Concord Times (Freetown)
Mohamed Vandi
21 May 2008
Kenema — Youth leader of Faima in the Nomo Chiefdom, Kenema District has disclosed to Concord Times in Kenema that residents in their chiefdom could die of hunger due to the increase in prices of local commodities caused by poor road conditions.
Keifa Jusu Kanneh said terrible road network has rendered the chiefdom completely isolated from the rest of the country, stating further that people could only get basic food items and condiments from Liberia.
"No body travels from our chiefdom to Kenema to buy food stuff because of the conditions of the road. We were used to buying rice and other commodities from Liberia. But the increase in the price of rice has posed a serious threat to our existence there. The situation keeps deteriorating after Liberians refused to allow food items to cross over to us. We are finding it very difficult to survive," he said.
He reiterated that past governments had also abandoned the chiefdom thus no development project has ever been implemented in that chiefdom.
Keifa also confessed that the scale of farming in the chiefdom was very low, and as a result the people now depend on imported rice which is either hard to come by or very expensive.
He asserted that the chiefdom lacks the means to access imported rice and that they were finding it difficult because of the state of the road.
"For the past ten years, our roads have not been repaired. No rehabilitation has taken place. We are kindly calling on government to come to our aid, otherwise we will die of hunger," he said.
Meanwhile, public relations officer of Sierra Leone Roads Authority branch in Kenema Bockarie Koroma confirmed that the roads were in bad state, adding that for a very long time the roads have not been rehabilitated.
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