECOWAS
has the capacity to provide Gambia with judges as part of mediation process, he
went on.
In
any case, he continued, the two parties in the political dispute should engage
in a peaceful resolution of the political impasse.
Meanwhile,
the matter was adjourned until 16 January 2017.
