IT’S NOT LOOKING GOOD WITH GUINEA’S TRANSITION
By the time the junta guys in our neighborhood realize that they have to cooperate with ECOWAS and the international community to chart a path to return the Republic of Guinea to democratic civilian rule, many lives would have been lost and the economy would be in very serious trouble. Even in the best of times Guinea's economy has only been marginally better than those of Sierra Leone and Liberia, two of its MRU neighbors.
The military strongman in that country doesn’t think he should talk to ECOWAS about the political transition which he should have set in motion a few days after removing Alpha Conde from power. The colonel believes he can drive things the way he wants and everybody else, including those his people refer to as the inquisitive people of ECOWAS should just shut up. The guy wants to spend nearly a full democratic presidential term in office despite the fact that most Guinean people and the world expected him to have handed power back to an elected administration and returned to barracks or fly away to Spain to enjoy the small pennies he is saving right now six month after using the gun to come to power.
His political backers in Guinea and abroad should tell him he will not succeed to stay in office for as long as he wants because these days the kind of government he is heading is totally unacceptable because our modern democracies are not Ancient Greek city states.
Here’s what we think the Republic of Guinea is facing in the coming months:
1. Unfortunately those deadly street protests will continue. They will be sporadic and largely disorganized but they will continue and the possibility remains that with every action a few dead bodies will be recovered from the scenes.
2. With international cameras focused on Conakry, those pictures will turn off Guinea’s friends and the outcry for democracy to be restored will grow louder and louder. Guinea is steadily isolating itself from international institutions. That’s not good enough.
3. The civilian politicians have been out of office for more than a year and they are not going to tolerate the soldiers trying to run an endless transition program without even talking to them. There has to be an agreed program with crucial benchmarks and moral guarantors at home in Guinea and abroad.
4. The soldiers/politicians in Guinea have put a former Head of State and other military people in jail on Human Rights charges. How can they justify that? Every time there is a demonstration in Conakry, Doumbouya's forces shoot and kill half a dozen or so ordinary people?
CAN KANJA SESAY BEAT THOSE SABOTAGING HIS EFFORTS?
Apart from putting his hands up and accepting that he is now clearly overwhelmed by the extent to which people acting in bad faith have declared WAR against his efforts in the Energy Ministry, we have no idea what else this guy can do to stop the nation’s enemies from totally destroying our electricity infrastructure. We’ve reported a lot about criminal activities around electricity transformers and other equipment installed across the country to keep the lights on but the latest one in Kono has merely told us that the criminals are still ONE STEP AHEAD of Kanja and his people. How can we actually be sure that INSIDERS are not the real people destroying our power transformers?
The district had only recently been connected to the national grid with a huge fanfare involving Principal and his wife. Of course many of the ministers were there. In fact, the one from AGRICULTURE is never absent where the president is. We are told he makes sure he spends some time walking the corridors of State House daily so Principal can see him on his security monitor. Well done sir!
Those people who damaged the transformer we saw on social media in the last 48 hours are nation wreckers who should be put behind bars for a very long time but to do that, we have to catch them first. Maybe we’ve said this before but we want Kanja to do the following immediately.
1. We NEED one OSD officer at every transformer location that is at risk of losing its copper cables. How many such transformers do we have? We have enough police officers to secure them. Let’s recall all officers on guard duty at private homes and deploy them.
2. Like pedophiles who are convicted in court, let’s increase the sentences for people stealing or destroying critical infrastructure. They should be tried inside MAFANTA prison and jailed on Bonthe Island. We have to let them know we are serious.
3. Those that are destroying the facilities for political reasons and the ones we are really looking for like the Tolongbo man in Lungi who stole solar panels to deprive his own community of light. Let’s put them in jail.
4. Kanja should work with the police to immediately arrest and detain all those selling copper cables in this country. Those who cannot produce receipts and NRA documents for the foreign goods they are selling here including copper cables should be brought before a judge because it’s easy to know they are the ones receiving stolen property.
FREE QUALITY EDUCATION BUT THE SCHOOLS ARE KILLING PARENTS
For the umpteenth time we are calling on Rasta Sengs to do something about the burden secondary schools authorities are piling on ordinary people. Yes, under the FQE School fees have been eliminated but what the schools have done, and we believe Rasta Sengs knows this, is that they have created a long list of things they want from pupils as a MUST before the children can be admitted especially those that are moving into Senior Secondary School.
Rasta Sengs please prove us wrong when we report now that your schools are charging anything between NLe 400 and 850 per pupils for all sorts of school materials that could be bought for half the price on the streets. This is so unfair. We should never be surprised to learn that many children who passed BECE were unable to proceed to Senior Secondary School because their parents couldn’t afford these charges.
Let’s also consider that the same quality of school uniform materials sold on our streets are sold for different prices in our schools, same for berets, school crests and other really crazy charges. In one school we asked for a breakdown of the NLe 800 they asked for. We were dismissed with the wave of a hand. What is wrong with parents buying uniforms and other school materials from the open market where they can get good bargains?
We owe it to our conscience to warn Rasta Sengs that he is being dragged with his eyes wide open by school authorities into something that would boomerang soon. Anyway we are waiting for his next tweet. Sengs please ask your school authorities to provide a breakdown of their charges and give parents the option to buy uniforms and other materials at bargain prices outside the walls of those corrupt schools.
SALONE FEMALE FOOTBALL LEAGUE KICKS OFF AT LAST
At last the Salone Female Football League is underway throughout the country. We have watched a few matches and we are very impressed with the quality we’ve seen so far. It only means that as things progress, the quality will be even better.
We appreciate the fact that the GOSL has committed some funds. What Principal pledged is not enough. The organizers need more. Individuals and corporate bodies have also pledged some cash. We urge everybody to pay up and on time. The last thing we want is for this league to be postponed several times like that of their male counterparts for want of money. Please handle your financial books very well.
We congratulate the board running the league and wish them well.
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