By Jenneh Braima
Youth of Segbwema town in the Njaluahun chiefdom, Kailahun district say they are in the final stages of planning a demonstration against the road construction company, ISU for “violating an agreement with the community people”.
Speaking to Politico, the local parliamentarian, Abu Jajua of constituency 07, said: “I am aware of a demonstration being planned by youth of the community but I have calmed them down until we meet with stakeholders”.
He said the agreement required the company to pay both surface rent and royalty “for the quarry which is in Segbwema Town and that the underground rent should have been paid to the two families who own the land upon which the quarry is situated”.
He accused ISU of “paying only the surface rent, leaving the royalty and it has been four years since the agreement was signed”.
The opposition MP said “rents from the quarry were to be used for the construction of roads within the township of Segbwema but this has not happened even though materials were long provided by the community people to the Roads Authority that contracted the ISU construction company".
He said that as part of the agreement, the company was to build “a permanent structure in the township as they presently reside there but they chose to live in Kenema and then bring a container house in our town”.
The chiefdom youth leader, Dauda Gbow, said they needed clarification from the leaders of Segbwema regarding the agreement with ISU construction company “because we have ceased all community work because of on-going events”.
The public relations officer of the company, Mohamed Sheriff, said he was not familiar with the agreement as he was not with the company at the time of it was gone into.
“But all I can say now is that the container house structure they are talking about is our consulting engineer’s office”, he said.
Sheriff said that “there is no part in that agreement that states that the ISU should build a permanent structure at the camp site and secondly, the land on which we built the camp was leased to us by the Gbokoyema community and was paid for in full for the lease period”.
(C) Politico 11/02/14
