Corruption allegations rock Statistics Sierra Leone

Enumerators and drivers recruited by Statistics Sierra Leone (SSL) for the Demographic Health Survey (DHS) say they are being asked by management to give them kickbacks for their recruitment into the job.
Some of them who spoke to Politico on condition of anonymity alleged that they were asked to pay about 40% of their earnings from their assignments.
The drivers also say they are being asked to pay between Le 200,000 and Le 300,000 every month for the one-year contract they signed with Statistics Sierra Leone.
Other allegations include the recruitment of 17 drivers when there are only seven vehicles provided by the UNFPA for the DHS. They said they work in shifts of two weeks each within the month. A senior driver at SSL told Politico that management preferred to recruit new drivers for the project when they are sitting idly all day long. He said management should have saved some funds by making use their services for the project instead of recruiting new drivers.
The Acting Administrative and Human Resource Manager, Samuel Bangura dismissed the allegations as “false” and “unfortunate”. He said asking enumerators for kickbacks would jeopardize the entire survey exercise. With regard the recruitment of drivers, Bangura said they would not use the services of the permanent drivers to execute the DHS project because that could handicap the normal operations of the institution. He added that they recruited 17 drivers because they are expecting about the same number of vehicles for the Survey and the census. He said UNFPA has just donated its quota of seven vehicles and they are waiting on the Government of Sierra Leone to make its own contribution. He noted that permanent drivers of Statistics Sierra Leone are free to be recruited for the project that has a limited time span but they would have to resign from their permanent positions first.
Meanwhile, residents in Moyamba District have called on the District Council to refuse permission to a team of Demographic Health Survey (DHS) enumerators currently undergoing training for the survey exercise in the district. In a phone-in programme on Radio MODCAR in Moyamba, several callers argued that enumerators recruited out of the district to carry out the DHS should not be allowed to carry out the survey because they lack local knowledge of the targeted communities in the district.
In an interview with Politico, Prof. Bob Kandeh, Chairman of the Moyamba District Council and also a former Statistician General said the arguments of the callers on the phone-in programme did not hold because what is being carried out is just a survey of sample households and not a national census wherein the policy states that enumerators would have to be recruited within their respective districts. He said as a former Statistician General, he would go on air to set the records straight so that they could understand the policies.
Prof. Kandeh noted however that those concerns raised by the people should be noted by the management of Statistics Sierra Leone when recruiting for the national census to be carried out in 2014.