According to Countryaah.com, with capital city of Freetown, Sierra Leone is a country located in Western Africa with total population of 7,976,994.
Following the Constitution of 1991, Sierra Leone is a single-state multi-party republic. The executive has been added to a president- elect for five years; the president also heads the government. The legislative authority has been added to a parliament with 112 members, elected in the general election for five years. In addition, 12 members are elected as governors of the provinces in separate elections. The governing body in the ethnically diverse country has been unstable and the constitution was in effect out of force during the civil war from 1991 to the 2002 elections, organized by the UN. The country itself organized the elections in 2007 and 2012, and has been characterized as open and fair by international election observers.
Administrative division
Administratively, the country is divided into three provinces; northern, eastern and southern, as well as an area; Western Area, all governed by government-appointed officials. There are 147 chieftains, each governed by a chief and an elder. The chiefs are chosen among chiefs families. See ABBREVIATIONFINDER for how SL can stand for Sierra Leone.
Judiciary
The courts include a Supreme Court, a Court of Appeal, a High Court of Justice. The legislation is based on local traditions and British examples.
In addition to the fight against corruption, Koroma concentrated on infrastructure projects to secure the rebuilding of the country after the Civil War, and he lined up closely for Britain to secure aid and investment. He was therefore also one of the only African leaders to sharply criticize President Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe – in line with Britain.
From 2008, the country stepped up the fight against drug crime. Colombian drug traffickers are increasingly using the country as an intermediary for cocaine exports to Europe.
At its April 2009 party convention, the APC decided to re-elect Koroma for the November 2012 presidential election.
In 2010, the government adopted a program of free medical care for pregnant, nursing mothers and children under 5. The same year, the political and violent contradictions flared up between the country’s two major political parties, the APC and the SLPP. The government replaced 200 senior bureaucrats in the southern and eastern provinces with members and supporters of the ruling party APC.
In April 2012, the Special Court of the Sierra Leone (SCSL) in The Hague found Liberia’s former President Charles Taylor guilty of all 11 counts, including the use of child soldiers, murder, rape, sexual slavery, in one war crimes and crimes against humanity. He was sentenced to 50 years in prison. In July, both the defense and the prosecution appealed the verdict. In September 2013, an appeal court upheld the verdict and in October Taylor was transferred to a prison in northeast England where the sentence was to be served.
However, the epidemic proved far from over. In December-January, more cases were recorded in Sierra Leone than in the other West African countries combined. Although both authorities and international organizations repeatedly felt that the situation was under control several times during 2015, new centers emerged. In February 2016, the preliminary latest case was registered. In March, WHO initiated a 90-day countdown period, so that by June 2016, Sierra Leone would be able to declare Ebola freely. There had then been 14,122 cases registered and 3,955 deaths recorded. Only surpassed by Liberia.
The epidemic had disastrous consequences for society. Political and social rights were curtailed and economic activity fell drastically as a result of the closure of borders and the isolation of the various parts of the country. But isolation was a crucial step to stop the spread of the disease.
There was growing tension between foreign food companies and the country’s farmers. In February, 6 people were sentenced to 6 months in prison or fined for destroying palm oil trees during protests in 2013 in Pujehun district against a palm oil project run by Socfin. The peasants insisted that they had not authorized the involvement of their land for the project. The same month, the district court ordered the Chinese company Orient Agriculture Limited to restore 600 acres of land belonging to 70 families in Nimiyama. In 2013, the company had signed a contract with the local chief and local leaders for the purchase of cheap land, but without the farmers’ knowledge.