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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Sarah Johnson

Calls for release of Sierra Leonean singer jailed in ‘crackdown on free speech’

A young African woman in a headdress and loose gown speaks into a mic at an outdoors rally
Zainab Sheriff at a rally last November. Her case came a year after Hawa Hunt, a social media figure, was arrested on live TV for posts about President Julius Maada Bio. Photograph: Handout

Lawyers, politicians and activists have called for the release of one of Sierra Leone’s best-known celebrities, who they said was unjustly imprisoned as part of a government crackdown on free speech and political dissent.

Zainab Sheriff, a singer and reality-TV show contestant who became a political opposition figure, was sentenced in April to four years and two months’ imprisonment for incitement and using threatening language.

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