A/HRC/4/96 page 6 violence and the destruction of public properties. On 26 May 2006, requesting the release of colleagues detained by the police for having failed to obey police stop signs, students of Waterloo Peninsular Secondary School burnt down the Waterloo Police Post in the Western area. 6. Pursuant to an act of Parliament, national administration has been decentralized, local district councils established and a number of functions devolved from central government to these local councils. The decentralization of administration continues to facilitate the realization of political rights at the community level, including popular participation in local government. UNIOSIL field reports indicate that there has been increasing efforts on the part of civil society organizations to hold local district councils accountable to the public. The chairpersons of two district councils, Bombali and Tonkolili, were forced out of office under allegations of corruption and misappropriation of funds. 7. The instrumentalization of the institution of the Paramount Chiefs, established by customary law, continues to challenge the democratization process. It limits the right to contest the right of the chieftaincy to rule households and, within households, to oppose patrilineal heritage which results into significant numbers of the population being disenfranchised and discriminated against. Since independence, the institution of the chieftaincy in Sierra Leone has become increasingly politicized and subjected to interference from central government, as was the case with the Biriwa Chieftaincy elections. 8. The Government’s insistence on conducting the Biriwa Chiefdom Paramount Chief elections in August 2006, notwithstanding the boycott by the Limbas, who constitute over 85 per cent of the population, on grounds of irregularities led people to think that the Government was using its influence and power to advance the interests of the ruling party to the detriment of the rights of some significant segments of the community. Paramount Chief elections are not conducted under statutory laws, but rather under customary law which is unwritten, male dominated and discriminatory, and which still coexists with the Constitution and statutory laws of the country. In Biriwa Chiefdom, under customary law, every 20 women taxpayers are entitled to designate 1 woman representative to vote in the elections. Nonetheless, the names of the representatives of over 400 women, who had paid their taxes, were deleted from the official gazette and hence were not permitted to vote. This practice leads to the marginalization, exclusion and disenfranchisement of women, and works against peace and stability. The situation in Biriwa Chiefdom remains tense. The Limbas have refused to recognize the electoral winner, a Mandigo, as the Paramount Chief, and the situation presents a potential for large-scale violence between Limbas and Mandigos. 9. A number of Paramount Chiefs are known to use their power in their respective chiefdoms to intimidate, harass and threaten opposition parties, and obstruct their activities. The Human Rights and Rule of Law Section of UNIOSIL noted some cases in which Paramount Chiefs denied opposition parties access to their chiefdoms. The TRC in its final report stated that “Chiefs and traditional structures did little more than the bidding of the power base in Freetown” and called upon the Government to “seriously consider the return of the Chiefs to traditional roles and functions and to embark on a national dialogue in this regard”.1 No concrete 1 See volume II, chapter 2 of the final report of TRC, which is available online at http://trcsierraleone.org/drwebsite/publish/index.shtml.