WHY SO-CALLED PROTESTS ON THE STREETS ON THE EVE OF ELECTION?
In the last two days, at least the east side of Freetown has been somewhat paralyzed by a so-called protest against perceived electoral injustice relating to voter ID cards and alleged police highhandedness against the opposition since the start of the official campaign period. The calls for those so-called protests have consistently come from people living abroad and we have enough experience now of how they operate. For that we reference the riots in Makeni, Lunsar, and Tombo. Then there was the deadliest of them all – the Augusts 10 protest in Freetown. We don’t want to mention the killing of those police officers who were merely doing their job.
We know this is all about politics, a real fight for control of the people and their resources. We have already made the following points in the past but we should say it again for the records.
1. There are known hands on the ground in Sierra Leone organizing these unnecessary and damaging protests. It goes like this – instructions are sent from Freetown to the guys having a good time in Western capitals, they then go on social media and foot soldiers on the ground coordinate things to produce an explosion on our streets.
2. When we hear a spokesman for the main opposition belatedly trying to deny links with the most notorious of those inciting raw violence on our streets we feel sorry for him. What do politicians take us for?
3. We wonder how these Western countries would have reacted if we had groups of people in Sierra Leone inciting violence in those countries leading to the killing of police officers and ordinary citizens of those countries.
4. If people are so outraged by what this government is doing, why not wake up early on June 24 and drop a ballot in the box. That’s what people in civilized countries do. Why call foolish protests and stop children from taking exams?
5. Western diplomats in this country know that there are kinds of protests taking place in their countries on a daily basis and nobody gets hurt but in Sierra Leone our protesters damage cars, steal properties and kill police officers. The diplomats refuse to call them by their correct names. We know they are not our idea of protesters saying something for the attention of their leaders.
ARE THE OTHER PARTIES NOT CAMPAIGNING IN FREETOWN?
The people of Freetown must be forgiven for believing that there are only two parties in the coming election. Campaign days were recently allotted to the different political parties, more than a dozen of them in fact but they are completely missing in action. The truth is they are not able to mount and campaign because they can’t raise the money required to achieve. They don’t have the structure or personnel to deliver an effective campaign.
We told the PPRC sometime ago in this column that going by their constitutive act, many of our so-called political parties should be closed down because they are undemocratic, in terms of how they select their leaders they are confined to single room office spaces in one or two places and in the leader’s laptop computer. The PPRC knows this. In trying to accommodate people, PPRC has unleashed a group of parties that are totally unable to run themselves but they are going around posing as political parties.
We call on the PPRC to follow its own laws after this election and take some parties off the list. We feel extremely happy that no Goodluck Jonathan money is coming this way this year and we hope no state money is going to these social clubs. Those who want to run Sierra Leone should be first able to take care of themselves and follow the law.
Copyright © 2023 Politico (14/06/23)
