{"id":82189,"date":"2025-07-16T16:18:30","date_gmt":"2025-07-16T16:18:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/uncategorized\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission"},"modified":"2025-07-16T16:53:29","modified_gmt":"2025-07-16T16:53:29","slug":"mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission","title":{"rendered":"Mayor Lowe Testifies on Flight Upgrade before Commission"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Gambia. <\/strong><\/span><b>Banjul Mayor Rohey Malick Lowe appeared before the Local Government Commission of Inquiry to address questions surrounding the payment of D200,000 for the upgrade of her flight ticket from economy to business class.<\/b><\/p>\n<p>The Commission\u2019s Lead Counsel questioned the mayor: \u201cThere was a time Two Hundred Thousand Dalasi was paid to you through Fatou Mbenga for you to upgrade your flight ticket from economy to business class. Why was this?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In response, Mayor Lowe explained that the payment related to a multi-leg official trip from Kenya to Morocco, Indonesia, Malaysia, and eventually back to The Gambia.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo the tickets were all given to me by the company,\u201d she stated. \u201cSo because of the travel. It is long. I decided to travel some in economy class and some in business class.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>She clarified that the upgrades could not be arranged in The Gambia, so the Banjul City Council provided her with an imprest to make the necessary changes at the airports during her travels. She recalled making one such upgrade in Kenya.<\/p>\n<p>Upon returning from the trip, Mayor Lowe said she completed the retirement process and submitted all related receipts to Mustapha Batchilly, who was serving as BCC\u2019s Chief Executive Officer at the time.<\/p>\n<p>However, when Counsel Patrick Gomez questioned Batchilly about the receipts, he denied receiving any.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNo, I did not see any receipt,\u201d Batchilly told the Commission.<\/p>\n<p>Gomez then informed the mayor that Batchilly had previously given the same answer when questioned on the matter. He advised her to provide any receipts she might still have.<\/p>\n<p>Mayor Lowe maintained that the money had been refunded and said: \u201cI told you we have to refund the Two Hundred Thousand and Fatou brought the receipt to the commission.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Counsel Gomez acknowledged the receipt but raised concerns over the timeline of the transaction. \u201cThe refund is 2024. This transaction happened in 2022. Two years or so and we don\u2019t have evidence of an upgrade.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Local Government Commission of Inquiry was established to investigate financial and administrative irregularities within local councils across The Gambia.<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Gambia<\/span> Follow <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Africa-Press<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Gambia. Banjul Mayor Rohey Malick Lowe appeared before the Local Government Commission of Inquiry to address questions surrounding the payment of D200,000 for the upgrade of her flight ticket from economy to business class. The Commission\u2019s Lead Counsel questioned the mayor: \u201cThere was a time Two Hundred Thousand Dalasi was paid to you [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":82188,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,5,7],"tags":[260],"class_list":["post-82189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-economy","category-head-lines","tag-gambia"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Mayor Lowe Testifies on Flight Upgrade before Commission - Gambia<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Banjul Mayor Rohey Malick Lowe appeared before the Local Government Commission of Inquiry to address questions surrou ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Mayor Lowe Testifies on Flight Upgrade before Commission\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Banjul Mayor Rohey Malick Lowe appeared before the Local Government Commission of Inquiry to address questions surrou ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Gambia\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-07-16T16:18:30+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-07-16T16:53:29+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/gambia\/sites\/19\/2025\/07\/sm_1752671943.532069.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1280\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"720\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Mayor Lowe Testifies on Flight Upgrade before Commission\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-07-16T16:18:30+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-07-16T16:53:29+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission\"},\"wordCount\":363,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/gambia\/sites\/19\/2025\/07\/sm_1752671943.532069.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Gambia\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"Economy\",\"head lines\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/mayor-lowe-testifies-on-flight-upgrade-before-commission\",\"name\":\"Mayor Lowe Testifies on Flight Upgrade before Commission - 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