‘New laws give Sierra Leone farmers the power to protect their lands’ 5 November 2023

In towns like Tonka, farmers seek advice from paralegals and human rights organizations to take advantage of legislation that can protect them from large corporations. Aminata Bangura balances a banana tree on her head as she carefully descends a steep, slippery slope. Barefoot, she looks for firm ground in the mud. All around her are children playing in the wide Rokel River, which runs through Sierra Leone from the east to the Atlantic Ocean. The woman, wearing a yellow skirt and a faded pink T-shirt, wades waist-deep water through the river to reach the fertile fields of her community on the other side. A long walk. “Risky at times,” she says, “due to the current, especially for our children who help us.” The walk has become a daily routine since the large bioethanol-producing factory was constructed on their fields, right next to their village…The company cut down all the big trees in the area and, with the smaller ones that are left, we can only make narrow, unstable canoes,” says Bangura. She plans to plant banana trees in a corner of the peanut and corn fields in her community, with the idea of generating more income for herself and her three children.

…The farmers complain that the lease from Addax, the government and local leaders ignored them, arguing that they are the real owners and users of the land in Tonka, a village of 300 people in the north of the country, about three hours’ drive from the capital, Freetown. Traditionally, the community managed the land according to traditional law, without officially registering who owned each plot. In September 2022, following years of advocacy and mobilization by members of local communities and organizations like SiLNoRF and Namati (a grassroots legal empowerment organization) two new land laws were passed that give women rights over land ownership, farmers the ability to negotiate the value of land (previously this responsibility fell to community leaders) and to veto projects. Companies that want to operate in Sierra Leone must obtain consent from communities before mining, building factories or farms.

… The villagers want to join forces with the farmers of Tonka and other surrounding villages to reclaim the fields from Sunbird Bioenergy that they traditionally used for rice cultivation and to renegotiate the rental price. There will be a new round of negotiations with the company in 2024. Human rights organizations and parliamentarians from West African countries and Zambia in East Africa have expressed interest in Sierra Leone’s new land laws and efforts to resist and negotiate better terms with international companies. The paralegals of Namati and SiLNoRF believe that public financial institutions should be held co-accountable for what happens to their investments, as they are part of public private partnership policies that the World Bank and IMF promote. Sunbird Bioenergy, which declined to comment, states on its website that with the bioethanol and alcohol project in Sierra Leone it contributes to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).