by ibakarr | Jan 13, 2016 | Uncategorized
The decade long civil war in Sierra Leone saw many juveniles as victims and also perpetrators of serious atrocities. Violence became widespread and systemic against women and girls. Long after the war, and to date, women and girls still face abuse—mainly domestic and sexual abuse—although there has been significant improvements thanks continued advocacy by human rights institutions and civil society activism.
In 2007, the Government of Sierra Leone by the recommendations of the Truth and reconciliation commission (TRC) between 2007 and 2012 enacted what has become known as the ‘Gender Acts’. This includes the Sexual Offences Act of 2012, enacted to prevent sexual abuse and punish sexual offenders. The enactment of these laws was a significant development in efforts to enhance gender equity, and the laws have improved the lives of particularly women and girls in Sierra Leone by providing them legal protection.
However, the end of the war, the enactment of gender laws and the setting up of judicial structures in the country have not put an end to sexual related violence and abuse. Sexual and Gender based Violence (SGBV) continues to be a major part of the justice problems faced by women and girls in Sierra Leone, especially in the Western Area.
CARL has been doing a great job of promoting and advocating for gender rights through its numerous strategies including monitoring of SGBV-related trials, community outreach and training of law enforcement and justice officers in the implementation of the gender laws, and so on, until when a serious threat to the progress of this work presented itself in May 2014 when the government of Sierra Leone announced the first case of the deadly ebola virus disease in the country. The virus has now killed over 2000 people in Sierra Leone including nurses, doctors. Soon the disease became a public health emergency which prompted the government to declare a state of emergency.
Since the outbreak in May this year, the Ebola virus has had a huge impact on women and children. According the Chief Executive of Save the Children UK, an estimated two (2) million children are at risk of contracting the deadly Ebola Virus as most of them had lost either one or both parent or are at the mercy of humanitarians to help them to survive. Apart from the direct impact of the virus on children, there are also indirect consequences in the form of the impact of the outbreak on the justice needs of these vulnerable members of the population. The restrictive measures announced by government after the declaration of the state of emergency have continued to affect the progress of juvenile and gender justice systems, like many other of the judicial system. Even with the outbreak of Ebola, there are increasing reports of sexual abuse, especially in the Western Area. There are fresh cases of sexual violence that are being brought to both Juvenile and Magistrates courts. During my monitoring exercises of sexual cases in court, I recorded over fifty (50) cases of sexual violence just between the month of October and November 2014, not to talk of the preceding months. On the whole, there was an increase in the number of sexual cases in the year 2014, and one can guess that this was not unrelated to the fact that the police have been too engaged in monitoring and enforcing government imposed emergency Ebola response measures such as enforcing quarantines and tracing affected or suspected cases of infection.
As a court monitor, monitoring sexual and gender based violence (SGVB) cases, I had to put up with a lot of changes and challenges after the outbreak of the Ebola Virus Disease. Before the Ebola epidemic, normal court sittings for SGBV cases were held on Saturdays at 10:00 am. This was done in order to expedite the administration of gender justice since the courts will be less crowded on Saturdays with other cases, and mostly to protect the identity of the victims, especially when they are of minority age.
But since the outbreak of Ebola, the sittings were incorporated into the normal court sittingswhich runs from Monday to Friday from 9:00am, and they are currently being conducted in the chambers of the Magistrate, all in a bid to protect the victims’ identity. For this reason, I don’t get to witness some of these cases, since the chambers can only accommodate six people at a time. So many times, if prosecutors and defence counsel are in the chambers we court monitors are not allowed to go in.
Another challenge faced during the cause of the year was that I was unable to implement some of the programmes under my gender project, as most of them would involve gathering people. For instance, since the public emergency regulations forbid public gatherings on occasions that are not Ebola-related, most of our gender project activities, such as focus group discussion and school outreach programs had to be put on hold almost indefinitely.
In spite of these challenges, there were a few hopeful steps taken by the judiciary to ensure that sexual and gender based violence cases were expedited as much as possible, and a good number of these cases are currently being given speedy trials and a lot have already been committed to the High Court for further trial. Similarly, at the Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law Sierra Leone (CARL – SL) we were able to continue with our advocacy on a lot of gender related issues in the best manner possible. This signals an element of hope in our collective efforts in the fight against SGBV even with the current Ebola crisis.
Finally, as we join hands together in the fight against Ebola, let us be mindful of the fact that our future leaders—the children of Sierra Leone, especially the girl child—need our protection both against Ebola and against sexual related abuse.
by ibakarr | Nov 17, 2015 | Uncategorized
I write to share a memorandum with new analysis and recommendations for your government for the ICC Assembly of States Parties session that begins Wednesday (attached and below). This memorandum—which is a joint effort of African civil society organizations and international organizations with a presence in Africa—discusses steps forward in the ICC’s investigations and examinations, in and outside Africa, and Africa’s relationship with the ICC. It also highlights key issues expected to arise and actions we believe are needed by your government with respect to them, namely: overall support to the court, budget, protection of the ICC’s independence, cooperation, and complementarity. We thank you for your consideration of this material.
