Government announces dismissal of detained police chief

The government of Gambia has sacked police chief Landing Badjie, who was arrested without explanation at the weekend, accusing him of "serious dereliction of duty." State television announced on Tuesday night that Landing had been replaced as Inspector General of Police by Major Ousman Sonko, an army officer who previously commanded the first battalion of the Gambian National Army. Badjie was arrested on Saturday, along with the head of the police criminal investigation unit, a former director of immigration and the Indian owners of two supermarkets in the capital Banjul. These five men were still being held in custody on Wednesday, although three lawyers and two directors of Gambia's largest tourist hotel, who were picked up in the same sweep, were released without charge on Monday and Tuesday. An official statement read out on television said Badjie had been dismissed "as a result of serious dereliction of duty and allowing himself to be put in very serious situations with individuals under investigation for activities endangering the security and health of the people." The two supermarkets owned by the Indian businessmen arrested along with Badjie were temporarily closed by the government last year for selling expired food. They later reopened. The government statement read out on television also criticised the sacked police chief for failing to solve a raft of other crimes, ranging from housebreaking to violent attacks on individuals, counterfeiting, serious economic crimes and driving cars without a number plate. The Daily Observer newspaper speculated on Monday, when news of Badjie's arrest first broke, that the police chief may have been implicated in the murder of outspoken newspaper editor Deyda Hydara two months ago. Hydara, the editor of The Point newspaper, was shot dead by unidentified men who drove alongside his car and shot him three times in the head as he was driving home at night on 16 December. No-one has ever been arrested or charged in connection with Hydara's murder, which was the latest in a series of violent attacks on media critics of President Yaya Jammeh. Journalists and human rights activists have voiced fears that the authorities had a hand in his killing. Last year, Jammeh, a former army lieutenant who came to power in a 1994 coup, made threatening comments about journalists who refused to register with a controversial new State Media Commission. "We believe in giving each fool a long rope to hang themselves... They will either register or stop writing or go to Hell," he told state radio.