Arbitrary arrest and ill-treatment of human rights defender Mamadou Billo Bah
On 21 January 2023, human rights defender Mamadou Billo Bah was arbitrarily arrested by a group of heavily armed security force personnel during the night at his house. The human rights defender was detained incommunicado for two days before being rushed to the hospital as a result of the ill-treatment he had suffered at the Central Direction of Investigations of the Gendarmerie facilities in Conakry.
Mamadou Billo Bah, is a human rights defender and mobilization coordinator of the Front National pour la Défense de la Constitution (National Front for the Defense of the Constitution-FNDC). The FNDC is a non governmental organisation dedicated to upholding the constitution of Guinea and all the rights and freedoms enacted within it.
On 21 January 2023, human rights defender Mamadou Billo Bah was arbitrarily arrested by a group of heavily armed security force personnel during the night at his house. The human rights defender was detained incommunicado for two days before being rushed to the hospital as a result of the ill-treatment he had suffered at the Central Direction of Investigations of the Gendarmerie facilities in Conakry.
Mamadou Billo Bah, is a human rights defender and mobilization coordinator of the Front National pour la Défense de la Constitution (National Front for the Defense of the Constitution-FNDC). The FNDC is a non governmental organisation dedicated to upholding the constitution of Guinea and all the rights and freedoms enacted within it.
On the evening of 21 January 2023, Mamadou Billo Bah was arbitrarily arrested at his house by a group of heavily armed security force personnel. The human rights defender took part, earlier on the same day, in a mobilization meeting organized by the FNDC in Conakry. The purpose of this meeting was to call for a return of the constitutional order and to raise citizens’ awareness of the principles of democracy. The human rights defender was held incommunicado for two days without access to a lawyer. He was then rushed to a hospital, suffering from the ill-treatment that he was subjected to at the Central Direction of Investigations of the Gendarmerie facilities in Conakry.
This new arrest comes as two FDNC leaders have been detained for five months for calling for a peaceful demonstration against the unilateral management of Guinea due to the transition to a military government since September 2021.
On 13 May 2022, the transitional military authorities announced a ban on all protests until the start of the electoral campaign, which will take place in one year. The ban ignited the FNDC movement to call for peaceful protests across the country in June and July 2022, to denounce the leadership and ruling of the military transition and ask for a more inclusive dialogue between the civil society and the government.
In response to these protests, the transition government banned all peaceful protests during the transition period, arrested some leaders of the FNDC and dissolved the FNDC movement on 9 August 2022.
On Saturday 30 July 2022, human rights defenders Oumar Sylla and Ibrahima Diallo, members of the organizations FNDC and Tournons la Page Guinée (TLP-Guinée), were arbitrarily arrested at their respective homes for having called for a demonstration on 28 July 2022 against the management of power by the transitional military authority, led by Colonel Mamadi Doumbouya. Both human rights defenders have been detained at the civil prison of Conakry, after having been charged with "participation in a prohibited assembly, looting, destruction of public and private property, intentional assault and battery". They are still being held at the civil prison of Conakry, in the capital city.
Front Line Defenders is deeply concerned by the arbitrary arrest and detention of human rights defenders and members of the FNDC, as it believes their detention is solely in retaliation to their legitimate and peaceful work in defence of human rights. It is also concerned about the arbitrary detention and ill-treatment of human rights defender and member of the FNDC, Mamadou Billo Bah.
