{"id":33224,"date":"2011-12-14T22:48:11","date_gmt":"2011-12-14T22:48:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sierraexpressmedia.com\/?p=33224"},"modified":"2011-12-14T22:48:11","modified_gmt":"2011-12-14T22:48:11","slug":"pay-us-our-money-or-311-soldiers-speak","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/?p=33224","title":{"rendered":"\u201cPay us our money or \u2026\u201d 311 soldiers speak"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cIf our money is not paid to us, we shall have no option but say to government that we are \u2018soldiers and till death shall we be,&#8221; displeased and discontented war wounded soldiers blew their minds as they marched through streets of Freetown to lay their protest to the Human Rights Commission Wednesday 8<sup>th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">A total of 311 ex- soldiers (war wounded) Wednesday 8<sup>th<\/sup> converged at the Wilberforce Barracks drill square (Hockey pitch) and afterwards marched through the streets leading to the office of Human Rights Commission; chanting hurtful slogans and compelling government to pay benefits due and owed them or\u00a0 they will have no choice, but unswervingly to cause disorder in society.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cWe\u2019ve complained to the Human Rights Commission and our case was looked into. It was recommended that the Army pay us our benefits,\u201d Chairman of War Wounding soldiers Blamoh Jesse Jackson said.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cThey say we are \u00a0\u2018mentally retarded\u2019 soldiers and have treated us as outcasts of society. We are \u2018war wounded\u2019 and not \u2018mentally retarded\u2019 soldiers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cThe Sierra Leone Army wants people see us as mixed-headed individuals; as people who make no good to society at all.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The protesting soldiers said however that their families have abandoned them because they\u2019ve had no money, and have been ruined and left penniless.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">About 50 (war wounded) Saturday 10<sup>th<\/sup> continued the protest for their unpaid benefit.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">They told our reporter that if their demands are not met, they will disorderly take to the street and cause unrest.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">It could be recalled that in June of 2011, the Human Rights Commission set up a tribunal to look into complaint made by 311 war wounded soldiers.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The Commission, according to findings, ruled that government should pay benefits due all the ex-soldiers (war wounded) unrestrained, but up until now, not one is observed to have been paid his\/her benefit at all.<\/p>\n<p><em>Emma Black <\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Stay with Sierra Express Media, for your trusted place in news!<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cIf our money is not paid to us, we shall have no option but say to government that we are \u2018soldiers and till death shall [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13254,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[671,673,1],"tags":[998,2472,11075],"class_list":["post-33224","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-national-news","category-uncategorized","tag-human-rights","tag-rslaf","tag-war-wounded-soldiers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33224","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33224"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33224\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33224"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sierraexpressmedia.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}