Barrow walks the talk as a new era begins

It has been another extraordinary week for a small West African nation which has dominated the headlines since a constitutional crisis triggered by December’s disputed poll resulted in military intervention by the Economic Community of West African States. Legalbrief reports that Adama Barrow, who became The Gambia's third President in January after defeating Yahya Jammeh promised greater freedom and an improved economy as thousands attended a ceremony marking his inauguration on Saturday. ‘This is a victory for democracy. It is a victory for all Gambians,’ Barrow said to a packed stadium near the capital that included dignitaries and several African heads of state. The day, he said, was symbolic because it also marked the day in 1965 when the small West African nation declared its independence from Britain. The Independent reports that Barrow first took the oath of office at Gambia's embassy in neighbouring Senegal in January as Jammeh refused to cede power. Ahead of the inauguration, Barrow selected Gambian UN prosecutor Hassan Jallow as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. The appointment ended a series of controversial foreign appointments to the position by Jammeh. Jallow has served in the appeals chamber of the Special Court for Sierra Leone and as a prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in Arusha, Tanzania. A report on the News24 site notes that Barrow's government had vowed to implement a 'Gambianisation' of the justice system after Jammeh named several Chief Justices from Pakistan and Nigeria. Foreign judges were regularly accused of kowtowing to the regime because their contracts could be easily terminated, and some were hired to hear a single case only. The report notes that the new Chief Justice was also Justice Minister under Dawda Jawara, The Gambia's only other President since independence, who was removed by Jammeh in a 1994 coup. Legalbrief reports that the only other Gambian to hold the post of Chief Justice was Abdou Karim Savage who served from 2006 to 2009.