- Monday 22 September 2014.
By Reverend Alfred Sam Foray, USA.The tiny town of Moyamaba Junction (part of which is shown in photo) about 100 miles from Freetown and 60 miles from Bo, where I spent a few months doing business during my recent visit to Sierra Leone is on the verge of total annihilation from the Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone. We are told by a resident of the town that about two weeks ago a resident physician, one Dr. Blango, who runs a private hospital in the town, recently treated an Ebola patient. Shortly afterwards, Dr. Blango contracted Ebola and died.
And now for the really bad news. In a scene that could have come from an Alfred Hitchcock horror movie, the doctor’s wife unconvinced that her husband had died from Ebola kept the doctor’s corpse in their house for five days. During that time many of the prominent people in town including the Town Chief who is also the District Councilor for the area, visited Mrs. Blango, who refused to remove the body from the house and complained to her relatives abroad about harassment from the authorities.
Eventually, after confirming that Blango had indeed died from Ebola, Mrs. Blango was forced to bury her husband but not before apparently infecting many of the town’s residents. So far 14 people are reported dead and several townspeople are reportedly sick from the Ebola virus emanating from Dr. Blango’s death and his wife’s bizarre decision to keep the corpse. She is now in police custody for her own protection from angry residents of the town.
A bit about Dr. Blango. Many Sierra Leoneans may recall Dr. Blango’s son, Columba Blango, a men’s Decathlon finalist in the famous Sierra Leone contingent at the 1980 Moscow Olympics, which included boxer, Mohamed Bangura, and sprinter, Eugenia Osho-Williams. Columba was also a former Lord Mayor of Southwark, London, and two-time candidate for the British Parliament for the Liberal Democrats. He was also a major force in the People’s Movement for Democratic Change (PMDC) of Charles Francis Margai during the 2007 parliamentary and presidential elections in Sierra Leone before declaring later for the Sierra Leone Peoples Party. The elder Dr. Blango was a very pleasant man. He and I chatted together several times about politics and family during my visit to Moyamba Juntion.
Moyamba Junction is in the Fakunya Chiefdom, Moyamba District and a major crossroads from Freetown to Bo and the mining area of Rutile. It is also a major transition point for vehicles moving north to London Mining and African Minerals and on to Guinea. As such, Moyamba Junction, despite its size, is a major strategic location for commerce and transport in the country. Over the past few days, government has placed a 21-day lockdown on the town. No vehicles are permitted to stop in the usually busy market town famous for its goat soup and cookery shops since the 1980s.
The nearby town of Mile 91, eleven miles away and other nearby towns are also on a 21-day lock down. http://www.thepatrioticvanguard.com/spip.php?article7924
