TRACE JOENAL

Residents of Kabala in the Koinadugu District North of Sierra Leone are currently facing the worst fuel crisis in their lives despite the huge quantum of fuel in the country. Investigation carried out by SALONE TIMES indicates that the usual consignment of fuel usually assigned to that region to serve that populace did not usually reach them directly. SALONE TIMES learnt that whenever the allocated supply reaches that community the two fuel stations in that community - National Petroleum (N.P.) and Safecon at Makeni road in Kabala divide the fuel. Part of the supplied will go to the fuel stations while the other half be sold at black-market rate to the Gold Mining companies and other big buyers. At Safecon we discovered dozens of five gallons loaded with fuel waiting for buyers who will pay extra. At black the markets, the fuel is sold at six thousand Leone’s (Le 6000) per liter while the official price is four thousand five hundred Leone’s (Le 4,500) some dealers at the black-

By Thomas Dixon The Open Government Initiative on Friday the 15th of July took people all over the country to interface with the Parliamentarians and the Local Councils at Parliament Building. The Director of the Open Government Initiative Khadija Sesay said that it would be important for the people to ask their Parliamentarians and councilors question as to what they are doing. Khadija Sesay said that the mandate of the OGI is to make sure that the people are informed about the functions of the government and to create a participatory kind of government. She also opined that the OGI will continue to bring the government closer to the people so that they will have their say in governance. The Speaker of Parliament thanked the OGI for such a wonderful imitative and said that it is good for people to ask their Parliamentarians questions so that they will be well informed. His Excellency the President Ernest Bai Koroma commended the OGI for such a wonderful job and told Parliamenta

As part of it Corporate Social Responsibility Sierra Leone’s biggest GSM operator africell, joined other partners in preparing unemployed graduates for a brighter future in a day’s job creation workshop. The event which took place at the British Council over the week brought together over three hundred graduates from various institutions has as its theme “Employability and Economic Productivity takes more than a University Degree” Africell Corporate Affairs Officer Joe Abass Bangura in his statement said the investments africell have made in the country have created more than 800 direct employments and more than 5,000 indirect employments. That he said includes dealers, security companies, maintenance companies and several other institutions that provide services to africell. “The direct and indirect economic effect of africell’s investment in the country is also very huge,” He went on to say human investment through training of personnel in the practical application of knowledg

Football fans all over the country have commended the Premier League Board for successfully ending the one leg round Premier League. The above league initially met a stumbling block due to lack of sponsorship thus causing the board to scale down the usual two legged competition to a single leg. Even at this the fans commended the Premier League Board for ending the league without a single team boycotting the league as had been done in previous years. This, the fans said was due to good administration. It could be recalled that when Rodney Michael was appointed as Chairman of the Board, most fans stated that it was a test case for him as he intends to replace Nahim Khadi as Chairman of SLFA come 2012. Alhaji Komba a member of the Board’s Media Committee told SALONE TIMES that the secret behind the Board’s success was due to the timely intervention of Africell and Mercury International the league’s major sponsors. Komba said africell which a few years suspended their sponsorship came

The executive of the Western Area Football Association WAFU has suspended the association’s acting Secretary General Thomas Collins for six months Sources state the executive of Brookfields United filed a protest against Shefield United for using two unregistered players during their match in the ongoing Division 1 league. The sources further states that Brookfields United paid a protest fee of Le 100,000 to Collins. Collins did not pay the money into the association’s account which is the normal procedure. It was when the verdict was delayed that it was found out that he never paid the money into the said account. This was why the Vice Chairman of the board Nasiru Deen Othman wrote a letter suspending the acting secretary for six months. According to the letter Collins is being suspended from being a member of the executive from Friday 8th July 2011. The executive made it known to the Collins that the action is without prejudice. The executive also asked for a replay of the match i