Police Declares Abdulai Bangura & Others Wanted
The Sierra Leone Police has declared Abdulai Bangura and other young men and women wanted, allegedly for participating in the August 10th riot, in which some six police officers were murdered in cold blood and a number of civilians also lost their lives in Freetown and in the strongholds of the main opposition party (APC).
According to police report, the said wanted persons are believed to be members of a group called “People’s Power in Politics” (PPP), and are alleged to be instigators of the violence that led to the complete breakdown of law and order.
According to Spokesman of Sierra Leone Police, a number of suspects have been arrested and detained, whilst others are on the run, including Abdulai Bangura, a 17 years old boy. According to police sources, Abdulai Bangura, who lives at 20 Pultney Street, along Siaka Stevens Street in Freetown, is one of the perpetrators and now declared wanted, and several attempts to arrest him have failed, at he has not been found at the said residence and is on the run.
Family sources explained to this writer that they have come under several threats from the police, who claim to have been looking for Abdulai. They furthered that since that fateful day, the whereabouts of Abdulai Bangura are yet unknown, and are fearful for his safety, especially as there has been reports of so many civilians killed and at the main mortuary. When asked whether they had gone to the mortuary to find out if he was among the dead, they said that they were also afraid of being arrested by the police, as many other families have stayed away from the mortuary.
There are also unconfirmed reports of that Sierra Leone Police were secretly killing people they perceive to have played a part in the violent protest, as well as information that the government’s main referral hospital mortuary, Connaught, is full of unidentified corpses allegedly killed that day, many of them displaying gunshot wounds. The said facility has been blocked to citizens’ access.
The minister of information is on radio and television calling on people to come and identify their dead relatives, a ploy many see as one to arrest them allegedly as accomplices. As we go to press, the whereabouts of Abdulai Bangura are yet unknown.
