By Allieu Sahid Tunkara
Deputy Minister of Political and Public Affairs, Karamo Kabba, was the savior of the day on Monday when he managed to convince protesting members of the Street Life Family (SLF) to disperse amidst a chaotic scene at the entrance of the main government ministerial building, Youyi.
The protesters were demonstrating against delay in payment of their outstanding money owed by the Ministry of Health for cleansing works done on its behalf.
SLF claims it is owed about Le700M for the services rendered earlier this year and it blames Deputy Minister of Health, Madina Rahman, who is said to have coordinated the exercise, for the delay in their payment.
On Monday some women who took part in the cleansing staged the second demonstration over the issue since June this year. At some point they blocked the main entrance of the main government ministerial building, Youyi, preventing vehicles from accessing it. As a result, traffic was severely affected on the main highways leading to Syke Street and St. John.
The SLF says it provided the cleaning services in March and April this year in various secondary schools in the Western Area on the eve of the reopening of schools.
Amidst the chaotic scene at Monday`s protest, the SLF head Alhaji Koroma went into the Ministry of Health offices where he met with officials as his women demonstrated outside.
An hour later, Koroma returned to his colleagues, along with the Deputy Minister of Political and Public Affairs Karamo Kabba. The women were then prevailed upon to assemble at Black Street, just opposite the National Stadium, where they were addressed.
The SLF head Koroma revealed then that the meeting with ministry official resulted in an offer by the deputy minister to pay only Le 300M, out of the Le 700M outstanding which he said he`d out rightly rejected.
Koroma then described Ms Madina Rahman as one of the few Ministers of Government who were bent on smearing “the image of the government” by such behaviours.
Alhaji Koroma then informed Karamo Kabba that it had taken over three months when they completed the job, but that Madina Rahman had not shown any effort in paying them their balance. And this, he added, has led some of the women to accuse him of embezzling the money.
The SLF boss recalled that he`d had to borrow money from a number of people to take care of the women while they were doing the job, a responsibility he said was supposed to have been borne by the Ministry of Health.
In his response, Deputy Minister Kabba assured the women that he would ensure that President Ernest Bai Koroma knows about the issue so that the money could be paid rapidly.
“I know that all of you have children and I feel it very badly because most of you are poor. I will ensure that the President knows about it,” Deputy Minister Kabba assured, before appealing to the women to disperse.
Jonathan Abass Kamara, Public Relations Officer at the Ministry of Health and Sanitation, told Politico that throughout last week officials of the SLF executive had been negotiating with the Ministry of Health and Sanitation regarding the payment of the money. He said although it is the Ministry of Health that the women piled pressure on for the money, it is the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology which should pay for the service they`d rendered, stating that the contract was awarded by the Education Ministry.
Kamara said the Ministry of health only came in because the issue had to do with sanitation. He also said that although the function of waste management within the municipality had been devolved to the Freetown City Council (FCC), the latter lacked the required expertise to undertake such mandate and this compelled the ministry of Health to provide personnel to the FCC. He however assured that his ministry was working very hard with the Ministry of Education to pay the money.
The SLF which has a membership of 3,150 is a group of jobless youths including mostly single parents and marginalised women and homeless people which came into existence in2010. The group has taken to self help projects as a means of making livelihoods.
(C) Politico 28/07/15
