This tree, which is part of the history of the country and the capital, covered the streets and surrounding buildings with its high branches from the center of a bustling roundabout.
He “cotton tree” Centenary of Freetown, one of the emblems of Sierra Leone, Africalost all its branches after a strong storm on Wednesday night, the government said.
Of the giant ceiba of 70 metersknown as “Cotton Tree“, only the base of its enormous trunk remains, still standing after “torrential rains and strong winds,” the government of this small West African country said in a statement on Thursday.
A hundred people gathered around the place on Thursday morning, an AFP journalist found. The police and the army were deployed while the site was cleaned up.
“For centuries, the Cotton Tree was a proud emblem of our nation, a symbol that grew to serve as a refuge for many people,” President Julius Maada Bio said in the statement. “I am shocked. My heart broke when I saw our beloved Cotton Tree destroyed on my way to work,” says Gibrilla Sesay, 34.
This tree, which is part of the history of the country and the capital, covered the streets and surrounding buildings with its high branches from the center of a bustling roundabout.
The Ministry of Tourism and Culture asked in a statement to the inhabitants of Freetown not to take the fallen branches, since they will be exhibited in a national museum. According to tradition, it was under this tree that the slaves from North America, who won their freedom fighting in the War of Independence, prayed and thanked heaven for their liberation at the end of the 18th century.
The image of the tree decorated banknotes and stamps, and it is so famous that Queen Elizabeth II visited it in 1961. The tree suffered a fire in 2018, and also in 2020.
Sierra Leone has experienced several ecological disasters in recent years. In 2017, more than 1,100 people died after a mudslide in the capital.
Source: Ambito
