IN SEARCH OF A NAME FOR THE NEW FCC BUILDING
Work is progressing very well on the new building that will house the Freetown City Council. From the look of things our Mayor of the Sun will occupy that building before she is due to renew her mandate in 2022. We are told that she continuously dreams about moving into that beautiful shiny building very quickly and register as the first Mayor to operate there because she is not sure about the outcome of the contest in 2022 or whether the Red Camp will still put her forward as their candidate in the first place.
Anyway, it will be over soon. For now we are interested only in finding a name for that building – a suitable one. Please we don’t want people to draw us into that kind of farcical argument that followed the naming of a section of the Juba Bridge after Sengbe Pieh. Let’s just deal with history around this building. We know that on that same site once stood what was called the Wilberforce Memorial Hall – obviously paying some respect to William Wilberforce who we were told in school, played a pivotal role in the abolition of slavery in England and the designation of Freetown as a British Crown colony. We are not pushing that line today.
The building was destroyed by fire in the 1950s after a performance by two amateur musicians, Roland Wyse and Bra Faux of the then SLBS and was reconstructed in the early 1970s by the North Koreans and named City Hall. It served as home for theatre until it was burnt down again during the 1999 attack on Freetown by SOBELS.
So what do we name this new building? We ask because we understand the Red Camp had promised to name it after King Messi. We don’t know how the fact that King Messi is no longer in power and has withdrawn to his Seat of Power might affect that earlier promise. To find a way out, that let’s organize a competition for people to suggest names for the building. In subsequent publications, we will suggest some names for Mayor of the Sun to consider.
And while on the subject of building:
LET’S DO SOMETHING ABOUT DELCO HOUSE PLEASE?
Is DELCO HOUSE a property of the government of Sierra Leone or is it a private property? If it belongs to the government we want to humbly ask the ministry in charge of public infrastructure to ask Jay Jay Blood for money to rehabilitate that building with immediate effect. From the outside, that building is a disgrace in the middle of our city and there are quite a few institutions occupying it. Now we understand why the Mano River Union moved its secretariat out.
The other alternatives to getting money directly from the government will be for all the agencies in the building to contribute to the rehabilitation or somebody should embark on some aggressive local fund-raising effort to get money to do the rehabilitation work. People like us who are scandalized by such neglect will be compelled to drop some cash into the box.
We called on the authorities to make sure rehabilitation work on DELCO HOUSE begins and ends before Christmas 2020. We don’t want the same situation with the NASSIT building along Walpole Street to play out at DELCO HOUSE. At Walpole Street rehabilitation work stopped just before the last election but the rickety scaffolding is still hanging there.
AIDS PATIENTS FEEL ECLIPSED BY COVID -19
There is growing sense of frustration and concern amongst people living with HIV/AIDS as well as their campaigners in the country over what they see as neglect ever since global focus shifted to the deadly coronavirus pandemic. People living with AIDS in Sierra Leone are complaining that their intake of huge amount of pills is not happening anymore as supplies have dwindled. Sea and air travel has been largely disrupted due to corona and importation of AIDS drugs has also been affected as well. In the 80’s and early 90s having AIDS was like a death sentence being handed out but advancement in medical research saw the discovery of life -prolonging drugs for the disease. Patients here in the country have depended heavily on these drugs that have helped them stay relatively in good shape.
But with this outbreak of coronavirus, they say greater attention is being given now to the infectious disease and that their supply of retro viral pills has been rationed in a way that it has struck fear into the hearts of patients. The availability of the drugs meant hope for a life of longevity. We know there is a lot of stigma around AIDS but some sufferers have in recent times demonstrated great courage by appearing in public to reveal their status and share their experiences, all this bolstered by their accessing of these vital pills.
With supplies believed to be running dry, this will serve as a lesson for our National Aids Secretariat and partners to consider as a priority the storing of drugs for patients in the event of crisis situations like these wherein importation of the drugs could be affected and the lives of patients put at risk.
Let us make no mistake, AIDS is real and some well-known men and women in our society have died from the disease. They cannot be named to show our respect and to honour their rights to privacy but sad to say some died whilst in the prime of their lives. Well since our airport is opening to the world again it is hoped that more drugs for these AIDS patients would be brought in and given to them. For those still in denial, AIDS is real and is claiming lives the world over.
SLFA SPLASHING THE CASH BUT STILL NO ELECTIVE CONGRESS
We are dealing with a very strange organization in this country called SLFA. It’s strange in many ways but mainly because it refuses to be democratic and neither its members nor the government of Sierra Leone is able or willing to call it to order. Well, basically to get them to conform to their own constitution and regulations. The whole world knows that the election that brought The Queen of the SLFA to power was rigged inside out. The Queen has continued to hold on to that flawed mandate which expired long ago by sheer manipulation and threats of a possible FIFA ban.
From all we can see now, the advent of COVID – 19 to Sierra Leone has offered The Queen another perfect excuse to delay the democratic process that has only one outcome – The Queen will be thrown out of office.
We know that there are restrictions on the number of people who can meet in one place but how come The Queen and her people recently worked with the National Sports Authority to hold that event in Kenema? We know exactly how many people were inside that hall. In the last few day the SLFA called club owners and some journalists together in Freetown to ridiculously splash FIFA money around. We’re not even sure those allocations were discussed with the member of the SLFA. All The Queen was doing was organizing some publicity for herself and by excluding the critical media, again citing COVID -19 as excuse, she has once again demonstrated how much this pandemic has become the new bogeyman boy for the SLFA.
Sometimes we complain about the lack of democracy in the running of the SLFA and blame it on The Queen but we should never lose sight of how as a result of clearly avoidable tactical errors, the so-called Football Stakeholders have contributed to the situation we are dealing right now. They have no clear leadership as three or four factions speculate about beating The Queen. All those interested in restoring democracy to the SLFA know that there will eventually be a clash among these factions over leadership and it is The Queen who will benefit because it may be too late to repair to damage.
The SLFA members and their administrative staff plus election observers and journalists will not be more than 100 people. Why can’t these people meet and elect a new President and Executive Committee right now? There are in fact innovative ways to conduct that election without rigging if they are committed to maintain democracy. But, what we have now is an almighty president hanging by her finger nails with an expired mandate and running the organization while The Stakeholders are guessing the next move.
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