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Bye-Election leaves five houses set ablaze. |
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Written by Abass/Francis
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Tuesday, 16 February 2010 |
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Police in Tongo say they have so far arrested thirty-nine people allegedly involved in the fracas between supporters of the All People’s Congress (APC) and the Sierra Leone Peoples Party (SLPP) following the conduct of the local council bye-election in Tongo.
There was heavy fighting in Tongo on Saturday, 13th February 2010, during the election in Ward Forty-Two, Constituency Fourteen in the Palima and Tongolah areas in Tongo fields, Lower Bambara Chiefdom, Kenema district. Superintendent Osman Pilo Kamara, Local Unit Commander of the Tongo Police Division, confirmed to CTN that five houses were burnt down, shops looted and people seriously injured. Prince Kamara, Chairman of the APC in the Kenema district, blamed the SLPP for the violence during the election. He told CTN that the SLPP imported youths from Bo to disrupt the election in Tongo. He accused the Chairman of the SLPP, John Oponjo Benjamin, of organising a meeting in Tongo where they discussed how to disrupt the election. Jacob Jusu Saffa, Secretary General of the SLPP told CTN that they went to Tongo to mobilise support for their candidate and not to incite violent and riotous conducts. He said the meeting they held had nothing to do with disrupting the election. He accused the APC of importing thugs from Kono to disrupt the election. Police say calm has been restored to the township and a curfew had been declared and enforced. The opposition SLPP candidate, Ibrahim Jalloh defeated his close rival Momoh Ensah of the ruling APC in the bye-election. The National Electoral Commission (NEC) conducted the long awaited bye-election following the death of the only ruling APC Councilor in the entire Eastern Region. The bye-election was to fill the vacant seat in the Kenema District Council.
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The News 
