By: D. A. Jawo

Wonders really never cease in today’s Gambia. Despite all the strange happenings, we have been witnessing in the country in the recent past, we were no doubt all flabbergasted by the drama in the past few weeks involving the Gambia Bar Association and Moses Richards, one of their members, who is currently serving a jail term for giving false information to a public official.

While many people no doubt sympathised with Moses Richards and supported the decision by his colleagues to boycott the courts in solidarity with his incarceration, but many others also questioned the morality of that action.

We all know that several Gambians have been subjected to various forms of mal-treatment in the hands of the judiciary, including unfair prosecution and imprisonment, but never has the Bar ever raised a finger about it.

Therefore, one would wonder how they could morally justify taking such action just because one of their nember has been involved, as if what is wrong for the lawyers is not wrong for the rest of the society.

On the other hand, it is also hard to understand the demeaning decision purportedly taken by Richards to dissociate himself from the action of his colleagues who seem to have risked everything to throw their weight behind him.

This is no doubt the biggest show of disunity within the legal fraternity ever seen in this country and it is hard to see how the Gambia Bar Association can get out of this unscathed.

As a result of the letter Richards was purported to have written to President Jammeh begging for forgiveness and even going to the extent of describing the President as being “like a father and a mentor” to him, one would wonder how he would ever have the courage to look his colleagues and indeed other professionals in the eye whenever he comes out of prison.

It is indeed inconceivable that a former high court judge and a reputable lawyer of Richards’ calibre will stoop so low just to obtain his freedom from jail.

While there is no evidence whether or not Richards wrote that letter under duress, but what is likely to happen is that as a result, and for the fact that he has succeeded in humiliating his colleagues in their confrontations with the administration, he may sooner rather than later be granted a presidential pardon and released from jail.

It is also likely that he will either be reinstated as a high court judge or in another senior position in the judiciary as a compensation for playing ball with the regime.

However, Richards’s biggest problem, whenever he comes out of jail would be how he can even continue to live in The Gambia, let alone take up a position in which he would come into daily contact with his colleagues in the Bar.

It would also be hard to imagine someone who has pledged such allegiance to the executive could ever reconcile with the prospects of serving as a judge who is supposed to deliver impartial judgments.

No doubt, this purported action by Richards has negatively affected his reputation and credibility and it is hard to see how he could re-integrate into his professional class after his release from prison.

Another person who seems to have played quite a bizarre role in the Moses Richards saga is Lawyer Lamin Mboge, who decided to confront his colleagues of the Bar on the issue from the very beginning.

He even said in one of his discourses on the issue that he was among those who went to Mile Two to persuade Richards to apologize and ask for forgiveness from President Jammeh.

One would wonder why Mboge had chosen to break ranks with his colleagues of the Bar. Has it got anything to do with his own ongoing court case in which he is charged with ‘’making false documents without authority,’’ coupled with ‘’false swearing’’ and ‘’uttering false documents’’?  

Even the very fact that he not only made some positive remarks about the Nigerian judges and prosecutors, but even ended one of his discourses with ‘Long live the President’ was indicative of having a personal agenda on the issue.

Therefore, it would not be a surprise to anyone if Mboge himself eventually writes a letter of apology and an appeal for forgiveness from President Jammeh whenever his case ends in conviction and sentence. He appears to be preparing the ground for such a scenario.

Another interesting aspect of this Moses Richards saga is the fact that while our judges and legal practitioners appear not to be quite bordered with getting us the ordinary people convicted and incarcerated, sometimes over very flimsy issues, but they themselves are so scared of being sent to Mile Two has been as aptly demonstrated by Richards’ reaction to his sentence.

There is no doubt that while he was serving as a high court judge, Richards must have sentenced some people to prison terms, and yet just less than a month into his own imprisonment, he is down on his knees to beg for mercy and stooping so low just to get a pardon from the president.

“My aged mother, I may not be her only child but I happen to be her very valued friend, my children who are still in their formative stages, my clients and some other people to whom I am committed in one way or the other, will join me in being eternally grateful to you, for a positive response to this plea,” Richards was quoted in his letter to President Jammeh. One would wonder whether he had ever thought of the feelings of the aged parents and the children of those he had been sending to jail while he was on the bench.

This saga not only has left Moses Richards’ own credibility in tartars, but it will also no doubt leave a big dent on the very reputation of our ‘learned friends’ of the Gambia Bar Association who had hitherto been held in high esteem by the general public.

It has shown that behind that queer gown, the legal practitioners are human after all and that they are not infallible as they appear to us ordinary mortals. It will therefore take quite some time to repair the damage this episode has caused to both the reputation of the Bar and the credibility of some of its members.

ENDS