By: Mustapha Jarju & Fatoumatta J. Camara
Justice Ebrima Jaiteh on Monday revoked the D5M bail granted to three senior government officials, who were slammed with criminal and economic crimes.
The Program Manager of the National Malaria Control Programme Balla Kandeh, the Executive Director of HoPDO Omar Malleh Ceesay, and the Permanent Secretary at the Health Ministry were earlier given police bail at D5M but on Monday, the High Court revoked the bail granted to the trio by the police and instead gave them a D19M bail.
As part of the bail requirement, the accused persons must provide two Gambian sureties with property worth not less than D19M and shall be recommended by a government valuer or a recommended valuer not later than the order of the court.
The sureties must provide their original title deed to the Principal Registrar of the High Court.
Meanwhile, the suspects were also ordered to surrender their travel documents to the court and are required toattend each sitting of the case punctually.
They were slammed with 21 count charges, includingeconomic crimes, official corruption, forgery, theft, disobedience of statutory duties and conspiracy to commit a felony.
They denied any wrongdoing.
The lawyer for the accused persons, L.S Camara,during the introduction of charges against his clients,argued that counts 14 and 15 were the same, adding that counts 16 and 17 were also the same as well as counts 20 and 21.
The state prosecutor, at this juncture, applied for an adjournment to amend the counts.The case resumes on 30 October 2023.
