Photo: Umaru Fofana

In Sierra Leone, victim always languish in their victimization. From our civil war victims to ebola survivors and orphans, the Freetown mudslide victims should have known that in this country their suffering is purely their burden. When the funds are raised and the immediate tragedy ends, our government is not in the habit of caring for those for whom its coffer is filled by those who care.

In the past week, I have witnessed with horror and outrage as individuals, businesses, NGOs, Plenipotentiaries, foreign heads of state, and even our own local government ministries make direct donations of cash, cheques, and supplies to the president and vice president for victims of the recent flood and mudslide in Freetown. These donations, amounting to millions of dollars, are made under no concrete instruments of accountability. C’est a dire, these donations are not for t...

When Alexander Falconbridge, agent of the Sierra Leone Company (SLC), a business venture established to facilitate commerce between Britain and Sierra Leone, renegotiated a land contract for the reconstruction of Freetown, which had been recently burnt down by Chief Jimmy, the presiding sovereign, King Naimbana of Robana, added to the new land grant a request for Falconbridge to take his son, Prince John Frederic, to London to receive Western education under the guardianship of the British ab...

When the first bullet was fired at Bomaru on March 23, 1991, I had just gotten out of prison with my father and walked back to Sierra Leone from Liberia. We had been arrested by Charles Ganghay Taylor’s National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) rebels and incarcerated on the outskirts of Voinjama. I was only about eight or nine years old and as a child I had no idea why we were in jail. Years later I would come to learn that Ganghay Taylor was retaliating for Sierra Leone’...

Experts are stating that while there is considerable progress towards some form of ebola vaccine, a cure may not be available until sometime next year. What this means is that the fight against the deadly disease must proceed as if there was no vaccine in order to halt its projected exponential spread.

Now that many of the myths have been dispelled and the lackadaisical attitudes of Western countries and international organizations have been checked, it is time to provide conc...

Lungi International Airport in Sierra Leone is separated from Freetown, the capital, by sea. Travelers often have to take a local and usually overcrowded ferry to reach Freetown. In addition to international travelers, the ferry is usually full of traders and hawkers of all sorts. This is a video of the ferry transit between Lungi and Freetown.