Yusuf Keketoma Sandi

18 April 2012

In a country where the recent 2012 US Embassy statement on ‘Sierra Leone Investment Climate’ estimates that over 72 percent of the country’s population live on less than $1 per day – and in extreme poverty, you can laugh your head off whenever you hear APC government supporters shout: “Di Pa Dae Wok”(The President is working).

What is obvious is that while the APC government apologists keep singing “Di Pa Dae Wok”, ordinary families up and down the country – continue to struggle at the mercy of economic hardship.

Therefore, to evaluate how seriously ordinary people have been suffering – for almost five years under President Koroma’s APC, I sent two of my researchers in Freetown to find out the prices of the basic commodities, which really matter to ordinary people.

In this report, I have compared the current market prices to what they were in September 2007 – when the last SLPP government handed over power to President Koroma. Continue reading →