By Umaru Fofana
Sierra Leone’s two main political parties seem to be being led by hardliners. Hawkish and self-serving leaders who are mostly surrounded by people of their ilk. Led by their leadership, many members and supporters of the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) believe this is their turn to do as they wish and to fend off the opposition All People’s Congress (APC) party who were no different when in office.
Members and supporters of the APC allowed their party to be hijacked and crash-landed at the behest of one man. Almost all of them kept quiet as they followed him like sheep. Sadly in Sierra Leonean political lingo when they say someone “sabi politics”(is politically savvy), they actually mean the person is a crooked politician. I wonder when last any of our politicians read a book about politics or a good politician.
Since their defeat which was easily predictable because of that one-man dominance which continued up to the eve of the elections last year, the APC have kept a clenched fist. From the non-denial denial of the fact that they lost the presidency genuinely and legitimately, to the noncooperation in the governance of the country through boycotts, and making good the pledge made by their standard-bearer Dr Samura Kamara on voting day that he or they would “cause all sorts of problems” for the current government.
On that same voting day, I interviewed the outgoing president, Ernest Bai Koroma at the polling station. My last afterthought question was whether he intended to continue as Chairman and Leader For Life of his party as he had been crowned – apparently accepted by him – at the party’s Youth Wing delegates’ conference in Port Loko. His reply to me was unequivocal. He said he would stand down from that position within three months of the election. That was 15 months ago! He is still at the helm of the party.
In fact it is perfectly correct to refer to the former president as Opposition Leader. This is because he heads the APC party. It is natural that this will put him on a collision course with the government and president Julius Maada Bio. Such is how true his opposition leadership is that when people talk about bringing APC and SLPP together for the good of the country they make reference to how Koroma and his predecessor Ahmad Tejan Kabbah had a cosy relationship, and how Koroma and Bio hugged after the 2012 election which Bio lost to him. What they do not say is that there are fundamental differences between all of these.
Kabbah was a former president, true and through. He held no position in the SLPP when the party was in the opposition. He was a statesman from the day his party lost until his death. So the same can hardy happen right now between Bio and Koroma because the latter is in active politics and leads his party.
As for the 2012 situation analogy, then the call should be for President Bio and the man he defeated – Dr Samura Kamara – to hug publicly which they have already done as facilitated by the Catholic Church which both men belong to. Dr Kamara should be playing a lot more role than he is currently allowed to do. I find it strange that Ernest Bai Koroma still towers over the APC. It only leaves one with the impression that he would have conveniently got a third term had his party’s candidate won the presidency.
To unclench their fists, the APC should reset. They should play a more robust role in governance and more constructive role in opposition. Let Ernest Bai Koroma and all those who throughout his tenure prominently served him and the party – if there is any difference between the two – step aside. There are brilliant and nearly untainted members of the APC party that I know – both here and abroad. Let them take the back stage, for now at least. Crucially, the party should have as its face and voice someone other than any of those who have dominated matters in the last 11 years. A fresh face who is young, articulate, civil and honest!
Someone may argue that it is difficult to get the APC to unclench their fists with the ongoing commissions of inquiry. First off, clenching their fists will not kill the commissions. But also the party has all along protested the innocence of its members who served the Koroma administration, denying any wrongdoing. Like the SLPP, the APC is allowing hawks to call the shots for the party in a way that besmirches its image. With such a strategy elections become harder to win.
It is refreshing to know that there is a call louder now than ever before within the APC for the SELECTION clause to be expunged from its constitution. If that is achieved, internal democracy would have been moved a significant step forward. I am saying so being cautiously optimistic because even in the SLPP which has some progressive provisions in its constitution including obligatory ELECTION of parliamentary and presidential candidates, things are susceptible to manipulation. When a party’s member lost in a contest and believed they did so fairly, chances are that they would stay very active in the party and not take the back stage or even wish defeat for the SELECTED or CROOKEDLY ELECTED one. But when they lost genuinely, they would not feel too hard done by. They will stay and be active out of conviction and not coercion or fear of retribution.
We need an honest and less bellicose even if stern opposition for our democracy to flourish. With all this fighting, the APC stands the risk of losing that position to the NGC which will continue to provide alternative viewpoints in an articulate and less quarrelsome yet piercing manner.
The party should return to parliament with a new strategy: to use their membership of committees to find out more and more about the good and bad that go on in government. They should go easy on vilifying or even trying to humiliate the electoral commissioner and return to electoral contest. They should hold monthly or quarterly press conferences to present alternative thinking in trying to solve the myriads of problems the country is beset with. This is a party that is deep-rooted in many parts of the country and cannot be undone just like that. They will always pose an electoral threat. So how they carry themselves will either increase those chances or diminish them.
© 2019 Politico Online
