By Amin Kef Sesay
The 14th December, 2021 first sittings at the High Court in Freetown presided over by Justice Fisher of Dr Samura Kamara and 5 others on allegations of corruption charges filed against them by the Anti Corruption Commission not only had thousands of passengers and commuters in the central and central west part of the city annoyed but also caused many unwarranted business delays, cancelled and lost and delays in arriving at work on time on offices that require worker to be in as early as 7.30am or earlier.
Understandable that fearing a repeat of what happened before around the precinct of the ACC building on Charlotte Street when Dr Samura Kamara was called for questioning in November, from as early as 7am, police had sealed off the entire area from Liverpool Street heading towards the Cotton Tree and the Law Courts building, and going down towards the adjacent Siaka Stevens Street – the two principal inlets and out lets into the city central.
This caused a journey that usually takes passengers and commuters less than five minutes from the upper reaches of Pademba Road and Siaka Stevens Street into and out of the city center to take over a frustrating hour.
To the annoyance of city dwellers who depend on conducting business promptly, this is not the first time that police have brought traffic to a virtual halt in the perimeter of the city central whenever there have been high profile cases at the law court building.
It is therefore a humble suggestion to the Inspector General of Police and the Chief Justice of the Judiciary, that in the exercise of our rights as citizens to free, uninterrupted movement, high profile cases that would result in severe disruption to free flow of traffic in the city center be held at the Special Court premises on Jomo Kenyatta Road where they are less likely to interfere with the free flow of traffic the whole day long.
As this commentary is been written, traffic flow around the central parts of the city are frustratingly slow, with even pedestrian movement on streets in the vicinity of the Cotton Tree and the Law Courts completely cut off, causing us to use longer routes.
