By Steven Bockarie Mansaray
Police have arrested the rider of a commercial motorbike with registration number AIE 659, Ibrahim Barrie aka Daddy from Amdialia village and his motorbike after three cartons of assorted free health care drugs were found on them.
The arrest of the drugs followed a tipoff to the Post Commander of the Gbentu Police Post Sergeant 780 Sesay Sorie by the Paramount Chief of Folosaba Dembelia chiefdom, Fenda Mondu Kamara II.
The drugs were allegedly being taken to Sandakoro village in neighbouring Guinea. The suspect was then questioned and released on bail to Sadu Tall a tribal authority in Gbentu, since the police didn’t have a detention facility there.
Barrie later escaped from his surety, Tall who was then arrested by the police for failing to produce the suspect. Tall, the exhibits and the motor bike are now being detained in Makeni.
The Regional Monitoring and Evaluation Officer for Health For All Coalition, Alfred Turay and the Regional Police boss have invited members of the district health management team, Tall and the exhibits to Makeni for further investigation.
Turay told Politico that five of the 10 different drugs arrested were from Koinadugu district. The district free health care steering committee has also called the district health management team to a meeting to know more about the matter.
The district logistics officer, John Sorie Koroma told the meeting that they had launched an internal investigation to know the source of the drugs. The district health management team is yet to take responsibility pointing that the drugs may have come from other parts of the country "taking advantage of the porous borders in the district".
However, the escaped suspect had alleged that the drugs belonged to one Abdul Rahman Barrie aka Mama, who has drugstores in Sandakoro and other parts of Guinea and to whose wife he alleged he was to hand over the drugs in Sandakoro. He was also arrested with the Guinean identity card of the said Abdul Rahman.
Two years ago, Adraman Barrie was arrested and charged to court in Kabala for the same crime and he was convicted. The court fined him a minimal amount and he was freed.
Campaigners say Sierra Leone is losing a lot of resources due to the huge amount of unprotected border crossing points in the Koinadugu district.
(C) Politico 03/12/13
