Following her announcement last week of a new local council rating system for the capital Freetown, Mayor Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr has failed to win the political backing and support of the Bio-led government.

After much pressure from sections of the population in Freetown, as well as internal party political pressure, the government’s minister of local government wrote a letter to mayor Aki-Sawyerr telling her to scrap her new Freetown city council rate payment policy decision.

“If every house in the municipality pay a minimal Le 30,000 city rates, council will collect enough to manage it affairs.

“Less than 35% of property owners are actually paying their dues to the Freetown City Council.

“The World Bank recently stated that if 35% of property tax is actually paid by property owners to the government through the local councils, it will help in a long way in addressing many of the problems in the cities and booming our economies.