The attention of the wise bird has been drawn to fracas between the government of Sierra Leone and major rice importers in the country.

According to information, the latters’ anger is being triggered by what they referred to as betrayal of trust and manipulation by high-ranking government officials.

The irate importers have accused the government to be conniving with other rice importers on reduced charges whilst they are paying high charges.

The Bird has gathered that the rice importers are being furious because despite the high charges they continue to pay, they have been put under pressure by government to reduce the price of rice from NLe900 to NLe730 per bag while sacred cows are protected allowing them to sell well over a thousand new leones.

According to information, the Chief Minister on behalf of the government met with them and appealed to them to be reasonable to adjust their prices as this is a Holy month of Ramadan so that everyone will be able to afford it, which he said will be a huge support to government even though they said they told the CM it will be a big loss to their business.

At that meeting which the brave bird clandestinely attended, the rice importers singled out VIP Trading Limited as one of the rice suppliers supplying rice to our forces police and military at exorbitant price of NLe1,150 per bag instead of the standard or normalized price of NLe 650 per bag, alleging that the company is making an extra NLe500 per bag of fen-fen rice.

The aggrieved importers viewed this as a discrepancy, because even though they are paying all the taxes and still selling a bag of rice at the normal price of NLe650, other importers are supplying at huge price with government doing little or nothing to address the burning situation, instead, it has turned to them again to reduce their prices further.  “This is unfair, unbearable and unacceptable,” the furious traders fumed with disgust.

This discrepancy raised very serious concerns and suspicions among the importers who accused the Chief Minister of allegedly conniving with VIP Trading Limited to manipulate the market unfairly disadvantaging other suppliers.

These traders further alleged that the Chief Minister and VIP Trading Limited has personal relationship hence setting lower prices for their supplies whilst VIP receives high amount for theirs even at the detriment of the state.

They also alleged that the Lebanese entities too are selling rice to government at an exorbitant price of NLe1,150 per unit, noting that the actual market price for rice particularly broken rice is even lower than the government imposed rate.

The situation has become more complicated by government’s failure to allow fair play in the business by not insisting on the uniformed price by all importers without fear or favour.

The Ministry of Trade being the only arbiter in price control/adjustment is reported to take a stringent measure within the shortest possible time to stabilize the cost of rice per bag in the country.

As usual the bird will always go out to get the views of people on issues of national interest.

A good number of them he spoke to did not give a pass-mark to government on the issue of rice.

They drew the attention of the bird to some of the campaign promises President Julius Maada Bio made during the 2018 elections when he assured of reducing particularly the price of rice which was sold between Le250 and Le300 under the previous APC regime.

He condemned that government for lack of vision, given that a bag of rice was sold at that price was too expensive for him. But ironically, the president has completely reneged from that promise which has led to the cut-throat increase in price of the country’s staple food making it difficult for the ordinary citizens to afford.

“And given the current appalling situation when the price of rice has tripled, it is safe to say that President Bio himself doesn’t have clear or perfect vision for this impoverished country,” they alleged.

The patriotic bird is however watching how things are unfolding in this Kingdom.