By Patience Loum

Victims and survivors under the former 22-year-long regime of Yahya Jammeh are demanding justice and calling for the quick implementation of the Victims Reparations Bill.

These conversations and others were raised at a day workshop organised by the International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ) and the Women’s Association for Victims’ Empowerment (WAVE) at the Kairaba Beach Hotel on 25 November 2022.

Victims Reparations Bill

Following the implementation of the Truth Reconciliation and Reparations Commission, the Government of The Gambia allocated D50,000,000 which was utilised to provide health care, material, financial and other support to victims.

However, these allocations did not cover all victims and survivors; hence the Ministry of Justice proposed to create a successor body to the Reparations Committee of the TRRC which will “be independent, created by statute and vested with the power to manage and make payments out of a reparations fund”.

According to the Ministry of Justice, this independent body will administer issues related to reparations within the confinement of the act.

During the workshop, a lot of issues were raised all of which centred on the Reparations Bill.

“Implementing the Reparations Bill would greatly help us in our healing process which is very important to us. We know that the implementation of the bill cannot address all of our financial needs but at least it will make things better,” said one of the victims.

“There’s so much that needs to be taken care of. We have school fees, house rents, and so many other responsibilities.”

Sheriff Kijera, chairperson of the Victims Center, said all of these have to do with managing the general expectations of the victims.

“We know that the government had made several commitments to make contributions to the reparations fund since the time of the TRRC; so victims have always been expecting that reparations will be paid in a one-off payment but the Ministry of Justice has promised that the government has made an allocation of D150,000,000 that was supposed to be paid to the victims this year.”

“Unfortunately, we have come to the end of the year and still the victims have seen nothing nor have they heard from the government. And all these have to do with lack of communication from the government as far as the payment of reparations of victims is concerned,” he said.

Kimbeng Tah, the Deputy Director for Civil Litigation and International Law at the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), said the Victims Reparations Bill (draft) is finalised and should be tabled in Parliament in the December 2022 Parliamentary session.

“So, in December if it passes, we can be sure that by January the [interim] body will [be] set up and we start payment,” he said.”However, we cannot control parliament but we are still consulting on it because we have finished drafting [the Victims Bill].”

Victims Re-traumatized

A lot of the victims feel they are continually being re-traumatized. Speaking to this medium, one of the victims said it has been very challenging on their mental health seeing perpetrators walking freely without anything being done.

Mr. Kijera said it is very difficult for the victims as this has to do with lack of communication between the government and the victims-led associations and victims in general.

He said there should be a public sensitization about the ongoing processes that are in place “because grassroots participation and local inputs into these processes are very important.”

Mr. Kijera also urged the government to provide ongoing counseling and psycho-social therapy to victims.

“It is frustrating for the victims. It is very disappointing especially from the level of the presidency,” he emphasised.

This article is supported by the International Center for Transitional Justice

Read the original article on The Point.