By Saio Marrah After presenting seven witnesses and documents at the ongoing tribunal set up to look into alleged misconduct by the Auditor General, Lara Taylor-Pearce and her deputy, Tamba Momoh, Lead State Lawyer, Ahmed J.M. Bockarie has closed the case for the prosecution. This saw Lead Defence Lawyer, Rowland Wright representing the first respondent, suspended auditor
By Chernoh Alpha M. Bah, Matthew Anderson, and Mark Feldman
Official correspondences and bank statements on travel expenditures from the Office of the President of Sierra Leone uncovered by Africanist Press reveals shocking details on how the country’s president Julius Maada Bio, and his wife Fatima Bio, spent more than Le5.2 billion (over US$520,000) on travel costs and per diems for the month of December 2020 alone, the highest travel expenditure incurred in a single month by any sitting president of Sierra Leone since independence in 1961.
Documentary evidence, including bank withdrawal notes and financial statements examined by the Africanist Press, show expenses for presidential trips to Gabon, Ivory Coast, and Guinea in early to mid-December 2020, and his visit to Bonthe in southern Sierra Leone for the Christmas holidays. These statements show total costs of Le5,217,538,692.86 charged directly from the country’s Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF). As a low-income country, S