Wednesday, September 24, 2014

Malta and Gambia signing the death warrants of 80 Gambians at the margins of the General Assembly

Finance Minister Touray and Maltese Foreign Minister 
The Gambia and Malta today signed at the margins of the United Nations General Assembly an agreement to repatriate some 80 Gambian migrants which is equivalent to the signing of their death warrants.

"Currently in Malta, there are around 80 persons from Gambia who were not awarded the asylum status," the government said.

Curiously, the Maltese government did not say how many Gambian migrants were granted asylum.  The number is probably embarrassingly small.

In signing this disgraceful protocol, The Maltese government claimed that the human rights of these Gambians were not being violated in repatriating them to a country that has been universally acclaimed of having one of the worst record in the world.

Malta is not signing a repatriation agreement but a death warrant for those 80 Gambians who will first be transported to Gambia's notorious Mile II prisons were they'll succumb to the effects of torture or malaria.  

Malta is not alone is engaging in the doling out cash to a corrupt regime in exchange for the repatriation of Gambian migrants, most of whom are victims of a repressive regime who are fleeing The Gambia because of a bad governance environment.

Spain is another European country that has a similar cash-for-migrant arrangement with the Jammeh regime, with the cash going into the dictator's pocket.

While The Gambia was busy exploiting the plight of 80 Gambians who are victims of a bad set of economic and human rights policies that the corrupt regime created, the Ghana delegation in New York were engaging the same Maltese government at the margins on matters of economic substance.

Ghana president Mahama and the Maltese Prime Minister recognizing the synergy in their respective energy sectors, discussed Ghana's potential as an energy hub in West Africa with a reciprocal designation of Malta as energy hub in the Mediterranean.