Five youth have today been reportedly arrested over voter registration chaos in Manduar village in the Kombo Central District.
The youth are currently detained at Mandina police post and the main station in Brikama, according to our source at the scene.
“So far, 5 youth have been arrested and taken to Mandina police post and main station in Brikama. The PIU are still stationed in the village [Manduar],” a native of Manduar told Kerr Fatou.
According to the source, the chaos broke when a particular area of the village referred to as Touba Manduar insisted that claimants from the area would be given attestation by someone they consider as their Alkalo, which the people of the main Manduar opposed. This, the source said, started after Seedy Njie, the deputy spokesperson of the National People’s Party visited the area and held some side talks with them. However, the source could not establish what Njie allegedly discussed with the people of Touba Manduar.
“ So, this morning, Seedy Njie came there [Touba Manduar] with the police. They held some side discussions. But we can’t tell what they discussed. After that moment, we saw the people of the area set up a separate table for attestation aside that of the Alkalo of Manduar [Jerreh Bojang]. So the youth of Manduar insisted that would never happen. That was how the chaos came about which finally led to the forceful removal of the said table from the location. During the push and pull, the PIU started firing teargas and that worsened the chaos,” the witness explained.
The incident occurred on day 2 of the registration process which began on Monday but nothing of such occurred on the first day, the witness confirmed.
Meanwhile, our source added that Touba Manduar claimed to have been designated as an independent village and their Alkalo was appointed by former West Coast Region Governor, Lamin Waa Juwara.
Due to the tense situation, Kerr Fatou’s move to get the views of both sides and the police could not yield fruits.
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