Abubakar Hashim/Freetown
Opposition APC Presidential candidate in the June 2023 elections, Dr Samura Kamara, is, today, being ordered to be arrested, with immediate effect, just nine days after his house was searched for coup related offences.
The Court of Appeal has ordered his immediate arrest and directed the Undersheriff to hand him over to the Anti- Corruption Commission ACC for investigations.
Samura is being alleged to be involved in a “shady and secret deal”, relating to the sale of shares by the government in Sierra Rutile Limited SRL.
Justice Ivan Sesay, who led a three- man jury, unanimously ordered the appellant, Samura Kamara, to refund to the Government $727,364 ( seven hundred and twenty ywo thousand, three hundred and sixty four dollars) within 14 days or provide evidence of the loan agreement entered into by the government with SRL in 1992. These were from findings of the Commission of Inquiry COI, chaired by a Nigerian, Justice Biobele Georgewill.
Samura appealed the judgement through his lawyer , Ady Macaulay.
The Court of Appeal dismissed Samura’s appeal, stating that even the former Permanent Secretary, who worked with Samura when he was a Minister then, was not aware of the sale of 30% shares belonging to government.
“There is no documentation on the sale, but there is documentation between the Bank of Sierra Leone and Sierra Rutile Limited SRL”, Justice Sesay maintains.
The Court of Appeal further revealed: “ the sale of the shares was conducted in 2012, during the tenure of former President Koroma, when Samura was the Minister of Finance and the amount paid into the Consolidated Revenue Fund CRF amounted to $12,000”.
When he was eventually arrested, Dr Samura Kamara, 72, will have a tough battle ahead