By: Joseph Fitzgerald Kamara, Esq.
President Julius Maada Bio calls 2026 a “year of action.” How lovely, and how I wished it to be so. But, alas, for our ordinary people, the only thing accelerating is the gap between wages and a bag of rice. The action is happening elsewhere, probably in the comfortable rooms where champagne is readily toasted, gulped down with spaghetti bolognaise and fish carpaccio.
Albeit, let’s start with basic survival, since the government seems allergic to arithmetic. The minimum wage is nudged from NLe 800 to NLe 1,200, generous enough to demand a standing ovation, if anyone could afford the transport to attend. Meanwhile petrol jumps from NLe 25 to NLe 40 per litre, a 60% leap that travels straight from pump to transport fare to market stall to dinner plate. Fuel is the circulatory system of the informal economy; when it spikes, the market woman, the bike rider and the civil servant all pay the “market realities” tax.
Be that as it may, the numbers aren’t subtle at all, 54–56% live in chronic poverty; 78% are food insecure, 13% severely. Food inflation may have cooled from its 2023 peak, but the pot is emptier and the children hungrier. The government’s acknowledges “families feel it in the market,” as if that discovery deserves a plaque.
The real dose, as the economic noose tightens, democratic space is being sawed away. Sierra Leone fell 23 places in press freedom rankings, from 56th to 79th. CIVICUS rates civic space as “obstructed.” A journalist has been barred from Parliament for over a year for criticism. Activists arrested and detained on cyber-bullying charges, and a protest against a constitutional amendment was simply banned.
The pattern is cynical and predictable. When people can’t afford bread, they ask why. When they ask why, they’re told to mind their manners. The government can manage the economy, just don’t ask for receipts, don’t protest prices, don’t audit, and “trust the process” blindly.