Cllr.Kanneh wants firearms, ammunition laws re-viewed

The Chairman of the Liberia Law Reform Commission, Counselor Boakai Kanneh is recommending for a re-visitation of Liberia’s firearms and ammunition control law and the Act that established the Liberia National Commission on Small Arms or LNCSA.

Cllr. Kanneh also calls for promulgation of protocols or regulations that would strengthen existing statutes noting that, “these protocols or regulations when concluded do not have to pass Legislature scrutiny except for gazzetting which is simply a publication requirement of Government.”

He made the call on Wednesday, 28 February at the start of a three-day workshop here on the Fire Arms and Ammunition Control Act (FACA) and the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) to do a draft legislations that seek to harmonize the two guns control instruments as well as expand the mandate of the implementing authority, LINCSA.

LINCSA organized the three-day forum in partnership with the Liberia Action Network on Small Arms and stakeholders. Speaking on the theme, ‘Drafting Legislation to support the effective implementation of the Arms Trade Treaty, Cllr. Kanneh says given his literature review of the existing laws, this is his initial recommendation, if Liberia were to do a good job.

“Given that a clear roadmap has established as a State Party’s obligation under Treaty, it behooves all of us to set the appropriate technical machinery into motion to begin either drafting laws or regulations in compliance with the Treaty”, he says.

The Law Reform Commission Chairman points out that he harbor no doubt that the required technicians and stakeholders have been contacted to begin this onerous task to comply with the Arms Trade Treaty.

-Editing by Jonathan Browne