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Published online by
Sylvia Blyden Dot Com
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Freetown,
Sierra Leone.
Tel: +232-77-772001
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www.awarenesstimes.com |
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YOU ARE CURRENTLY AT THE WEBSITE OF SIERRA LEONE'S FASTEST SELLING, HIGHEST SELLING AND MOST WIDELY CIRCULATED NEWSPAPER.
Source of above information: Sierra Leone News Vendors Association
EDITORIALS
Publicising Our Views on ERSG Toyberg-Frandzen in Sierra Leone
It is no longer a secret that there is an issue at the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone bordering around the staff draw-down process; for which two of the local newspapers have been taking digs at the person of the Executive Representative of the United Nations Secretary General to Sierra Leone, Mr. Jens Anders Toyberg-Frandzen. Some have even called for the Government to interfere within operational draw-down at UNIPSIL.
May 21, 2013, 17:18
EDITORIALS
Awareness Times is Flying High at Sierra Leone’s High Court
When AWARENESS TIMES newspaper took the Independent Media Commission (IMC) to court last year September for illegally suspending our newspaper, we were fully confident that we were within our rights. We also had Sulaiman Kabba Koroma Esq., the award-winning lawyer to argue for us.
May 14, 2013, 17:14
EDITORIALS
Call for better Response to Child Abuse Rape cases in Sierra Leone
Thank you very much for bringing to light an important topical issue which I think our government of President Ernest Koroma, and supported by the legislative body of Sierra Leone need to prioritise within the next 5 years his term of office. This can be achieved as he will have nothing to loose thereafter the 5 year term of office.
Mar 22, 2013, 17:08
EDITORIALS
Looking Backwards at Past Challenges : Sorie Fofana & Wikileaks cable Malice on President
One of our challenging times was 8th December of 2010 when Sorie Fofana of GLOBAL TIMES criminally doctored a Wikileaks Cable in order to give credence to a totally false innuendo that the Head of State, President Ernest Koroma, had suspect links to narcotics rings. The Cable, which was basically an opposition inspired piece of garbage, had made significant mistake which reduced its credibility. It stated Kemoh Sesay was a former SLPP MP.
Feb 26, 2013, 17:12
EDITORIALS
NPRC Records & their Sierra Leone Victims
Many Sierra Leoneans from all walks of life worked hard behind the scenes to pacify the angry families of the victims of the NPRC’s December 29th 1992 slaughter of James Bambay Kamara, Yaya Kanu, Salami Coker and many others. It was not an easy task to get them to abandon their mission to stay at the Freetown Cotton Tree last year all dressed in black singing solemn funeral songs. The families were furious the Government of President Ernest Bai Koroma was refusing to acknowledge their pains or State-sanctioned murders of their loved ones.
Jan 29, 2013, 17:17
EDITORIALS
Kono, Kono, Kono Leaders! Ye Kono Leaders of Sierra Leone!
We now wish to use this article to appeal to political & traditional leaders of Kono to emulate leadership style of Ernest Koroma as it’s best way forward. When a strike, purported to be peaceful, suddenly goes riotous without any provocation and thereby resorts to the kind of damage, arson and looting of extent visited on OCTEA and the Police, it leaves one wondering whether “workers strike” was not just a smoke screen for ongoing political supremacy battle in Kono. The disaster which resulted in deaths of two young men last week in Kono was not simply borne of a workers’ strike. No! There are political undertones. It was more a mind battle between Kono leaders who now find it totally impossible to reconcile and move Kono forward as a united entity.
Dec 24, 2012, 12:12
EDITORIALS
Sierra Leone Peoples Party meets Koroma as Excellency or..?
According to the highly reliable MONOLOGUE programme of David Tam-Baryoh, the main opposition Sierra Leone Peoples Party (SLPP) should be holding a meeting with His Excellency the President, Dr. Ernest Bai Koroma today, December 3rd 2012, at State House. As far as this newspaper is concerned, there is nothing wrong with President Koroma meeting SLPP hierarchy. However, the curious question is whether the SLPP will realise they are going to be meeting with His Excellency, the duly elected Head of State?
Dec 3, 2012, 12:06
EDITORIALS
Proving Frank Kargbo’s Statement
Hon. Franklyn Bai Kargbo, the Deputy Secretary General of the ruling All Peoples Congress (APC) who doubles as Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, in a recent Personal Press Statement, had revealed of how pro-opposition operatives who were seemingly stranded in Freetown from Kenema, had surreptitiously been allowed to vote at Freetown Polling Stations.
Nov 26, 2012, 12:06
EDITORIALS
A Note to the EU Observer Mission: Incumbency can be Positive and Negative
The global economic crisis has seen incumbent governments lose elections because their people could not understand the sudden triple increase in both petrol and basic commodities like bags of rice. The economy is the main reason why the former President of Zambia, H.E. Rupiah Banda lost elections. He gracefully acceded because he realised that the opposition had made much use of propaganda about the economy and high prices of food and fuel.
Nov 23, 2012, 14:03
EDITORIALS
Congratulations Sierra Leone People for a great Campaign Period!
Statements of congratulations have been pouring in for Sierra Leone over impressive manner in which the just-concluded electoral campaigns have been conducted in one of the most free and democratic atmospheres ever seen on the African continent. All over the country, Sierra Leoneans have freely campaigned with not a single reported incident of a politician being blocked from entering any part of the country as was the case in the 2007 elections.
