FHM director complains illegal occupation of their centre

The executive secretary of the Family Homes Movement (FHM), Ernest Sesay, has complained that an unknown person is using the homes’ interim care centre at St Michael’s Lodge at Lakka as a hospital.
Explaining to journalists at the FHM Parsonage Street office, Mr Sesay said the interim care centre at Lakka was bought from John Michael eight years ago which was used during the height of the war to rehabilitate child combatants. He said when the war intensified, FHM collaborated with UNICEF and the ministry of Gender and Children’s Affairs to provide and cater for war affected children.  The centre, Mr Sesay went on, gained child protection status in 1997-2001 from UNICEF for which over 5,000 war affected children passed through the centre.
With the activities of the centre during the war, he explained , the centre was recognized by UNICEF and the ministry of Gender and Children’s affairs as the best child protection agency which earned the visit of the then UN Secretary General Kofi Anan to the centre. He warned that, “even the ministry of Gender and Children’s Affairs knows that we legally own that centre and let me warn those attempting to use the centre should not attempt as there are state lands for which they should apply for.”