Gambia

The victory of opposition candidate Adama Barrow in the December 2016 presidential election brought hope for improved respect for human rights and the rule of law. Barrow defeated incumbent Yahya Jammeh, who had held power since a 1994 coup, and whose government had a long track record of using arbitrary arrests, threats, enforced disappearance, and torture to silence opposition voices. Barrow’s government faces enormous challenges to rebuild the country’s broken economy and long-neglected institutions. Key issues include providing justice to victims of Jammeh-era abuses, reforming the security services, and rebuilding the judiciary.