15th National Cleaning exercise in Freetown

July 6, 2018, marks the fifteenth National Cleaning exercise in Sierra Leone.

It is evidently clear that the National Cleaning Days are geared towards cleaning of communities, and homes, this includes side-walks, gutters etc.

The first Saturday of every month is declared as a National Cleaning Day, this gives chance to every resident to clean and dispose of their garbage for a healthy environment between the hours of 7 am to 12 pm.

A monthly National Cleaning Day in which public areas are cleaned of rubbish, trees planted and walls repainted was brought in during the 1992-1996 junta government led by Captain Valentine Strasser, who was overthrown by Bio, then his deputy. The monthly cleanup was restored from time to time by following regimes.The National Cleaning exercise was reintroduced in April 2018 by President Bio after winning the March 2018 elections.

“The cleaning exercise is very much important especially this time of the year when we are about to experience heavy rainfall.
The enthusiasm of the people clearly shows that they want their environment to be clean,” Mariama Sesay a City Council Inspection official told Switsalone.

Sal Jalloh a Switsalone blogger was given access by the Freetown City Council to some part of Freetown during the cleaning and these are some of the photos that were taken during his tour across the city.This time of the year Sierra Leone is expected to experience normal rainfall, but in 2017 Sierra Leone experienced heavy rainfall which led to flooding and mudslide.