Click here to download
by ibakarr | Oct 10, 2015 | Press
Freetown, 5th October, 2015 – The Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law (CARL) in September filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Leone Preparatory School seeking a judicial review of the Ministry of Education’s order in July that the school be closed. The suit was filed with the High Court of Sierra Leone pursuant to Order 52 of the High Court Rules 2007. The applicant is the Leone Preparatory School. The respondents are the Minister of Education and the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice.
PLEASE CLICK TO DOWNLOAD PRESS RELEASE
by ibakarr | Feb 11, 2015 | Uncategorized
It is a general rule in all court cases—civil and criminal—that no external or outside charge should be pitched into the proceedings of a specific offence(s) for which an individual is brought to a court of law, expect for other court related offences such as contempt, lying on oath, and the like. This general rule was overtly abused by a Chairman in the Native Court No. 2 in Bo city, when he fined a woman for an alleged offence which had not been investigated and which was beyond his jurisdiction.
This piece is intended to bring into the open one of the abuses inherent in one of the courts in Bo city. It points out some of the existing laws that prevent courts from overstepping their jurisdictional authority, and further enumerates the effects of such abuses on litigants and the Local Court system in this region generally. Lastly, it points out recommendations intended to forestall such abuses and restore the integrity of our Local Court system in the country at large.
Section 44 (1) of the Local Courts Act states that: ‘any person who sits as a member of the court without due authority [in it] commits an offence and shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding Le 200,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding one year or to both…”, and Section 44 (3) stipulates that: “No prosecution for an offence against Subsection (1) shall be instituted without the consent in writing of the Director of Public Prosecution”.
This abuse of authority under initially sparked off when a concerned mother reported one Hassan Koroma and his mother for harboring her 16-year old school-going daughter for sexual purposes, to a Section Chief at Yemoh Town section. This Chief then sent a sub-chief to invite the alleged offenders. The victim’s elder brother, Elijah, was asked to accompany the emissary-chief to identify them. Upon arrival, the alleged offenders insulted the brother in the very presence of the sub-chief. When this incident was reported to the Section Chief he imposed a parallel fine of Le 30,000 each on both the insulters and the insulted. The insulted young man paid the fine while the 2 on the other side failed. There upon, the Section Chief forwarded the defaulters to the N.A. Court No 2. During inquiries into this criminal case of contempt and upon the failure of the insulters to pay the fine for their insulting conducts, the harbored victim was reported to have said that her mother knew of her love relationship with Hassan Koroma, the alleged abuser. This court Chairman instantly levied a Le 100,000 fine on the victim’s mother without allowing her to tell her side of the story, though her son, Elijah, informed then that he and their mother had reported the case of harboring to the East End Police Station and that it was under investigation. Notwithstanding, the Chairman and his panel could not listen, but ordered the clerk to serve the woman with a criminal summon, followed by threats of detention if she should fail to pay. Under pressure and in distress she offered her cell-phone as collateral and then sent her other daughter home to ask for a loan to enable her pay off the fine.
It was after this payment that a CARL/SL Monitor discovered this anomaly. When the Chairman and the clerk contested the monitor’s intervention, he advised the abused woman to write a complaint to the Customary Law Officer for redress. She did write the letter, dated 16 October, 2014, but since the time of filing this complaint, about mid December 2014, it has not been addressed. This mother lamented that the petty trade from which she supported her five school-going pupils had collapsed as a result of this court fine and other expenses in the circumstances. It was on 12 December 2014 that the harbored girl returned home after appealing to her aunt and the mother for mercy.
In the first place, cases of harboring are entirely criminal in nature, and therefore beyond the jurisdiction of Local Courts. Their initial complaints are taken to the police for investigations and then charged to the Magistrate’s Court for preliminary investigations and possible committal to the High Court should there be sufficient evidence for the case to enter trial in the High Court. It was therefore wrong for this Local Court Chairman to interfere with and impose a fine in a case that is lawfully beyond his jurisdiction. Further, the woman was denied her rights: a) to a fair hearing, and b) to be presumed innocent until proven guilty. This means that her case was not investigated or heard in court before judgment was passed on her. She had stood against the abuse of her daughter by a 28 years old man, arguing that she and her son, Elijah, had initiated a complaint of harboring at a Police Station, and that she could not allow her 16-year old child to stay with a lover while the victim’s elder sister, aged 20, was still in school. Yet this Chairman had not taken any action.
Abuses of the trial rights of parties to a complainant have the effects of eroding the reputation of our justice system, especially after our civil conflict one of whose causes was the glaring injustices in the courts and the police. These situations are a glaring fleet in a distance, and in order to nip them in the bud, CARL will proffer suitable recommendations which if considered and implemented would be of great benefit especially since it would strengthen our fragile democracy.
