By Richmond B. Tholley
National Elections Watch (NEW) observers were removed from the April 11 Paramount Chieftaincy election in Bombali Sebora Chiefdom on the instructions of the Electoral Commission of Sierra Leone, the Bombali District Human Rights Committee (BDHRC) has reported.
According to a statement issued by BDHRC on April 13 and signed by Chairperson Peter Conteh, the incident took place at the Practising Field in Makeni, the designated polling venue. The rights body said the Electoral Commission’s North East Regional Commissioner, Max Kanu, directed a Sierra Leone police officer to eject the NEW team from the premises.
BDHRC stated that the removal went ahead despite protests from NEW’s Bombali District Coordinator, Emilia Jengo-Kamara, who was present and informed officials she had received verbal approval from the Senior District Officer (SDO) for NEW to observe the elections.
The committee said the ECSL regional commissioner had indicated that NEW “will not be allowed to observe any elections until they resolve the issues that they have with the ECSL management”. BDHRC described this as part of “what appears to be a pattern of preventing and excluding NEW from election observation”.
Attempts to reach ECSL for comment on the incident and on BDHRC’s statement were unsuccessful at the time of publication.
In its statement, the BDHRC condemned the removal as “discriminating and humiliating” and said it followed the incident “with utter dismay and disbelief”. The Committee stressed NEW’s “nearly a quarter of a century of solid track record” in election observation, calling the organisation “a proud national asset in the promotion of democracy”.
It warned that excluding NEW carries “huge reputational risks” for the ECSL and called for a “robust, impartial investigation” into the matter. BDHRC said it “stands in solidarity with NEW” and extended “heartfelt sympathy” to NEW colleagues over the “self-created tension” by the regional commissioner.