Nov 16, 2012, 17:20
EDITORIALS
IMC’s Sealed Lips as SLPP Incites Armed Forces
The country’s so-call Independent Media Commission (IMC) which has the constitutional responsibility to monitor what comes out in newspapers, magazines, and television channels and radio stations, seemed to have been deeply penetrated by politicians that its Commissioners have decided to sit and allow the Sierra Leone Peoples Party’s (SLPP) Unity Newspaper to ignite malice and enmity between the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces (RSLAF) and the Operation Support Department (OSD) of the Sierra Leone Police (SLP).
Nov 15, 2012, 17:14
EDITORIALS
Burnishing Sierra Leone Ruling Party's Human Rights Credentials
It is an indisputable fact the old APC party regime (1968 - 1992) was notorious for human rights abuses. This had caused some citizens to be fearful of a return of APC in 2007. However, after 5 years of APC under President Ernest Koroma, it is clear APC of yesteryears is different from this current APC regime; insofar as human rights is concerned.
Nov 14, 2012, 17:17
EDITORIALS
U.S. Ambassador Acted on ‘Advise’
Inside today’s edition, we have a call from UDM party for U.S. Ambassador Mike Owen to either apologise for his assertion that a run-off was likely next month or immediately leave this country. We can understand outrage of UDM but in all honesty, we do not think the American diplomat alone is to blame. We have partisan citizens working at these foreign embassies or aligned with them. They are giving bogus ‘intelligence’ information to these diplomats.
Oct 24, 2012, 17:14
EDITORIALS
A Critical Look at Sanctity of Sierra Leone: SLPP & Police
... are two former WEST SIDE BOYS. These are former fighters who invaded Freetown in January 1999 leaving unimaginable destruction in their wake.They are both currently serving in private army of the opposition SLPP presidential candidate Julius Maada Bio. The one with an FBI cap & Tshirt goes by nom de guerre of Timberland whilst the one with SWAT cap is known as Shawalawalay. They are both amongst ex-combatants who, upon being driven out of Freetown in 1999, had held Sierra Leone hostage along Okra Hills outskirts of Freetown until British Army officers prised them out of their hideouts leading to eventual peace in the land. CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR ARTICLE/PHOTOS
Oct 23, 2012, 17:34
EDITORIALS
Apology from Maada Bio to Ernest Koroma is needed in Sierra Leone
The first I heard about the blocking of President Koroma’s convoy was on Facebook when someone asked me of it last Friday. I had dismissed it as untrue propaganda. However, it is now clear that indeed Bio had breached traffic rules by doing what we call “broke traffic” in the local parlance. It is always a risky venture to ‘broke traffic’ but all of us have done it in the past and we will continue to take such risks when we are trying to get out of that terrible East-end traffic. I know I have taken that risk before. Maada Bio is not the first culprit.
Oct 19, 2012, 17:18
EDITORIALS
As Campaigns Kick Off... APC & SLPP = Brothers
We have published a photo news item today of two Sierra Leonean youths holding hands even as they sport different political party paraphernalia. One of them supports Julius Maada Bio for President of Sierra Leone and the other supports Ernest Bai Koroma for the same position.
Oct 15, 2012, 12:18
EDITORIALS
Is Sierra Leone Ambassador Kanu Honest with himself?
Opposition SLPP Strategist Ambassador Kanu who is usually a part of official SLPP delegations to stationed diplomats and visiting dignitaries to the country is still unable to grasp how unethical it was for him to have sat on the Human Rights Commission (HRC) Inquiry into Police Shootings & Disturbances at Bumbuna. This is the same man who has accompanied opposition delegations to the international community to push for the Sierra Leone Police to be disarmed.
Oct 1, 2012, 12:18
EDITORIALS
Sierra Leone Libel Laws & Press Freedom
Clearly, DEATH THREATS for journalists should have activated the IMC to leap into action against the SLPP newspaper which threatened Sylvia Blyden off her right to her life and bodily well-being & her public safety but the IMC looked the other way... Rather, that impugned publication of Awareness Times is actually FULLY PROTECTED by the Criminal Libel Laws caveats which allow adequate responses to provocations under its Section 30.(J) which states: No person shall be criminally liable for the publication of a defamatory matter where the publication is made in order to answer or refute some other defamatory matter published by the person defamed, concerning the person making the publication.
Sep 27, 2012, 17:10
EDITORIALS
Sierra Leone Nomination Fees was laid as a Statutory Instrument
We should never lose sight of the fact that it was the SLPP MPs who, just a few months ago, teamed up with the PMDC and APC parliamentarians to give a carte blanche (blank check) to NEC (Christiana Thorpe) to prescribe any amount which NEC desired to prescribe as Nomination Fees. The 2002 Elections Laws ensured they specified the precise fees for each seat but the 2012 Elections laws left it to NEC to decide how much should be charged. So, NEC, in its 'wisdom' decided to charge what it charged. So, who is to blame for the mess?
Sep 18, 2012, 17:17
EDITORIALS
Filth in Capital City
The records of leading presidential candidates on ensuring the country’s capital city is kept clean are distinctly different. H.E. President Ernest Bai Koroma has failed to ensure Freetown is kept sanitised & clean under his watch. Argument might be proferred that the Koroma Central Government has devolved cleaning of the city to the Freetown City Council.
Sep 13, 2012, 17:26
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