Sierra Leone’s Attorney-General Alpha Sesay has proposed that candidates for political office be required to have paid taxes in the country for five consecutive years and lived there for at least 24 months, provisions that, if passed, would redefine who can stand for election and could significantly affect Sierra Leoneans who split their lives between home and the diaspora.
Sierra Leone’s Parliament is in the middle of one of the most consequential legislative debates in the country’s recent democratic history, and a single proposal within the sweeping Constitutional Amendment Bill 2025 has drawn particular attention: a requirement that candidates for political participation must have paid taxes in Sierra Leone for at least five years and maintained a minimum of 24 months of residency in the country.
The proposal, advanced by Attorney General and Minister of Justice Alpha Sesay as part of proposed amendments to Section 76 of the 1991 Constitution, was tabled before Parliament on Tuesday, 28 July 2026, during the First Reading of the Bill. What followed was a marathon legislative session that began at 11:00 a.m. on Tuesday and ran until 1:56 a.m. on Wednesday morning a session that laid bare the depth of disagreement between Sierra Leone’s ruling party and its main opposition over the future of the country’s constitutional architecture.
Parliament has since adjourned debate until Friday, 31 July 2026, when proceedings are expected to resume at 10:00 a.m.
Section 76 of Sierra Leone’s 1991 Constitution deals with disqualifications for membership of Parliament. In its current form, it addresses conditions including citizenship, dual nationality, criminal convictions, and public office establishing the legal boundaries of who may and may not contest elections in Sierra Leone.
The proposed amendment would add two significant new thresholds: a five-year tax payment requirement and a 24-month residency requirement. Both conditions would need to be satisfied before a candidate could fully participate in the country’s political process.
The tax requirement is particularly novel in the West African constitutional context. By tying political eligibility to documented fiscal contribution, the proposal introduces a principle that those who seek to govern Sierra Leone must first demonstrate a verifiable financial stake in its national development. The residency clause reinforces this by requiring that candidates be physically present in the country for a sustained period not merely citizens or passport holders, but people who have lived there.
The tax and residency proposals sit within a far wider set of constitutional changes that the Attorney-General has described as a generational transformation one designed to move Sierra Leone, in his words, “from a constitution of survival to a constitution of prosperity.”
Delivering his ministerial statement in Parliament, Sesay recalled that the 1991 Constitution was enacted primarily to restore stability and establish a multi-party democratic system during a challenging period in the country’s history. He noted that calls for constitutional reform began with the 1999 Lomé Peace Agreement, gained momentum through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission between 2002 and 2004, and were subsequently advanced under successive administrations.
He told lawmakers the proposed reforms draw from the Justice Edmond Cowan Constitutional Review Committee Report and the Tripartite Committee Recommendations, maintaining that the electoral provisions are already reflected in Sierra Leone’s legal framework and describing the Bill as “not partisan, but generational.”
Other significant changes in the Bill include the replacement of constituency-based parliamentary elections with Block Proportional Representation, reforms to the nomination process for electoral commissioners, the introduction of independent presidential candidates, a reduction in the presidential election threshold, and changes to the timelines for public officers to resign before elections.
The Constitutional Amendment Bill 2025 has been anything but uncontested since it was first introduced. The Institute for Legal Research and Advocacy for Justice (ILRAJ) issued a strongly worded position paper warning that several proposed changes could undermine democratic governance and entrench ruling-party dominance if left unamended.
ILRAJ expressed concern over the Bill’s formal introduction of proportional representation and the deletion of Section 38A, which previously allowed temporary electoral arrangements, arguing that these changes were made without the broad national dialogue recommended by the Tripartite Committee, risking partisan imposition of an electoral system that could skew outcomes in favour of the ruling party.
The main opposition All People’s Congress (APC) has fiercely objected to the proposed changes, raising concerns about attempts to amend the Constitution through what critics describe as the back door. The marathon parliamentary session on Tuesday night was punctuated by prolonged and heated exchanges between ruling SLPP lawmakers and opposition APC members a confrontation that required the Speaker to adjourn proceedings in the early hours of Wednesday morning.
Of all the proposals within the bill, the tax and residency requirements carry perhaps the most direct implications for Sierra Leoneans living abroad. Sierra Leone’s diaspora concentrated in the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, and across Europe plays an outsized role in the country’s political life, both as voters and as a pool of potential candidates. Many diaspora Sierra Leoneans have periodically returned home to contest elections, leveraging international education and networks in their campaigns.
A five-year tax payment requirement and a 24-month minimum residency condition would, if enacted, significantly raise the bar for such candidacies. An individual who has spent the preceding years abroad even one maintaining Sierra Leonean citizenship and contributing to the country’s economy through remittances would need to demonstrate documented fiscal and residential engagement with the state before qualifying to stand.
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Parliament has previously called on civil society organisations, legal experts, political parties, and citizens to submit position papers and legal opinions on the proposed amendments a recognition that changes of this scale require public scrutiny beyond the chamber floor. The debate resumes Friday. Its outcome will shape who Sierra Leone allows to seek power in 2028 and beyond.
For a constitution that has governed the country through civil war, Ebola, contested elections, and more than three decades of democratic experimentation, the stakes of getting this moment right could hardly be higher.
