According to a public notice issued by the Sierra Leone judiciary, the decision to allow women to attend court sessions emanated from instructions, because the leadership of the Judiciary had received several complaints, that women in trousers and those with their heads uncovered had been wrongly turned away from court premises by security personnel.
The public notice further stated that with immediate effect, all security personnel attached to court premises country- wide are reminded that there is law preventing women wearing trousers, entering the court premise, nor there is any law that is requesting them to keep their heads covered.
For religious or cultural reasons, women are free to attend court sessions even when they in trousers and any security personnel who contravene the said public notice will be subjected to disciplinary measures.
The public notice also stated that driving women away from such reasons, is not only discriminatory but also pointless, and its often result to the increasing adjournment of cases, which such women are involved whether as witness, sureties or visitors.
The notice further stated that women as well as men are expected in all circumstances to dress in a manner befitting the dignity and respect, due to courtroom and court premises, and that the practice of issuing cotton material locally referred to as “Lappa” to litigants, sureties or visitors, by security personnel attached to the country’s courts, should be discontinued immediately.
Such practice, according to the public notice, has several health issues and perhaps disrespectful to women, and the public relations officer who also doubles as the official spokesman of the Sierra Leone Judiciary, Moses Lamin Kamara intimated African Young Voices that the decision to allow women to attend court proceedings with their heads uncovered, was a deliberate and conscious approach towards restoring the dignity of women in Sierra Leone.
He noted that his institution had put in place concrete strategies to discourage any act that would undermine the leadership of the judiciary, and at the same time misrepresent or paint a grim picture of this all important colonial institution.
Moses Lamin Kamara made it abundantly clear that nothing would debar the commitment and dedication of the present leadership of the Sierra Leone Judiciary, in ensuring this all important national entity function to the expectations of Sierra Leoneans and the world over.
