The Office of the Attorney General and Minister of Justice has just scored two major successes at the ECOWAS Court in Abuja, Nigeria, after winning two litigations which would have nearly paralyzed the Government of Sierra Leone financially.
On 8 June 2023, the ECOWAS Court ruled in favour of the Government of Sierra Leone in a matter brought against the Government by the Centre for Accountability and the Rule of Law (CARL) in respect of the Ebola outbreak.
CARL, with two Ebola survivors, had filed a case against the Republic of Sierra Leone concerning “mismanagement of Ebola response funds”. In the judgment, the Court held that the right to health and the right to life of the Plaintiffs were not proven to have been violated.
Meanwhile, the ECOWAS Court also recently ruled in favour of the Government of Sierra Leone in respect of the helicopter crash carrying the Togolese national football team in 2007. The Government was sued for “negligence” and the lawyers were asking for over US$20 million in damages excluding costs. But again, the Court ruled in favour of the Government of Sierra Leone.
It could be recalled that after the legal turbulences provoked by Charles Francis Margai, Dr Priscilla Schwartz and Anthony Brewah as Justice Ministers; the Office of the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice needed to be calm after those storms.
On 18 January 2022, President Julius Maada Bio appointed his then Solicitor-General, Mohamed Lamin Tarawalley, as his new Attorney-General and Minister of Justice. And recent legal successes in that office, coupled with those at the Law Officers’ Department, have proven that one of the best things the President has ever done in his entire five years’ presidency was, and still is, that appointment.
Lawyer Mohamed Lamin Tarawalley, as Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, has had several successes. Early this year, he and his team won a case at the Supreme Court of Sierra Leone where they had argued that the Proportional Representation (PR) or District Block System was the way to go for the 2023 multi-tier elections.
Amongst the feats he has accomplished as Attorney-General and Minister of Justice are the tabling in parliament of the Public Elections Act, 2022, which is an Act to repeal and replace the Public Elections Act, 2012 (Act No. 4 of 2012). The Political Parties Regulation Commission Act 2022 is also one of the accomplishments of Mohamed Lamin Tarawalley Attorney-General and Minister of Justice.