A heavy downpour of rain has flooded the two towns of Largor Jasawabu in the Nogowa Chiefdom and Foidu Mameima in the Lower Bambara chiefdom, near Kenema, and destroyed over 100 homes leaving behind 824 people homeless. The Kenema District Disaster Management Committee, which is comprised of the Office of National Security (ONS), World Food[…]

Electricity is probably one of the biggest major constraints Sierra Leone is facing, says Parminder Brar, World Bank Country Manager. “85% of Sierra Leone’s population does not have access to electricity,” Brar stated. Improving the country’s energy sector is one of the foremost development objectives that government and international donors should be working to address.[…]

Action for Large Scale land Acquisition Transparency (ALLAT), an NGO working in the land sector has called on government to take issues of land seriously so as to avoid possible conflict. The Coordinator for ALLAT, Abdulai Bun Wai, disclosed that over 80% of rural Sierra Leoneans depend on land for their livelihood. “It provides succour[…]

International Day of Yoga was celebrated at the Radisson Blu Hotel with the theme, ‘Yoga for Harmony’ on Saturday 24 June 2017, with over hundred yogis in attendance to practice the art. A yogi is a person who practices the ancient meditation practice. “Doing the exercises and meditation,” Dr. Baimba Bayoh, who is an orthopedic[…]

An old saying goes something like, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. But teach that man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.” Usually, when people use this metaphor, they’re talking about the transformative power of education, but I want to look at it a little more[…]

Four land rights activists were freed on Friday 23 June 2017, from the custody of Pujehun Correctional Centre after legal representation were made for them at the Pujehun Magistrates Court. The four activists are Munda Sannoh, Joseph Ganda, Brima Momoh, and Abdul Karim Mansary. The four accused persons are executive members of Youth Affected by[…]

You may not have heard the term before but “cyberbullying” is encroaching into the social media lives of many Sierra Leoneans. And, if you use a smart phone or a computer to access the Internet, and you're a social media user, chances are you've seen or been a victim of cyberbullying. Cyberbullying is the use of electronic communication to bully a person, typically by sending messages of an intimidating or threatening nature. Or, to put it another way, online bullying (known as cyberbullying) uses technology to transfer, send, post, publish or disseminate content with the intention to harm a person or a group. It involves aggressive behaviour that is often repeated over time. Maseray Sesay is a young, articulate, university student in Freetown. She recently spoke about her [...]

Students applying for admission in the University of Sierra Leone have raised concern over what they say is “the exorbitant cost of registration forms”. Many who went to buy registration forms at the Sierra Leone Commercial Bank (SLCB) last Thursday were unable to because they said the price of the form has increased from Le350,000 to Le500,000. Salmatu Fofanah, stated, “The increment in the cost for admission is too expensive. This is too much taking into consideration the economic situation of the country. Not everyone will be able to afford that amount. If someone buys a form now and later she did not get the requirement to gain admission into the university, that money would go in vain because it is not refundable.” She added, “One has to buy an admission form at [...]

On Friday 28 April 2017, Chernor Bah, allegedly stole a motorcycle worth Le17,750,000, belonging to the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC). According to the police, Bah was armed with a broken bottle when he robbed the complainant of the motorbike. The accused, Bah, is charged with Conspiracy and Robbery with Aggravation, contrary to the Larceny Act of 1916. On his first appearance before Magistrate Albert Moody at the Siaka Stevens Street Magistrate Court in Freetown on Friday, Bah's lawyer, Julian Cole applied for bail and said the accused was not a flight risk. The police prosecutor, Inspector S. Conteh objected to the application. He stated that the accused was charged with Conspiracy, which means his partners were on the run. He stressed the seriousness of the charge [...]

On Thursday 22 June 2017, over 50 participants concluded a three-day workshop to develop a National Action Plan to End Statelessness at the Bintumani Hotel, Aberdeen. 16 MPs attended and worked to develop the action plan, which now needs collective efforts to implement. Hon. Paran Tarawalli of Constituency 69 in Bo District, pledged support, noting that since the start of the process to end statelessness, Parliament played an important role. He said, “With other state actors they will identify the gaps in existing laws that discriminate against people with no nationality. We will continue to look into the laws and before 2024, discriminatory laws would have been changed”. Ann-Marie Sidique, the Government Focal Point on statelessness in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, [...]