Sierra Leone countries/sl.yaml
The medical production guidelines cover cannabis as a starting material for pharmaceutical products, including cannabis extracts, with quality standards for cultivation, harvesting and processing.[@medgrow] Their stated purpose includes production and manufacture for export.[@medgrow]
medgrow
A conviction is a criminal record.[@pm1] Sentences run heavy for small amounts: a youth got 25 years for possessing 30.5 grams of kush, and a dealer 10 years.[@pm1,pm2]
pm1, pm2
Road Traffic Act section 102 prohibits driving or attempting to drive on a road while alcohol or drugs make proper control of the vehicle impossible.[@traffic2007] The published 2007 Act grades imprisonment by harm: up to six months for no or minor bodily injury to another person, one to two years for aggravated bodily injury, and three to five years where death occurs.[@traffic2007] The court may also order compensation. Current fines and later penalty amendments were not certified; the original monetary figures should not be read as current new-leone amounts.[@traffic2007] Section 107(3) requires police to consult a medical practitioner and follow that advice on drug-impairment questions arising under its detention provisions.[@traffic2007] Sections 104–106 describe alcohol-oriented breath/specimen procedures and hospital safeguards, not a verified cannabis concentration limit.[@traffic2007] Current drug toxicology, refusal rules and offence-specific licence-point assignments remain follow-ups.
Figures reported by the government to the UN drugs office record 1,632 kg of herbal cannabis seized in 2024, against 22,778 kg in 2023.[@unodc_szr] The UN publishes them as kilogram equivalents, and countries count seizures differently, so the figures are not comparable across borders.[@unodc_szr] At home the trade centres on kush: the 2025 task force seized 198 kg of kush alongside 300 kg of cannabis, and police report wraps counted by the hundred in Freetown raids.[@tocu26]
unodc_szr, tocu26
The African Roots of Marijuana Research Square preprint — From Emergency Declaration to District-Level Delivery: a mixed-methods evaluation of Sierra Leone's national KUSH response (2024–2025) Government of Sierra Leone — Transnational Organized Crime Unit (TOCU) report (24 June 2026, PDF) The Sierra Leone Telegraph — President Bio announces five new measures to tackle Sierra Leone's Kush crisis (3 November 2025) 9 unchanged
word Diamba · lang Krio · meaning cannabis; the coast-wide word carried by seamen and traders · sources duvall19, word Kush · lang Krio · meaning the smoked drug devastating youth since the 2020s; prosecuted as kush in court · sources court2023, pm1
label Unlawful drug possession · treatment criminal · term Possession · prison min 5 years · note At least five years; courts may impose a shorter term or a fine where that would be harsh or unconscionable
label Cannabis offences (Pharmacy and Drugs Act) · treatment criminal · term Cultivation · prison min 15 years · note At least fifteen years for cannabis offences; Board written consent required, label Licensed medical cultivation and processing for export · treatment legal · term Licensed medical production · note Pharmacy Board guideline PBSL/GL/022; export only, no local patient supply verified
There is no legal recreational supply: possession can bring at least five years (courts may reduce it where harsh or unconscionable), and unlicensed cultivation at least fifteen years.[@act,pharmacy2001] The only licensed cannabis activity is medical cultivation and processing for export under Pharmacy Board guidelines; nothing is lawfully sold locally.[@medgrow] A 2023 case refused bail to two men accused of cannabis and kush possession.[@court2023]
act, pharmacy2001, medgrow, court2023
none
No industrial-hemp exception was verified: the pharmacy law restricts narcotic-producing plants to Board consent with no low-THC distinction, the 2008 Act lists dangerous drugs without a hemp carve-out, and licensed activity is medical cultivation for export.[@pharmacy2001,act,medgrow]
pharmacy2001, act, medgrow
Enforcement runs on kush: an evaluation of the 2024–2025 national response counted 891 kush-related arrests and 189.7 kg seized, including 47 high-level traffickers.[@researchsquare25] In January 2026 the organised-crime unit reported 52 convictions, most in the Western Area.[@tocu26] President Bio responded in November 2025 with a special drug court and a joint police-army security unit.[@telegraph25]
researchsquare25, tocu26, telegraph25
Two coast-wide words meet in Sierra Leone: [diamba](/culture/language/diamba/), the Bantu word carried up the coast, and [kush](/culture/language/kush/), now the street name of the drug devastating youth.[@duvall19,court2023] Sierra Leonean seamen once carried diamba along West African sea routes — in 1938 one was arrested with it in New York (see the [1938 seamen entry](/history/sierra-leone-seamen-regional-trafficking-1938/)).[@duvall19] The colonial state banned the plant in 1926 (see the [1926 ordinance](/history/sierra-leone-dangerous-drugs-ordinance-1926/)), and the 2008 drug law took effect on a president-set date after a cocaine plane forced its urgency (see the [2008 commencement](/history/sierra-leone-drugs-commencement-amendment-2008/)).
duvall19, court2023