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Salone Messenger

Our Team

Sallu Kamuskay Biography
Festus Conteh Biography
Ishmael Sallieu Koroma

Sallu Kamuskay

Festus Coonteh

Ishmael Sallieu Koroma

Sallu Kamuskay is a Sierra Leonean activist, storyteller, and blogger. He was born in Sierra Leone but later relocated to Guinea as a refugee because of the war in his country. Sallu Kamuskay uses his phone to engage on social media, under the name ‘’Salone Messenger’. He Co-Founded the Salone Messenger platform after his experience of the war, Ebola, and injustices. According to him, silence was the root cause of war, and of many social injustices, we continue to face as a nation. In 2013, during the Ebola crisis, Sallu Kamuskay took the risk and volunteered to fight Ebola. He spent some months in both safe and unsafe places; helping the victims and telling their sad stories. The election in 2018, left a divided country with communities fighting on tribal lines. This inspired Sallu Kamuskay to serve as the coordinator of the United Sierra Leone peace concert, which was organized in 4 major parts of the country, targeting violent communities and troubled youth. Sallu Kamuskay led a group of entertainers, activists, and organizations across the country on a peace tour, a program supported by the European Union, United Sierra Leone, Africa Union, ECOWAS, and the Messeh Leone Trust. Sallu Kamuakay has also served as a staff writer for the Hidden Voices Magazine.
Over the years, Sallu Kamuskay has been using his Techno phone to be able to tell stories, the phone he used to tell the story of Gbessay during Ebola who was admitted at one of the Ebola treatment centers after rumors that she had Ebola when the actual sickness was ulcer, she was almost abandoned at the treatment canter with no medication provided to her. She could have died. Sallu told the story via social media and was able to secure funding from the United Sierra Leone to buy her medication and advocated for her. She was later discharged and taken home, He did the same to a patient that died and was abandoned in the street, Sallu Kamuskay used his phone and shared the message across, the corps was later taken and buried. It could have been more disaster without his voice. The story of late America Stress 3-year-old daughter. The hero’s daughter was abandon after his father’s death. He shared her sad story and was able to get a sister who has taken the child as her own and is currently providing her with educational support. The article of America Stress can be read on the link below http://ayvnewspaper.com/index.php/k2-categories/item/7350-america-stress-a-hero-to-recognize.
Sallu Kamuskay feels the stories of Gbessay, America stress and that of many others need to be told. The media house we have cannot better tell these stories, they are better reporters than telling human interest stories. He created the Salone Messenger platform and brought together passionate storytellers to be able to tell these compelling stories.

Festus Conteh is an international youth that functions conveniently in all forms of writing including article writing, news, script, content writing, constitution and project/proposal writing.
Writing is fun to Festus and has brought fame and recognition in his clime. In 2019, he was awarded best upcoming writer in an online writing completion that was organized by the Association of Sierra Leonean Authors (ASLA).
After his impactful contribution to national development and cohesion through writing, he was nominated for the African Genius Award for the Best Writer in Africa Award Category an award he lost to one of the greatest African Writers – Chinua Achebe.
In 2022, Festus was one of the applicants to the Commonwealth Youth Council (CYC) as Vice Chairperson (Policy and Advocacy) a process that met imperil feedback.
As a freelancer, Festus has written articles for magazines, newspapers, and media houses and his articles have attracted big media houses including BBC, Aljazeera and Legit. Ng and is the Head of Programs at Salone Messenger a public relations firm based in Sierra Leone with the latest news and information. He is the founder of Africa’s Wakanda a platform that spotlight the beauty of Africa.
Festus is also a perpetual volunteer in life-changing causes and has shown great commitment and dedication to being a catalyst and solution to the challenges faced by young people like himself. Festus currently serves as the Secretary General of the Africa Youth Leaders movement which is a network of youth between the ages of 20 – 30 years who have shown achievement, leadership potential and commitment to make a difference. Festus is also the Africa Focal Point of Youth for Change Initiative, which is a platform through which young people can access resources, be empowered and given the opportunity to grow to become useful members of society who will participate in the development of their communities and nation.

Along with another Africa Youth platform, Festus has Co-Founded the Future of Africa initiative which is an advocate forum with the aim to bring together local and international socio-economic stakeholders to support innovative programs aimed at advancing the radical and practical progress of adoption awareness-vulnerable children and youth and youth leadership-through interlinking local, regional and international resources and opportunities.

Ishmael Sallieu Koroma is a multi – award winning journalist based in Sierra Leone. He started his career in journalism in 2011 and has worked for both print and broadcast media.

He is the winner for the 2020 Merck Foundation Stay at “Home Media Award” bagging first position for the Print Category in West Africa with an award value of $500.

Ishmael was among ten journalist that won the 2017 United States of America (USA) Embassy in Freetown Media fellowship Grant of $350 for the submission of a story idea titled ”The Rise of Social Media and its effect on Freedom of Expression in Sierra Leone.

During the 2018 elections , Ishmael was a frequent interview host for the Senegal based West African Democracy Radio updating their global audience on Sierra Leone’s election , the unfolding events during and after the process of the most crucial election in the former British West African nation.

Ishmael is the correspondent in Sierra Leone for the Efe- Spain’s International News Agency based in Madrid and writes extensively on different beats from Breaking news, news feature,articles among others. Also he writes as a freelance journalist with Pan African Visions online , a US based news platform whose aim is to write African stories to an International audience . Koroma has been contracted by leading media institution in the world and has worked on several projects and most recently with the Media Reform Coordinating Group (MRCG) and the Transitional Justice Legacy Fund (ATJLF) based in Ghana on a six- month Project doing transitional Justice stories in Sierra Leone.

Koroma has appeared on so many platforms including the State broadcaster -The Sierra Leone Broadcasting Corporation (SLBC)’s Podium Program and Freetown Television Network (FTN) and on Africa Young Voices Television (AYV TV) in Sierra Leone.

Ishmael has interviewed many great personalities including former Nigerian President Good luck Jonathan, former Ghanian President John Daramani Mahama ,world environmental icon Dr. Jane Goodall , Sierra Leone’s Anti – Corruption Commissioner Francis Ben Kaifala Esq , President Julius Maada Bio among others.

He has so much interest in writing health stories , development and human interest stories with an human right angle. He is an active blogger, social commentator and writes extensively on different topics including economic , human rights and social issues among other areas.

Ishmael is the current Vice President of the Sierra Leone Reporters Union(SLRU) in the country. He is a Merck Foundation Alumni member.