By Nasratu Kargbo
The Executive Director of the Legal Aid Board (LAB) Sierra Leone has said that there are more children on trial for sexual offences than adults based on data from the judiciary.
Fatmata Claire Carlton Hanciles was speaking on Wednesday 29th September 2021 during a presentation at the 2022 budget hearing at the Ministry of Finance. The Executive Director alleged that there are more children facing trial because their parents could not afford to bribe their way “These adult sexually active population, are not on trial because they pay from the police to the court, but that poor woman and man who have that 10-years-old do not have money,” she said, claiming LAB has clients as young as 8 and 9-years –old that they represent in court.
Hanciles explained that the country has only two child correctional homes, and there was a time people at the Port Loko correctional center kept calling her at around 10pm informing her that they do not have accommodation for a child who was alleged to have sexually abused a friend. She believes a lot needs to be done.
Speaking on access to justice for women, the Executive Director said they made a lot of progress, especially in dealing with men who do not want to shoulder responsibility and those who denied pregnancies, with LAB having to make sure DNA tests were conducted.
She explained that they noticed after mediating some cases that many men came in to pay maintenance for their children, which saw them partner with Rokel Commercial Bank to introduce “Pekin Account”, but that the mothers are not allowed to withdraw the money until the child is 18.
Throwing light on local court, madam Hanciles said people in remote areas in Sierra Leone do not believe in the modern court but in their local court system.
She added that even at the local court level, women and children are more disadvantaged, explaining that in the local court women cannot get divorce. She explained a scenario where a young lady who had been married for 10 years to an old man who is over 70 wanted divorce in order to marry a younger man and bear children. She said the old man asked the lady to return the bride price before he could grant the divorce, which forced LAB to intervene, the man later saw reasons to let the lady go.
“Local courts are very patriarchal, they look to male laws, so women there have virtually no relief,” she said.
She said that’s the reason LAB’s Act provides for paralegals to be in those areas to make sure they hold the balance and divert cases that should be at the general court.
Speaking on unfair trials and imbalance, she explained that in villages most of the items stolen are chickens, goats, sheeps etc. and that those found guilty are sentenced to 4 or 5 years imprisonment by the local court, whiles in the general court a person steals something worth 4million Leones and is sentenced to a year in jail.
In her presentation she spoke on the various challenges faced by the institution one of which she said is lack of transportation which has affected their work.
She went on to note that LAB has only 18 lawyers that handle all their cases across the country. Therefore, she said one lawyer covers many areas, due to the fact that they do not have resident lawyers in those areas.
In addition, she said they have lost most of their experienced lawyers to the Law Officers Department due to high pay at the latter. The Legal Aid Board has budgeted 11 Billion Leones to carry out their operations in 2022.
Copyright © Politico Online (05/10/21)
