DRAMA UNFOLDS AT SUPREME COURT: Auditor General vs. The State – A Battle for Transparency or a Desperate Bid to Silence Truth?
By Sulayman Ben Suwareh
In the Auditor General’s case, the proceedings proceeded as scheduled before the Honourable Chief Justice as a single Judge, with Lawyers Lamin J. Darbo and Jarra Jeng representing the Plaintiff.
Representing the defendants were the Solicitor General, H. Thomasi, J. O. Okete, Acting Director of Civil Litigation, A. A. Wakawz, Principal State Counsel, S. L. Jobarteh, Senior State Counsel, and M. Ngum, Senior State Counsel, with private law practitioner Ida D. Drammeh.
The first critical observation points to a heavy presence of a mixture of lawyers from the state side, including the Solicitor General and the Acting Director of Civil Litigation, as well as one other state counsel, a foreign national, with two other Senior Gambian state attorneys, and a private Gambian lawyer.
Why does the State require the heavy presence of state counsels and add Ida Drammeh, a private lawyer, to their team of lawyers to defend a constitutional legal interpretation? Where many argue that the Justice Minister, who has been the President’s legal adviser, has taken a reckless decision to remove the Auditor General unlawfully and now must hire private legal counsel, paid from the taxpayers’ fund, to defend a clearly unconstitutional act.
What’s the point of hiring a private lawyer when the state has more than four senior lawyers in the team? How much money would be spent on hiring Ida Drammeh? It is the greatest manifestation of how unscrupulous and lacking in regard that the Barrow administration can demonstrate for our democratic institutions. Gambia needs to stand up to Barrow’s excesses.
What’s the point of the Solicitor General and the Acting Director of Civil Litigation with the other three senior counsel mentioned for the defence before the court?
Hence, in the defence response, it appears that the state was conceding the most critical issue in the case, namely, that the president didn’t have the authority to terminate the services of the Auditor General, by contending that Auditor General Ceesay had resigned and accepted another assignment. How can’t this point form a critical part of the decision that the Justice would arrive at? The defence lost the case even before it began by conceding in their court filing that President Barrow doesn’t have the authority to remove the auditor general in the manner he did.
There might be nothing stopping the state from hiring private lawyers. We recall how the former Justice Minister, Baa Tambadou, hired his brother, Sheriff Tambadou, and Lawyer Antouman Gaye at the time to try the NIA 9, a highly controversial matter that was seen as unethical. The government justified the hiring as a result of a lack of capacity. What’s the excuse this time around? Is the Justice Minister primarily doing this for the optics, as they don’t want foreigners to be leading such a critical case for the country?
The final observation is the unusual decision by the Chief Justice to order the inclusion of Mr Chernor Sowe, the person to replace Auditor General Modou Ceesay, which is also somewhat uncommon. Is the Chief Justice creating an avenue to declare that Sowe’s appointment is invalid?
What’s left for the defence? Suppose the state concedes the legal issue of whether the president has the authority to fire the auditor general. In that case, we are left with the factual issue of whether Ceesay left the post voluntarily. There is no evidence that Ceesay resigned. If CJ finds that Ceesay didn’t resign, then Sowe’s appointment would be void.
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You can now write for the Open Gambia Platform, share information anonymously, and join the community. Please share your stories! Anon contributed to the article on November 13th 2025. Contributors’ views are strictly personal and not of The OpenGambia Platform!
