TELL Magazine

Adama Barrow

In the last hour, the social media had been awash with news that Adama Barrow, Gambian President-elect who defeated the country’s long-ruling leader, Yahya Jammeh in the country’s presidential election on December 1, 2016, had been killed. An online medium, CBN Television, claimed that Barrow, who had vowed to assume duty as President of the country on January 19, despite Jammeh’s refusal to accept the outcome of the election, had been murdered. It claimed that Barrow was killed by assailants who “overpowered the security guards of Mr. Barrow, leaving two of the guards dead and other six injured from  gunshots.” The TV outfit further claimed that “President Yahya Jammeh, the ‘prime suspect’ has denied any involvement in the incident.”

In a bid to confirm the veracity of the news, TELL reached out to a Gambian journalist, Sheriff Junior, one of the country’s prominent reporters who debunked the news. Currently based in Dakar, where he fled to from Gambia to escape the oppression in his home country, Sheriff monitors, and reports events at home for a retinue of international news mediums. He denied that Barrow is dead. “Barrow is meeting with the Gambia Chamber of Commerce right now as I write,” he told the magazine.