There is ongoing protest in Moyamba, Freetown in Sierra Leone, over election malpractices during the 2023 general elections and the killing of opposition party members, SaharaReporters learnt from eyewitnesses.
SaharaReporters gathered that Sierra Leone military personnel had also shot at some of the protesters in a bid to curtail the uprising.
“At Moyamba community, there is protest and also on Black Hall road, Freetown, the state capital, one person has been shot,” a witness said.
“The ongoing protest in Sierra Leone today is over the rise in the cost of fuel, food commodities, election malpractice during the 2023 general elections and the killing of opposition party members.
“The entire country protesting today; all the deaths recently were recorded in Freetown,” another witness said.
SaharaReporters on Sunday also reported that Sierra Leone's capital Freetown was thrown into darkness after Turkish firm, Karpowership switched off the electricity supply to the West African country.
Karpowership switched off the power supply following an unpaid debt of around $40 million, the energy minister of the country reportedly said on Friday.
Minister Kanja Sesay told Reuters that the outstanding amount "was accrued over time because the government subsidises more than half the cost the ship charges per kilowatt hour".
He had said the government had to spend more on the subsidy because it charges consumers in the weak local Leone currency, one of worst performing against the dollar in which it pays the power provider.
A government commission has been set up to review consumer electricity tariffs which could double.
Karpowership, one of the world's largest operators of floating power plants and part of the Karadeniz Energy Group, signed deals in 2018 and 2020 to provide electricity to Sierra Leone's state power utility.