Some of the one hundred and fifty (150) police recruits that have been expelled from the Police Training School at Hastings over the weekend have accused some senior police officers and government officials of demanding between three million to five million Leones from each of them to gain entrance into the Force.
On Saturday May 6th 2023, the Complaint Discipline Internal Investigations Department (CDIID) stormed the training school on the instruction of the Inspector General of Police, William Faya Sellu, to conduct verification exercise on the newly admitted recruits, three weeks after they started training.
This is the second batch of one thousand recruits of the Operations Support Division (OSD) of the Sierra Leone Police that have been recruited by the Police.
The Head of Media and Public Relations of the Sierra Leone Police, Assistant Commissioner, Brima Kamara, however said the affected recruits were not supposed to be at the training.
“They were not supposed to be there. Whoever took them there should be his/her cup of tea. It’s entering the Force by fraud,” ACP Kamara said over the weekend while responding to question about the decision of the police Chief.
The affected recruits claimed that the final list was prepared and verified at Police Headquarters and the names of successful applicants posted on the directives of the Police Chief. Others alleged that they were removed from the training because of their tribal and regional lines an accusation some senior officers have vehemently denied.