The Director of Public Prosecutions has discontinued criminal proceedings against Atif Amin, who had been accused of impersonating a Pakistani diplomat and committing a series of related offenses.
Principal Magistrate M. Krubally of the Banjul Magistrates’ Court granted the prosecution’s application for a nolle prosequi, formally ending the case and discharging Mr. Amin on all seven counts.
The charges included impersonation, forgery, obtaining money by false pretenses, issuing false checks, and falsely assuming diplomatic authority.
Prosecutors had alleged that between 2022 and 2024, in Banjul and elsewhere in The Gambia, Mr. Amin falsely presented himself as a Pakistani diplomat and as chairman of the Pakistani community in the country.
According to the charge sheet, Mr. Amin made such representations to several government officials and institutions, including the Banjul City Council, the Department of Lands, internal audit officials and information technology personnel.
He was also accused of using fraudulent diplomatic license plates — bearing the designations “1 AV4 ICD,” “1 AV4 2CD” and “Pakistan I.C.D.” — on several vehicles. A separate forgery charge alleged that he had fraudulently produced the plates, in violation of Section 318 of the Criminal Code.
Two additional counts accused Mr. Amin of obtaining money by false pretenses under Section 288 of the Code.
In one instance, prosecutors alleged that he obtained 100,000 dalasis from Muhammad Ousman after promising to transfer the money to Mr. Ousman’s family in Pakistan, but failed to do so. In another, he was accused of collecting 15,000 dalasis from Lamin Kinteh to develop a website that he allegedly did not deliver.
Mr. Amin was also charged with issuing two checks despite allegedly knowing that his account contained insufficient funds. The prosecution said the Zenith Bank checks included one for 100,000 dalasis issued to GACH Global Company and another for 71,000 dalasis issued to Basamba Drammeh.
The final count accused Mr. Amin of falsely assuming diplomatic authority by presenting himself to government agencies as Pakistan’s ambassador to The Gambia.
Mr. Amin, who was not represented by a lawyer, pleaded not guilty to all seven charges when he appeared before Magistrate Krubally on July 21, 2025. The prosecution subsequently began presenting witnesses in support of its case.
But the Director of Public Prosecutions, A.M. Yusuf, filed a nolle prosequi dated July 15, 2025, invoking Section 85(1)(c) of the 1997 Constitution and Section 74 of the Criminal Procedure Act of 2025.
In his ruling, Magistrate Krubally said the court was constitutionally bound to give effect to the prosecution’s decision.
“Having gone through the nolle prosequi against the accused herein referred to as Atif Amin pursuant to Section 85(c) of the 1997 Constitution and Section 74, in particular Subsection 3, of the Criminal Procedure Act of 2025, which requires such application to be made in the absence of the accused, I have no option but to heed the constitutional demand submitted herein,” he said.
“In the premises, I accordingly grant the prosecution’s application and hereby discharge the accused herein, Atif Amin,” the magistrate added.
A nolle prosequi allows the Director of Public Prosecutions to discontinue criminal proceedings when the relevant constitutional and statutory requirements have been met. The ruling discharged Mr. Amin from the case without a determination of the allegations at trial.
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