By George K. Werner (former education minister)
I come to examine the indictment, not to pronounce its verdict.
Yesterday, I watched Cllr. Abrahim Boimah Sillah explain the government’s position on the prosecution involving Jewel Howard-Taylor and other defendants. He said evidence would be presented against each defendant, addressing each offense and its elements, at the appropriate stage. He denied political targeting. He asked the public to trust the government.
Let that assurance receive a fair hearing. Let the document receive a careful reading.
For as I listened, I remembered Cllr. Sillah in another courtroom, carrying another responsibility.
In 2022, he led the defense of Alexander Benedict Cummings in the criminal case concerning the Collaborating Political Parties’ framework document. Among the prosecution’s witnesses was Joseph Nyuma Boakai, then a former vice president and the Unity Party’s standard-bearer. Today, Boakai is president, and Cllr. Sillah is his appointed Acting Solicitor General.
The men have changed positions. The questions have survived the journey.
Is the account accurate? Is the record complete? Does the evidence support the meaning assigned to it?
I remember writing a Facebook post during the Cummings proceedings, calling the charges bogus and asking for his acquittal. That was my judgment as a citizen, not a finding by a court. I believed the state had to substantiate its accusations, however influential those supporting them.
I bring the same conviction to the prosecution involving Jewel Howard-Taylor. The allegations differ. The evidence must be assessed separately. But a principle worth defending in one case must remain worth defending in another.
Recall what happened in the Cummings proceedings.
Cllr. Sillah challenged omissions from WhatsApp conversations presented by the prosecution. He maintained that the missing material mattered to the defense. On March 30, 2022, FrontPageAfrica reported that prosecutors acknowledged omitted pages, described the omission as inadvertent, and submitted the missing material to the court.
The distinction deserves care. The defense alleged suppression; the prosecution said error. The reporting alone does not establish deliberate misconduct.
Yet the lesson is plain. A passage can contain someone’s exact words and still fail to convey their full meaning. What comes before may explain them. What comes after may qualify them. What is omitted may change the reader’s conclusion.
Cllr. Sillah understood this. He asked the prosecution to account for its selections and omissions. He subjected its account to scrutiny.
Remember that insistence. It belongs in his present office.
In the briefing I watched, Cllr. Sillah also clarified that the present document is an indictment, not a re-indictment. According to his explanation, the earlier proceedings against some suspects, including Jewel Howard-Taylor, involved police charges before a magistrate, and the indictment superseded that charge sheet.
That distinction should be respected. Those who ask the government to be precise must accept the same obligation themselves.
His undertaking to present evidence at the appropriate stage also deserves fair treatment. The absence of detailed evidence in a press briefing does not establish that prosecutors possess none. Witnesses and exhibits must undergo examination through the judicial process.
But the promise of evidence tomorrow does not settle a question about the wording of an indictment today.
An accusation must first say clearly what it alleges. Its chronology, descriptions, and inferences must form an account the accused can understand and answer. Whether that account can then be proved is a further question.
In my separate examination of the indictment copy made available to me, I identified inconsistencies and ambiguities requiring clarification. I have not independently compared that copy with a certified court copy. My observations concern its written account; they do not establish that the alleged events never occurred.
I will not repeat each discrepancy here. The question now is whether the Ministry of Justice’s leadership will address them.
This indictment came after the new leadership took office. Cllr. Sillah’s appointment as Acting Solicitor General took effect on September 11, 2026. Reporting places the court’s resulting arrest writ on October 7. The prosecution advances this document under the new leadership’s authority.
Responsibility follows that authority.
Cllr. Sillah need not have written every paragraph to insist that every material allegation be checked. Personal authorship is one question; institutional accountability is another. The leadership advancing the case must answer for the care with which it is presented.
The document’s strengths are theirs to defend. Its errors are theirs to address.
For a new leadership asking the public for confidence, unresolved inconsistencies are an unpromising beginning.
That judgment should not be mistaken for a verdict on the defendants. A clerical error, an ambiguity, and a substantive contradiction can have different consequences. Some matters may be explained; some may require correction; others may bear directly on the prosecution’s theory. Their significance must be assessed against the evidence and the applicable procedure.
But first they must be examined.
There is no loss of dignity in correcting an error. There is a greater risk in allowing the authority of an office to become a reason for leaving it unanswered.
Nor can editing perform the work of proof. A polished allegation remains an allegation. Careful revision can clarify the case; sufficient evidence must establish it.
President Boakai also has reason to understand the importance of scrutiny. He appeared as a prosecution witness in the Cummings case and faced questions from the defense team led by Cllr. Sillah. That experience should reinforce respect for the process by which an account is tested, whoever presents it.
His administration should give prosecutors the freedom to follow the evidence, correct mistakes, and reconsider allegations that cannot be sustained. Cllr. Sillah should exercise that freedom with the rigor he once demanded from others.
The public deserves an effective response to drug trafficking. The accused deserve fair proceedings. Neither interest is served by careless documents or untested assumptions.
Cllr. Sillah asked us to trust the government. Trust can grow from what the government does next: how it answers legitimate questions, how it addresses discrepancies, and how its evidence withstands examination.
I supported scrutiny when Cummings faced the state. I support scrutiny when Jewel Howard-Taylor faces it. Political circumstances cannot be allowed to determine the strength of a principle.
Cllr. Sillah once stood beside an accused person and asked the government to account for its evidence. He now speaks with the government’s authority. That makes his former insistence more consequential.
Cllr. Sillah, remember what you asked of the state in the Alexander Benedict Cummings case. Examine the document your leadership advances. Reconcile its inconsistencies. Seek necessary corrections through the proper legal process. Prove the allegations against each defendant.
You have changed sides of the courtroom. Carry the standard with you.
