Friday 14th July, 2017: Eugene Cole, a seventeen (17) year old boy who is born on 29^th December 1999, in the northern province of Sierra Leone form an extended polygamous family, has been on the hiding since surviving a brutal initiation process in the hands of Poro men in Yoni Bana, Tonkolili District.

The eldest of seven children born to a very committed and highly placed Poro man called Raymond Cole (now Yamba), Eugene had been singled as the appropriate successor of his father as supreme controller of the Poro society in that part of the country.

His father is a complete traditional man who has little or no respect for education and western ideas and thus was compelling the young and promising Eugene to choose the path of traditionalists instead of fostering his western education. The father had been alleged to always confront Eugene on several occasions to prepare for the Poro initiation but the lad was said to have always told him that he would never be a part to such group.

Meanwhile, information gathered by the Awareness Times Newspaper say during the afternoon hours of 5^th July 2017, Yamba (Eugene’s father) was said to have organized a feast at home inviting his colleagues and friends. In the presence of huge gathering, it was alleged that there was a halt, as Yamba stood up, and told Eugene that the feast was organized purposely for him to be forcefully initiated into the Poro society. Eyewitness said, Eugene was taken to the Poro shrine where they forcefully initiated him despite his protest and resistance.

As a result of his forceful initiation, Eugene was said to have been very angry and bettered that he was narrowly escaped from the secrete shrine at night as he was left with no alternative but to reveal everything he went through to the public.

However, here in Sierra Leone, the process of initiation is always very secrete and that once one is initiated either forcefully of at will, he should have everything in top secrete.

Thus because Eugene took it upon himself to publicise the secrete of Poro society, he has now become an object of target as his life is in danger.

Eugene’s father and his colleagues are now very angry searching for him in the whole town that he had offended their “gods.”

Meanwhile, many who saw him the night of his escape said Eugene had gone to a nearby town named Mile 91, very devastated, as he then boarded a vehicle there to head for the capital in Freetown. Until now, Eugene’s whereabouts are still not known.