CARL has been providing trainings in Bo to court officials in the laws, the extent and limits of their authority, jurisdiction, fair trial rights of litigants and the rule of law generally. This approach should be replicated by government and other development partners on a regular basis and in all districts or jurisdictions across the country. Case monitoring should be introduced at pre-trail levels (police investigations) and then broadened to encompass all levels of courts wherever they are in Sierra Leone. Judicial authorities should take seriously the constructive criticisms and corrective measures put forward by court monitors as they are living witnesses to the inherent lapses in our justice system. Also, there should be set up a Judicial Service Ethics Commission to oversee the work of justice officials, receive and deal with complaints against these officials, and punish in line with the provisions of the law those found in default in the performance of their duties.
It will be too costly for our fledgling democracy for the justice needs of any category of people and at any level to be sacrificed for any selfish aspirations; for, as was aptly put by Martin Luther King Jr., “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”.
by ibakarr | Feb 2, 2015 | Uncategorized
The decade long civil war in Sierra Leone saw many juveniles as victims and also perpetrators of serious atrocities. Violence became widespread and systemic against women and girls. Long after the war, and to date, women and girls still face abuse—mainly domestic and sexual abuse—although there has been significant improvements thanks continued advocacy by human rights institutions and civil society activism.
In 2007, the Government of Sierra Leone by the recommendations of the Truth and reconciliation commission (TRC) between 2007 and 2012 enacted what has become known as the ‘Gender Acts’. This includes the Sexual Offences Act of 2012, enacted to prevent sexual abuse and punish sexual offenders. The enactment of these laws was a significant development in efforts to enhance gender equity, and the laws have improved the lives of particularly women and girls in Sierra Leone by providing them legal protection.
However, the end of the war, the enactment of gender laws and the setting up of judicial structures in the country have not put an end to sexual related violence and abuse. Sexual and Gender based Violence (SGBV) continues to be a major part of the justice problems faced by women and girls in Sierra Leone, especially in the Western Area.
CARL has been doing a great job of promoting and advocating for gender rights through its numerous strategies including monitoring of SGBV-related trials, community outreach and training of law enforcement and justice officers in the implementation of the gender laws, and so on, until when a serious threat to the progress of this work presented itself in May 2014 when the government of Sierra Leone announced the first case of the deadly ebola virus disease in the country. The virus has now killed over 2000 people in Sierra Leone including nurses, doctors. Soon the disease became a public health emergency which prompted the government to declare a state of emergency.
Since the outbreak in May this year, the Ebola virus has had a huge impact on women and children. According the Chief Executive of Save the Children UK, an estimated two (2) million children are at risk of contracting the deadly Ebola Virus as most of them had lost either one or both parent or are at the mercy of humanitarians to help them to survive. Apart from the direct impact of the virus on children, there are also indirect consequences in the form of the impact of the outbreak on the justice needs of these vulnerable members of the population. The restrictive measures announced by government after the declaration of the state of emergency have continued to affect the progress of juvenile and gender justice systems, like many other of the judicial system. Even with the outbreak of Ebola, there are increasing reports of sexual abuse, especially in the Western Area. There are fresh cases of sexual violence that are being brought to both Juvenile and Magistrates courts. During my monitoring exercises of sexual cases in court, I recorded over fifty (50) cases of sexual violence just between the month of October and November 2014, not to talk of the preceding months. On the whole, there was an increase in the number of sexual cases in the year 2014, and one can guess that this was not unrelated to the fact that the police have been too engaged in monitoring and enforcing government imposed emergency Ebola response measures such as enforcing quarantines and tracing affected or suspected cases of infection.
As a court monitor, monitoring sexual and gender based violence (SGVB) cases, I had to put up with a lot of changes and challenges after the outbreak of the Ebola Virus Disease. Before the Ebola epidemic, normal court sittings for SGBV cases were held on Saturdays at 10:00 am. This was done in order to expedite the administration of gender justice since the courts will be less crowded on Saturdays with other cases, and mostly to protect the identity of the victims, especially when they are of minority age.
But since the outbreak of Ebola, the sittings were incorporated into the normal court sittingswhich runs from Monday to Friday from 9:00am, and they are currently being conducted in the chambers of the Magistrate, all in a bid to protect the victims’ identity. For this reason, I don’t get to witness some of these cases, since the chambers can only accommodate six people at a time. So many times, if prosecutors and defence counsel are in the chambers we court monitors are not allowed to go in.
Another challenge faced during the cause of the year was that I was unable to implement some of the programmes under my gender project, as most of them would involve gathering people. For instance, since the public emergency regulations forbid public gatherings on occasions that are not Ebola-related, most of our gender project activities, such as focus group discussion and school outreach programs had to be put on hold almost indefinitely.
In spite of these challenges, there were a few hopeful steps taken by the judiciary to ensure that sexual and gender based violence cases were expedited as much as possible, and a good number of these cases are currently being given speedy trials and a lot have already been committed to the High Court for further trial. Similarly, at the Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law Sierra Leone (CARL – SL) we were able to continue with our advocacy on a lot of gender related issues in the best manner possible. This signals an element of hope in our collective efforts in the fight against SGBV even with the current Ebola crisis.
Finally, as we join hands together in the fight against Ebola, let us be mindful of the fact that our future leaders—the children of Sierra Leone, especially the girl child—need our protection both against Ebola and against sexual related abuse.
