A WAR OF PERCENTAGES GRIPS THE GREEN MOVEMENT
On the one hand people in the Green Movement are telling the world how focused they are on the BIG 5 agenda set by Principal in his last term but on the other, there is already a fierce succession struggle underway. And the struggle is taking place openly on social media, in newspapers and even in night clubs. Principal is aware of what is happening and apart from dropping a few cryptic comments here and there, he has refused to really address the issue as leader of the movement. He may well be forced to do so in the not too distant future.
We have counted about TWELVE people now positioning themselves to take over from the big man. They have set up campaign groups that are active on social media, always taking up memory space in our phones with dozens of unsolicited videos and boring articles about their candidates. They have even gone as far as attacking each other. It’s really becoming interesting for the neutrals. As we bring down Principal’s tenure, things will take frightening dimensions. We cannot even rule out hand to hand combat. It’s that serious. We are not clairvoyants but we urge you to trust us on this issue.
We are now beginning to get used to waking up to bogus polls concocted in some corner showing certain candidates in the lead and this and that. We attach zero credibility to that effort. All we can say right now is that we are aware of what is going on but the race is yet to begin. We urge the social media warriors to slow down or they will be exhausted by the time the whistle is blown.
It is one thing to hire a few so-called bloggers to churn articles on social media to heap praises on oneself and quite another to understand how to become the leader of a major political party. For now, let the music play:
1. So-called bloggers will continue to churn the materials for social media and collect their fees. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. In fact they are not bound by any ethical code that prevents them from constantly moving from one potential candidate to the other every hour.
2. Some newspapers will also reserve several column inches to spread the message. The more the merrier.
3. As always with such issues, the anointed one will be in a little corner, observing the ONE DOZEN or so MEN as they position themselves. We saw that with the Red Movement in 2018.
4. We know that some guys are merely trying to give themselves some relevance in the whole process so they might be considered for certain jobs and big government contracts. We’ve been watching things for too long to be fooled again and again.
THE FCC MAYOR SAYS SHE IS PLANTING TREES
The Mayor of this great city is back full time with her TREE PLANTING idea. Please, today we are not going to make any comment about CABLE CARS. Mayor Kemokai enjoys being on social media so pictures of some tree planting efforts here and there are all over different applications. At least this time we have actually seen some young people in vehicles with megaphones shouting out messages about the need to plant trees to make Freetown the GREENEST capital in Africa. Well done FCC Mayor.
We don’t however understand why your publicity people are operating deep inside the rural part of the western area which is not under your control. Are you in touch with the man on the other side?
1. We will be going to the notice board of the FCC in the next few days to see the budget for this tree planting exercise and to know the funding partners. We know that the government of Sierra Leone is putting some money into it. The FCC Mayor is aware that the Local Government Act mandates all councils to make such information available monthly on their notice boards.
2. The FCC Mayor wants us to believe that this is a continuation of an earlier tree planting program for which she won an award of some sort in the period leading to the election. The trouble is that we have been looking for those trees throughout this city but we’ve been unable to find them. Meanwhile British news outlets continue publishing stories to pull wool over our eyes.
Now, at least we have seen people in vehicles talking about tree planting backed by another set of pictures on social media. We will go in search of the actual planted trees soon.
3. By the way, one of the people in those tree planting vehicles who spoke to us had a clean British accent – much more polished than that of the Mayor. Is that person part of the Delivery Team that was supposed to have been disbanded?
COMMUNITY SERVICE INSTEAD OF MOB JUSTICE
We have watched a particular video on social media several times in the last 48 hours to try and determine what was really going on. In the video is a young man shoveling away grass from a roadside along a major road in this city. The commentary in the background talks about the need for the people to avoid mob justice when they catch a thief. According to the voice, the best thing to do is to get the thief to do community service like the guy who was doing the cleaning job on that roadside.
We concluded that the guy was captured trying to steal something and was then compelled to do the cleaning job to avoid mob justice. The man doing the commentary sounded very pleased with his idea. As we prepare this material, there’s been no word from the numerous Human Rights groups in Freetown. Here’s what we think about this community service thing.
1. We applaud those who prevented the community people from doing mob justice but a community service punishment like that must at all times be handed down by the legal system. In small communities local authorities can do that. When people catch a thief the right thing to do is to hand them over to the police.
2. We are in the middle of the rainy season and this is time for thieves to be active around our homes. If the police allow communities to force those thieves to do community service, then we will have the cleanest city in Africa because there are many thieves all over the place right now.
PARTY CONVENTIONS IN THE USA vs. SIERRA LEONE
Both major parties in the USA have completed their conventions where they approved their presidential and vice presidential candidates for the November election. From the point of view of people in faraway Sierra Leone, not particularly interested in which party wins, we absolutely had a good time watching the processes unfold. What we saw was a fantastic American-style presentation – lots of money, many good hands in the background and a well-produced outcome.
We have to be clear that we are only talking about what happened inside the halls, the celebration, speeches and musical performances. We have seen videos on social media of people being thrown out by security, protests outside the hall and all that. So there were a few ugly scenes but that should be expected in such large political gatherings.
We have witnessed party conventions in this country involving our two big parties. We really don’t want to compare ours with what just happened in America for many reasons but there are things we should learn from them.
1. When people get up to speak they should be appropriately identified and warned beforehand to avoid those long and boring salutations.
2. Nobody wants to go to a party rally and sit around while even minor speakers ramble on and on. Out there people have to keep to their allotted time.
3. We did not see young people that high on KUSH assaulting and insulting one of the candidates in the service of their political master.
4. Adequate space was provided for the media to do their work without molestation. Yes, old man Trump in particular would occasionally call them FAKE but there was nothing violent.
5. Both parties have powerful donors but we are not sure a single donor selected any of the presidential candidates and their running mates for the parties. The party machinery was at work, no matter how flawed certain aspects of the process were.
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