Police Arrests Mayor of Freetown, Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr
Ibrahim Hashim The Mayor of Freetown, Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr has reportedly held at the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) and will likely be charged to court for obstructing the police in performing their duties. It is unclear whether she will be granted bail pending her arraignment tomorrow.
This is according to a report by Sierra Eye Salone on Twitter.
The report states that, “Reports indicate that Mayor of Freetown, Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr is currently at the Criminal Investigations Department and will be charged to court for obstructing police. It is unclear whether she will be granted bail pending her arraignment tomorrow.”
On Thursday 29 September 2022, the Sierra Leone police summoned the Mayor Aki-Sawyerr for questioning over allegedly obstructing police work and “disorderly behaviour”.
The summons is tied to an incident at the airport last month.
On September 17, the mayor streamed a live video on social media from Freetown International Airport, on her way to New York for an event coinciding with the annual UN General Assembly.
She claimed in the video that a city councillor travelling with her had been escorted away by airport immigration officers and handed over to the police, who said they had an arrest warrant for him accusing him of incitement over deadly protests that rocked the country in August.
Aki-Sawyerr said in the video that they had been about to board their flight when they were told that Sheku Turay, the city councillor who also goes by Ice T, was needed at the immigration office.
“Half an hour later, I received a call that he had been arrested,” the mayor said in the video.
According to eyewitness accounts in the media and on social media, the mayor went to the police station where Turay had been taken and an altercation took place there, before she returned to the airport and posted the video.