The Sierra Leone ex-president, Ernest Bai Koroma has left his West African country by plane and flown to Nigeria on Friday, according to a report by two Reuters journalists.
This update is coming after a court allowed him to travel abroad on medical grounds regardless of treason charges.
On January 3, 70-year-old Koroma was accused of committing four offences for his alleged role in failed military coup to overthrow the government in November, but a high court on Wednesday directed that he was free to leave the country.
This decision is coming amid concerns that his indictment could incite domestic tensions linked to the 2023 election, which saw President Julius Maada Bio re-elected for a second term even though the main opposition candidate had rejected the results and international partners had queried the vote.
Koroma’s lawyers have called the charges “trumped up” and part of a political vendetta.
A Reuters reporter at the airport in Sierra Leone’s capital Freetown had reported seeing Koroma depart on a Nigerian presidential plane on Friday afternoon.
The plane eventually landed in the Nigerian capital of Abuja and Koroma was welcomed by Nigerian officials and the ECOWAS president, a second Reuters reporter at the scene revealed.
ECOWAS had at the time of filing this report early Saturday morning, not responded to a request for comment.
