By Adama Makasuba
The Gambia Armed Force Deputy Chief, Mamat O Cham, has urged journalists to desist from publishing information that ‘may likely jeopardise the country’s peace and security. He said these during a two-day interface held at the Officers’ Mess in Kotu on Thursday.
According to him, the press will not put forward any information that may be detrimental to national security.
“And that is why we decided to have this interface so that together we can look at these challenges, we can look at what is reasonable and chart a way forward,” he said.
“The armed forces have a constitutional duty to ensure harmony through disclosure of reasonable information to the general public, and that is our civil-military relations. But at the same time, the press will probably be guided through their laws or probably their self-restraint to ensure that any information that may likely jeopardise the safety, security, and the public order of this country put on the public domain,” he said.
“We also recognised what perspective you are coming from. National security would include justice, issues of social accountability and you name it. And this is not really to ask you not to do your duties,” he said and added that if someone put something wrong in the public domain, it might disturb the peace and stability of the country.
“From The Gambia Armed Forces command, we feel that to move the agenda of the country forward, there are need for a very constructive engagement, especially in the form of communication between the armed forces and the fourth estate, the press. As you all know, communication is a nebulous process making it very difficult to define,” he disclosed.