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Sierra Leone ALERT: Newspaper editor physically assaulted

David Jabati, editor of  the Exclusive, a Freetown-based independent newspaper was on March 13, 2008 violently assaulted by angry supporters of the  ruling All People’s Congress Party (APC) at the Headquarters of the opposition Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP). Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA)’s correspondent reported that Jabtai, who had gone to the party’s headquarters to cover a clash between the two main political parties in the country, was accused by the APC youth of being a...

SIERRA LEONE: Diamond miners choose cassava over carats

In Sierra Leone plummeting diamond prices, dwindling reserves, consistently poor working conditions and a lack of regulation are driving diamond workers to start farming, youths told IRIN. “The future of Kono is not diamonds,” said Tamba Kakarnbanja, councillor for youths in Kono District. “It’s agriculture.” Diamonds helped fuel the 11-year civil war that killed at least 75,000 people, injured some 10,000 and displaced almost half of Sierra Leone’s 4.5 million population according to the UN....

SIERRA LEONE: Women access power, vote by vote

In Kailahun, Sierra Leone, the poorest region in the world's poorest country, women are trying to effect change on the issues that matter to them – maternal mortality, girls’ education, teenage pregnancy, literacy rates for women – by entering political office. One in eight Sierra Leonean women die in childbirth, the majority of women are illiterate, and just one in five girls finish secondary school, according to the UN Children’s Fund's (UNICEF) 2009 State of the World’s Children report. ...

SIERRA LEONE: “Forced marriage” conviction a first

The Special Court for Sierra Leone on 25 February convicted three former leaders of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), marking the first time a court has convicted on the charge of “forced marriage”. After a four-year trial, the tribunal found former RUF interim leader Issa Hassan Sesay and RUF commander Morris Kallon guilty on 16 of 18 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and former RUF chief of security Augustine Gbao on 14 counts. All three men were convicted of forcing...

SIERRA LEONE: Communities take charge, one latrine at a time

Kadiatou Samura proudly showed her pristine new toilet to her Member of Parliament, the leader of her chiefdom and the head of the UN Children’s Fund’s district office as they toured her village, Kamayintin, in Sierra Leone’s Bombali district. The village was celebrating its status as the chiefdom’s fifth to be declared “free of open defecation”. The toilet was elegant and simple: an earth floor, walls built from local wood, topped by a conical straw roof. Samura built it herself with the help...

Sierra Leone ALERT: Female journalists taken hostage over reports on FGM

Four journalists in Kanema, a town of about 200km from Freetown, capital of Sierra Leone, were on February 7, 2009 taken hostage by members of Bondo Society, a traditional female group, over reports on female genital mutilation (FGM). Manjama Balama-Samba, Henrietta Kpaka of the Sierra Leone Broadcasting Service (SLBS) and their colleagues, Isha Jalloh and Jenneh Brima of Eastern Radio were picked up and detained in a bush for more than two and a half hours for allegedly filing reports on their...

Japan provides US$2.9 million in Sierra Leone

Targeting under-fives, pregnant women and young mothers nationwide The Government of Japan provided US$ 2.9 million for “the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases” in support of effective strategies to reduce child and maternal mortality in Sierra Leone. The project is directed towards children under the age of five years, pregnant women and young mothers in all the thirteen districts in Sierra Leone. The objective of this funding is to contribute to the Government’s effort to improve...

Sierra ALERT: Media rights advocate receives another death threat

Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai, Executive Director of Society for Democratic Initiatives (SDI), a Sierra Leone media advocacy organisation, received death threats on February 6, 2009 for allegedly criticising the ruling All People’s Congress (APC) government. According to a Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA)’s source, the anonymous person accused Abdulai of giving opponents of the government the platform to “preach hate politics” on his online Freedom of Information Forum. In an email...

SIERRA LEONE: Government weighs “hybrid” health care plan

The Sierra Leone government is considering a health care plan that would combine a national insurance scheme with totally free care for the neediest groups, including children and pregnant/lactating women. “We will probably have a hybrid of both,” Health Minister Soccoh Kabia told IRIN. Sierra Leone has some of the highest infant, child and maternal mortality rates in the world. But Kabia said the most recent demographic survey shows progress on these fronts. “We have a ways to go but we are...

Small Man Big Ideas

Mr. Mohmaed Fornah, principal of IPAM on Kombo Sillah High Way looks into the future of the institute with passion and hopes of an excellent...