Sierra Leone - The African Mirror

Aug

28

2024

Geneva Conventions commemoration hears urgent call to respect laws of war

WORLD

SEVENTY-FIVE years since the ratification of the Geneva Conventions, a former child soldier-turned-foreign minister of Sierra Leone urged greater international support for the key accords, highlighting their importance in rehabilitating him and tens of thousands of his fellow compatriots following the country’s bitter civil war. “I stand here today as a former child soldier, forcefully recruited during the civil conflict that decimated over 50,000 of my compatriots… I wouldn't be the person I am today without the critical support of the ICRC and the international community,” Musa Timothy Kabba told Members of the Security Council, referring to UN partner the…

Aug

22

2024

By The African Mirror

Sierra Leone’s women farmers use a custom called bora to access land – but it’s making them more vulnerable

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

BORA – a type of thank you gift – is a Sierra Leonean custom of respect that is often used in relation to land. For instance, informal farmers pay bora to landowners to be able to farm on their land. But bora has changed over the years and is having a negative impact on women, who are responsible for much of the West African country’s farming. In Sierra Leone, land ownership – and therefore use of land for farming – vests in men. Women’s access to land for sustainable livelihoods is the subject of a PhD by land rights scholar…

Aug

11

2024

By The African Mirror

Sierra Leone coup plotters handed heavy prison sentences

NEWS

SIERRA Leone's courts have moved to send a strong deterrent message to potential coup plotters, imposing lengthy prison sentences on soldiers who attempted to overthrow the government. This judicial action comes at a time when much of West Africa is grappling with military juntas that have supplanted democratically elected leadership. According to Reuters, Sierra Leone's courts handed down sentences ranging from 16 years to life imprisonment to 13 soldiers found guilty of attempting a failed coup in November 2023. The verdicts were delivered amidst a backdrop of regional instability, with several West African nations currently under military rule following successful…

May

14

2024

By TAMSIN BRADLEY

Female genital mutilation is on the rise in Africa: disturbing new trends are driving up the numbers

HEALTH

THIRTEEN-YEAR-OLD Salamatu Jalloh had her whole future to look forward to. But in January 2023, her lifeless body was found wrapped in a pink and blue shroud on an earthen floor in a village in northwest Sierra Leone. Salamatu and two other girls bled to death after participating in a secret Bondo society initiation into womanhood. The ceremony, which lasted for several weeks, began with a sense of excitement and anticipation – a rare occasion in this rural community to celebrate girls. But at its core was a violent act: the cutting and removal of the girls’ external genitalia. Their…

Apr

27

2024

By PULCHERIE ADJOHA

West Africa’s Benin, Liberia and Sierra Leone launch malaria vaccination

HEALTH

BENIN, Liberia and Sierra Leone launched large-scale malaria vaccine programmes on Thursday under an Africa-focused initiative that hopes to save tens of thousands of children's lives per year across the continent. The three West African countries are the latest to participate after successful rollouts of routine malaria immunization for children in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Ghana, Kenya and Malawi, the global vaccine alliance GAVI said in a statement. The World Health Organization-approved vaccine is meant to work alongside existing tools such as bed nets to combat malaria, which in Africa kills nearly half a million children under the age of 5 each year.…

Jan

19

2024

By The African Mirror

Sierra Leone allows ex-president Koroma to leave country on medical grounds

NEWS

A Sierra Leone high court allowed ex-president Ernest Bai Koroma, charged this month with treason, to travel abroad on medical grounds. Koroma, 70, was charged with four offences for his alleged role in a failed military attempt to topple the West African country's government in November. There are concerns Koroma's indictment could stoke tension brought by a contentious election in which President Julius Maada Bio was reelected for a second term in June 2023. The main opposition candidate rejected the results and international partners questioned the vote. Months later, on November 26, gunmen attacked military barracks, a prison and other locations in…

Jan

04

2024

By The African Mirror

Sierra Leone charges ex-president’s guard, 11 others over failed coup

NEWS

SIERRA Leone authorities have charged 12 people with treason in connection with a failed coup in November, including a member of former President Ernest Bai Koroma's security detail, the government said. Gunmen attacked a military barracks, a prison and other locations in Sierra Leone on November 26, freeing about 2,200 inmates and killing more than 20 people in what the authorities said afterwards was an attempt to overthrow the government. The accused were arraigned before a magistrate in the capital Freetown on Tuesday, the information ministry said in a statement, adding that they included ex-police and correctional officers and former Koroma…

Dec

14

2023

By The African Mirror

Sierra Leone court orders opposition leader’s arrest for suspected graft

NEWS

SIERRA Leone's Court of Appeal has ordered the arrest of the opposition candidate who was runner-up in presidential elections this year for suspected corruption linked to the sale of government shares in a mining company, it said in a statement. Samuel Kamara was the candidate for the opposition All People's Congress Party (APC) in 2018 and in June. He was indicted in 2021 for alleged graft involving a separate matter when he was foreign minister. The trial is ongoing and he denies wrongdoing. The Court of Appeal on Tuesday ordered Kamara to be arrested and handed over to the anti-corruption commission for…

Dec

08

2023

By The African Mirror

Sierra Leone ex-president Koroma summoned for questioning over failed coup

NEWS

SIERRA Leone police have summoned former president Ernest Bai Koroma for questioning as part of their investigation into a failed coup attempt on November 26, information minister Chernor Bah said in a statement. Koroma is invited to report to the headquarters of the Criminal Investigations Department in Freetown within 24 hours, the statement said. Koroma said he would honour the invitation. "I maintain an open mind and stand ready to support the police investigations to the fullest. Let the rule of law reign supreme in our democracy", Koroma said in a statement, calling on the public to remain calm. Gunmen…

Nov

28

2023

By UMARU FOFANA

Twenty killed in Sierra Leone attack and nearly 2,000 prisoners escape

NEWS

TWENTY people were killed and nearly 2,000 inmates escaped during an attack on a military barracks, a prison and other locations in Sierra Leone, officials said. The West African country was thrown into panic in the early hours when the assailants sent gunfire ringing across the capital Freetown. The government blamed "renegade soldiers" that it said had been repelled. President Julius Maada Bio said in an address on Sunday that most of the leaders of the attack had been arrested and that efforts to apprehend others were underway. An investigation has been launched, he said. Army spokesman Colonel Issa Bangura…