Freetown — Local unit commander at the Ross Road police station has confirmed the demolition of over six houses belonging to illegal squatters in an area called Mandela on Ross Road, east of Freetown.

Superintendent K S Kamara said he was not sure about the number of people affected but speculated that the number could be over fifty.

"The Sierra Leone Police are here to control and secure the area of the demolition," he said adding that the demolition exercise was carried out by court bailiffs.

"The SLP are only here to see that bailiffs are protected," he said.

A Pastor of the New Life Ministries, the church that claimed ownership of the land, refused to disclose his name but alleged that the land belongs to his church.

He said the land was bought some ten years ago and that the matter was in court for so many years before a ruling was passed in their favour.

"We have been telling the illegal squatters to vacate the land but they have been refusing to do so, therefore the court ordered bailiff to come and forcefully evict them," he explained.

One of the affected people Mariama Sesay, who appealed for government to help victims with shelter, said she has been sleeping out on the streets since she was sent out of her resident last Tuesday.

Sesay has three children all of them are in schools, thus she now wonders how she would cope with them now that she has been evicted from her residence.