By Nfalie Bawoh
Family members are concerned about the whereabouts of 19-year old Abdulai Momoh Conteh since he reportedly disappeared upon hearing that his name has been recorded for possible arrest by the notorious Operations Support Division (OSD) the Paramilitary Wing of the Sierra Leone Police (SLP) that has notoriety for torturing especially suspects identified by the establishment as “Opponents” of the administration with records of several deaths and disappearances in its trail.
It is not clear as to what may have befell Abdulai Momoh Conteh who was arrested during the 2018 political campaign over a political infighting at a Constituency in Waterloo in the Western Area Rural District.
Abdulai was a small boy but very active with the opposition All Peoples Congress (APC) party and he was participating in the party’s campaigns and canvassing against the now ruling Sierra Leone Peoples Party (SLPP) in their supposed stronghold of Mabureh in the Western Rural District. According to sources in the said district, Abdulai was “a torn” in the flesh of the SLPP campaign machinery because he was serving as an errand boy taking sensitive information from the SLLP to the APC camp. It was no surprise that he was rounded-up by the State’s police paramilitary arm on allegation of participating in the burning of the house of the SLPP candidate, Ahmed Joseph Kanu alias Momoh-G.
Abdulai was a small boy then, adopted by the former Hon. Kemokoh Conteh, whose influence had given him the political leverage to organize small boys to execute clandestine operations for the opposition APC party.
Family members contacted say they have not yet concluded on whether the worse has happened to Abdulai. Family sources say the police told them in August 2018 that Abdulai Momoh Conteh had “mysteriously escaped” from their custody at the “Benghazi” detention center at Brookfields in the capital Freetown. No further statement or prove of his escape was shown to his family members who, according sources, still remain very apprehensive that he may have disappeared for good.
Abdulai was arrested together with a number of other youth all of whom were later reportedly released, according to sources in the Mabureh community. Abdulai’s arrest came in the wake of a violent encounter between supporters of Hon. Conteh and Momoh G and Abdulai was spotted siding with Hon. Conteh’s group, and as a known adopted son of Hon. Conteh, it was easy for him to be identified and his name was therefore enlisted for arrest.
“Abdulai may have been identified as a special suspect and may have been also subjected to some forms of special inhuman treatment that could have killed him,” a friend confided.
Things turned out to be extremely serious for Abdulai when he physically participated in the August 10, 2022 protest and he was spotted by secret agents of the establishment when they attacked and burnt down the police station at the Post Office area of Waterloo. Abdulai was declared wanted by the SLPP administration for which he remains a fugitive, causing so much worries and concerns about his safety and wellbeing if he should even return to Sierra Leone. Abdulai’s safety cannot be guaranteed if he should surface again in Sierra Leone giving that he already has a pending police charge of arson and escaping from alleged police detention and his participation in the violent August 10, 2022 protest against him. He is bound to face further serious charges in addition to the initial police criminal charges against him.
This reporter notes with concern that Abdulai is still a highly wanted person by the police because of how he escaped from their custody which has even made his safety in Sierra Leone very precarious and risky. He will never be guaranteed safety in this country given this soar relationship with an institution that is guaranteed by the national Constitution to provide protection and safety for citizens and their properties.