The opposition National Grand Coalition (NGC) party has referenced the survey on the country’s economy by the Pan-African Afrobarometer research network to highlight a number of concerns with regards to the increase in the prices of basic food items and called for serious government action to reverse the trend.
A statement from NGC says there is a steady increase in the prices of food items with no corresponding increase in income.
The Afrobarometer report on Sierra Leone says: “Sierra Leoneans are overwhelmingly dissatisfied with their personal living conditions and the country’s economy, and very few citizens believe the government is doing a good job of handling the economy.” NGC therefore argues that ‘the priorities of the government do not seem to be the same as the priorities of the people’.
The party said it carried a survey on the daily needs and monthly income of a teacher in the civil service grade 7 category who, despite the 30% salary increment by the present government, can hardly live on his income, as the needs of the family were twice that of his monthly pay.
NGC recalled President Julius Maada Bio’s state opening of parliament address last year in which he mentioned an increase of one trillion Leones in domestic revenue for the previous year 2018, to a total of 4.35 trillion Leones.
“However, in his present condition, the ordinary man does not feel the impact of all this in his daily life, even with the Free Quality Education that relieved him of paying school fees,” NGC notes. The party asked the government to treat hunger as a the real threat to national security and requested that the government convenes a gathering of business people, economists and farmers to exchange their views on the temporary measures needed to address the economic challenges in the country.
NGC also quoted part of the Afrobarometer report that says: “dissatisfaction with the country’s economy and personal living conditions is reflective of citizens’ increasing levels of deprivation in their daily lives, as large majorities experience shortages of food, clean water, and other basic necessities”.
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