When the rulebook was pushed aside, one finance minister refused to look the other way
Parliament may have exposed the irregularities, but the first alarm bell came from the man guarding the nation's purse.
Parliament has rightly received praise for exposing irregularities in the handling of assets seized from former President Yahya Jammeh. The National Assembly's recent report has stirred an overdue national conversation about accountability, financial discipline, and the rule of law. Yet buried within the details of that report lies a truth that deserves equal attention: the first serious warning about those irregularities did not originate in Parliament. It came earlier from Mamburay Njie, then Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs, who insisted that the management of those assets must comply with the Public Finance Act 2014.
Finance Act is not a minor procedural guideline. It is the backbone of the state's fiscal system. The Act establishes how public funds and assets must be received, recorded, managed, and audited. It ensures that financial decisions remain within a transparent treasury framework overseen by the Ministry of Finance and the Accountant General. In economic terms, such systems protect the integrity of public finances by preventing discretionary handling of state resources outside legally recognised channels.
According to the findings now acknowledged by Parliament, the management of Jammeh's seized assets departed from this framework. Accounts connected to those assets were reportedly opened and administered outside the normal treasury system required by law. In any functioning public finance system, such an arrangement immediately raises serious concerns because it removes financial transactions from the very oversight mechanisms designed to protect them.
When these developments came to his attention, Mamburay Njie objected. As the minister responsible for safeguarding the nation's financial administration, he insisted that the management of those assets must be brought back within the legal framework established by the Public Finance Act. His position was neither political nor theatrical.
It was a straightforward professional obligation rooted in the principles of fiscal accountability.
[That insistence, however, brought him into direct conflict with the then Attorney General and Minister of Justice Abubacarr Ba Tambedou. According to the parliamentary report, Njie's objections were met not with institutional coordination but with confrontation. Tambedou reportedly threatened him with prosecution for challenging the financial arrangements surrounding the assets.
The significance of that confrontation has become clearer with the publication of Parliament's report. The National Assembly has now concluded that the management of those assets involved serious violations of the Public Finance Act. In doing so, Parliament has effectively confirmed that the concerns raised by Njie were not only legitimate but prescient.
What was once dismissed by some observers as bureaucratic resistance now appears in a different light. It was the earliest attempt within government itself to defend the integrity of the country's financial laws.
Yet the sequence of events that followed raises questions about how such acts of professional integrity are treated within public administration. Shortly after the dispute emerged, Njie was removed from his ministerial position and later posted to the diplomatic service abroad, where he now serves as The Gambia's ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
to the civil service that defending institutional procedures is not an act of disloyalty but one of patriotism. In countries where public institutions are still consolidating, such signals are essential for encouraging officials to act with independence and integrity.
Equally important, recognising his conduct would strengthen public confidence in government. Citizens are far more likely to trust state institutions when they see that those who protect the nation's financial system are acknowledged rather than forgotten.
The National Assembly has now performed its duty by exposing irregularities in the management of the Jammeh assets. But the record shows that the earliest defence of the country's financial laws came from a finance minister who insisted that the rulebook be respected.
Mamburay Njie defended the treasury when it mattered most.
The Republic should now recognise that service, not quietly, but with the national honour it deserves.
