They are back again. After we thought the needful had been done after complaints from concerned members of the public, rotten rice is back in town. It is not news to the average Sierra Leonean business person that the business people who import rice come into the country with expired and contaminated rice.
For example the Pussawa rice that used to be delivered in the old days was real parboil rice; there was no sugar. The new Pussawa rice we are seeing in the market today is full of sugar and mostly expired.
While we don’t know what the Ministry of Health and the Standards Bureau are doing about the matter, but chances are that the brown envelop culture used by the business people with the rice contracts has been very effective.
With diabetes being a major medical condition in Sierra Leone, this is something the government should resolve as a matter of national security. The health of the nation is her wealth. The government should ensure that the reported way the rice importers mix the old rice with the new and expired rice then re-bagging them later for sale is brought to a quick end. Those found complicit in this act of cheating and risking the health of the public should be brought to book to act as a deterrent to others who might be involved in similar acts of defrauding the state.
Stakeholders in the rice importation business have been suggesting that it is time the government of Sierra Leone pays extra focus on agriculture especially rice farming. Instead of giving out contracts to foreign business people to import rice at $300 million annually, this money can be used to start and support more local farming enterprises.
It is time the government rescues the nation from the clutches of rotten and expired rice importers by investigating them, prosecuting where necessary and encourage the nation to grow its own food.
To be continued with documentation…