Police Spokesperson Declines to Attend Online Journalist

 



Journalist John

Gambia police spokesperson yesterday refused to attend Mr Abdoulie John, a Gambian journalist working for U.S based news agency, Associated Press (AP).
“Go and seek clearance [from Inspector General of Police]. I don’t talk to those papers, because they are outside the country,” police spokesperson Yorro Mballow told Mr John, who also reports for Jollof News, a Gambian online news agency.
Mr John was investigating the death of Mariama Ann, a retired cleaner at the department of NGO affairs. The woman was allegedly knocked down to death by a military officer.
“I do my job with responsibility. When president Jammeh received the media at State House, he [Jammeh] never said that,” John told the police spokesperson, who insisted however that he cannot clarify any issue to the online journalist without clearance from the police IG.
“I have been getting information from the former police spokesperson, Sulayman Secka, but I was never asked to get any form of clearance,” Mr John, who views the action of spokesperson Mballow as an attack on press freedom told The Daily News.