Sierra Leone Court Orders Halt in Preparations for Tuesday Vote

(Bloomberg) -- A Sierra Leone court ordered a halt to preparations for a presidential runoff set for Tuesday pending a hearing on a request by a member of the ruling party for an injunction to delay the vote.

Ibrahim Sorie Kamara, a member of the ruling All Peoples’ Congress party, filed an injunction on Thursday over alleged fraud during the vote’s first round on March 7.

The high court will hear arguments on Monday, according to the ruling of the court, with Justice Aburaman Mansaray presiding.

Opposition leader Julius Maada Bio, of Sierra Leone People’s Party, won the first round and will face Samura Kamara, the candidate of President Ernest Bai Koroma’s All Peoples Congress, in a runoff. Neither candidate won the 55 percent needed to avoid a second ballot.

The SLPP and APC have dominated Sierra Leone politics since independence from Britain in 1961. The West African nation’s economy is recovering from a slump in iron-ore prices and the worst-ever Ebola outbreak that killed thousands of people and isolated the country.

--With assistance from Olivier Monnier

To contact the reporter on this story: Silas Gbandia in Accra at sgbandia@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Steve Geimann at sgeimann@bloomberg.net, Bernard Kohn at bkohn2@bloomberg.net, James Amott

©2018 Bloomberg L.P.