Local Elections Underway

June 2008 | Ratings Update

A year after the general and presidential elections that elected Ernest Bai Koroma and the then opposition All Party Congress (APC), Sierra Leone is set to have held nationwide local elections on July 5. There have been reported incidents of harassment of female candidates, as well as outbreaks of violence in Kono in the east and Port Loko just outside the capital, Freetown. Nevertheless, we expect that the elections will have been fair, and on the whole free of political intimidation, as all three main parties have urged their supporters to refrain from violence given the success of the last year's election. However, the issue of the role and influence of the paramount chiefs in politics is likely to remain a source of tension.

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