{"id":2508,"date":"2025-09-04T12:56:57","date_gmt":"2025-09-04T12:56:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/mayor-bensouda-questioned-over-council-contract-linked-to-brother\/"},"modified":"2025-09-04T12:56:57","modified_gmt":"2025-09-04T12:56:57","slug":"mayor-bensouda-questioned-over-council-contract-linked-to-brother","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/mayor-bensouda-questioned-over-council-contract-linked-to-brother\/","title":{"rendered":"Mayor Bensouda questioned over council contract linked to brother."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Kanifing Municipal Council (KMC) Mayor Talib Ahmed Bensouda has told a public inquiry that he intervened in a 2019 council project after discovering that a supplier, LionWorks, had ties to his brother.<\/p>\n<p>Testifying before the Local Government Commission of Inquiry on Tuesday, Bensouda said former KMC chief executive Jaja Cham contracted LionWorks for a beautification project without his knowledge. He said he objected after realizing his brother was an investor in the firm, insisting he avoided family-linked businesses.<\/p>\n<p>The mayor recounted asking Cham to return materials already delivered but was told this was impossible. He then sought a donation from the company\u2019s owner, who instead granted a discount worth 170,000 dalasi. Bensouda presented letters, invoices and payment records to the commission showing the council made a single payment of 188,875 dalasi.<\/p>\n<p>Lead Counsel Gomez noted discrepancies between his account and testimony from Cham and a LionWorks employee. Bensouda maintained he acted on principle, adding that had he intended to favour his brother, the full 1.5-kilometre project stretch would have gone to the company.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; Kanifing Municipal Council (KMC) Mayor Talib Ahmed Bensouda has told a public inquiry&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":326,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2508","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2508","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2508"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2508\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2508"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.techhivetechnologies.com\/blocktvgambia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}