News

By Septimus Senessie in Kono

Police at the Tankoro Division in the eastern Kono District have arrested and transferred to the Criminal Investigation Department headquarters in Freetown 11 people among them Sia Sam Bayraytay, younger sister of Vice President Samuel Sam Sumana.

Police in Freetown said the group of eleven suspects, including local authorities like Councillor Kai Lawrence Mbayo of Ward 63, the ruling party All Peoples Congress youth chairman, Mohamed Bandagbara, were arrested following a protest that left two people dead with bullet wounds.

By Allieu SahidTunkara

Chinese ambassador to Sierra Leone has told a press conference at the Chinese Embassy in Freetown that his country will provide US$82 million and other logistics to Ebola affected countries in the Mano River Union.

Zhao Yanbo disclosed that on the 24 October this year the Chinese President, I Jinping, announced in Beijing in a meeting with Tanzanian President JakayaKikwete that his government would provide much more assistance to the Ebola affected region in Africa.

By Septimus Senessie in Kono

Police at Tankoro division and soldiers of the Ninth Infantry Battalion at Sembakoro village in Kono district have been accused of “carrying out illegal mining exercises at Kongo Bridge, Lebanon in Koidu Town”.

According to some residents around the mined out bridge area and some members of the civil society groups in the diamond rich district, there were well over nine bore holes, locally known as ‘damakuru’, around the Kongo Bridge and some areas close to the main road in and out of the district.

By Mohamed T Massaquoi

District Medical Officer in Pujehun has expressed anger over the attitude of the Speaker of Malen Chiefdom, Robert Moigua, for flouting widely publicised bye-laws relating to burial procedures during the Ebola outbreak.

By Bampia James Bundu

Grave diggers and funeral home owners have expressed disappointment at what they referred to as “stagnation in our businesses because almost every death is now being classified as an Ebola death”.

In an exclusive interview with Politico, Amadu Kanu, a grave digger at the Kissy Road Cemetery in Freetown said that they were faced with serious challenges for the past few months as most of the corpses were being buried by the Ebola team “leaving us with absolutely nothing to do”.

By Crispina Cummings

PRECON Food Management, a Dutch consultancy firm, has engaged wharf communities in the Western Area on how to dispel myths about the Ebola virus disease, which has killed more than 1,000 Sierra Leoneans since May.

The firm, which had signed a contract with the government for a certification project, was also in the country to meet the European Union market standards on export.

By Aminata Phidelia Allie

The visiting United States Permanent Representative to the UN, Samantha Power, has assured Sierra Leone of her country's commitment to defeating Ebola in Sierra Leone.

She was giving an update of her travels to the sub-region, especially in the 3 Ebola crisis countries of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. She said safer burials were being done and people were becoming aware that they could no longer bury their loved ones like they used to.