CHRDI DIGITIZES SIERRA LEONE’S WAR HISTORY, ENCOURAGES PEACE AMONG CITIZENS
In an interview with MRCG, the Chief Executive of CHRDI, Abdul M Fatoma, established that they worked in partnership with the Human Rights Commission of Sierra Leone, the Special Court and the Peace Museum to access statements and exhibits from main witnesses and victims from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and they have so far accessed and digitized 255 relevant documents with 68 confidential files.
Adding to the above, Mr. Fatoma mentioned that their key activities were to hold advocacy meetings and stakeholder engagements, which they have done; so that the memory of the war would be transformed from paper based to digital, which may be used for academic and research purposes. He also stated that their effort as an organization is to make sure that government and its partners digitally access the country’s war history at any time so as to use them for peace building and to strengthen democracy.
“As one of our success stories, I am pleased to say that all the meetings with our specific stakeholders were fruitful and commitments have been made by our partner organizations in ensuring all relevant information are provided to CHRDI,” Mr. Fatoma indicated. In addition, he mentioned that they have been able to digitize all relevant depreciating contents ranging from damaged audios and torn documents. Mr. Fatoma also noted that the project is gradually impacting communities, especially war victims. He expressed that their organization is now able to catalogue the war history into series and they will soon be easily accessible to the public.
Highlighting their key challenge from their grant intervention, Mr. Fatoma expressed that the size of the grant is small and recommended to the ATJLF to increase the grant size in subsequent projects and to build a strong financial policy for transitional justice issues in Africa.