room under police escort
Ms. Aminata Faye-Manjang, a victim who serves as Prosecution Witness (PW1) in the alleged scamming case involving one Abdoulie Ndow, popularly known as Pap Ndow, on Monday, 18th July 2022, testified before Magistrate Mben Faal at the Kanifing Magistrate’s Court in the Kanifing Municipality.
The accused Pap Ndow is being charged with obtaining money by false pretense and with intent to defraud, contrary to the Criminal Code, Laws of The Gambia.
The victim has claimed that the accused has defrauded her with over D2M, the money she had planned to use for the purchase of her household items for her new house.
When the case was called, the police Prosecutor ASP Keita announced his representation for the Inspector General of Police and the complainant Aminata Faye-Manjang, while the accused Pap Ndow was represented by Lawyer I. Dibba from Antouman Gaye’s Chambers.
In giving her testimony before the Magistrate, the victim, Amie Faye-Manjang, who served as PW1, said she recognized the accused Abdoulie Ndow (Pap Ndow). She told the court that she first met the accused at the former independent candidate Essa Faal’s compound in Kerr Serign, sometime in November 2021 during the campaign of the presidential election.
She disclosed that she was discussing with her friends her plan to travel to Dubai and Turkey after the Presidential election to buy household items for her new house.
She continued: “While we were going out to find food to eat, Wem et Pap Ndow at the gate of Essa Faal. He was in a Blue private vehicle. He offered to drive us to where we were going and we told him that we have called a Taxi driver. He said we can tell the Taxi driver to cancel his coming he is going to take us and we did that.“
She explained that Pap Ndow then offered to drive them to go and find food.
She said while in the car, she told her friends Sainabou Njie and Bintou Njie again that after the election when she returns to Sweden, she will plan a trip to Dubai and Turkey to buy furniture and Pap Ndow overheard her. She added that they picked up one of her brothers called Kebba Drammeh along the Senegambia Highway and all of them drove together in the same car to a restaurant called D-Nubian Seafood Garden Restaurant in Kololi, where they sell seafoods, but we did not like that food and we later went to Ibra’s Afra in Manjai Kunda.
“Whilst we were inside the car, Papa told us that he is the man in charge of all Essa Faal’s logistics and that he even ordered the furniture and other house materials in Essa‘s house for him. He said he was working in a company in Turkey that sells all kinds of house materials. He even went further to show us house materials in his phone,“ she disclosed.
PW1 said the accused said he used to order household items for a lot of women from Europe in Dubai and Turkey. She said she then told him she needed those materials for her new house and Pap Ndow said she should start paying the money by installment at a particular place.
The witness said she then trusted him because he told them that he was responsible for Essa Faal’s logistics and she started paying him money by installment (physical cash) even before she leaves for Sweden. She said she already paid about D500.000 in The Gambia in the presence of witnesses.
She said when she returned back to Sweden, she used to authorize her daughter to be sending money to Pap Ndow via MJ Finance, Moneygram, Supersonics, etc, receipts which she kept.
She revealed that the total amount of money Pap Ndow collected from her is over D2M.
According to the witness, when her house was completed, she informed Pap Ndow that the household materials should come so can fix them but unfortunately, Pap Ndow would tell her the container is in Mali, and sometimes he says Guinea, etc.
She said she got audio messages from some people that Pap Ndow was lying to her and giving her different excuses and she decided to report the matter to Banjulinding Police Station. She said Pap was first arrested but he jumped bail and fled to Dakar, Senegal until he was re-arrested by Interpol and returned to Banjul, where he was handed over to the Gambia Police Force.
However, Pap Ndow’s Lawyer, I. Dibba applied for bail for his client but the Magistrate ordered that the accused can be bailed only if he provides three sureties who shall deposit their Identity Cards at the court house and swore to an Affidavit, and shall also pay One Million dalasis each if he escapes bail. Secondly, the accused person should provide a leased landed property within the Kombos worth D2.7 Million, with title deeds with evaluation by a certified evaluator. He could not provide that on Monday’s hearing and was remanded.
The case was adjourned to 1st August 2022 for continuation.
