UPKEEP TRANSFORMED KISSY PSYCHIATRIC HOSPITAL
Commonly called the Kissy Mental home, the psychiatric hospital in the hilly settlement east of Freetown was established to treat persons with mental health problems. Being a health condition that our society frowns at or hardly discusses, relapsing sufferers and those completely overwhelmed by the illness, face stigmatization.
For many years it carried a horrible reputation and families kept sick relatives away. There were those perennial allegations of ill-treatment of patients including beatings and starvation and coupled with the appalling conditions of the place. Only fearsome mentally ill people that roamed the streets were dumped at the hospital. The place has over the years symbolically come to represent abandonment, neglect and decadence, until this latest impressive transformation.
It came as a great relief to see the hospital rehabilitated, refurbished and modernized. It has also got Teaching Hospital status. Hats off to the American Not- For- Profit organization named Partners in Health for putting their resources into the place. Principal drove from the state house up to Kissy to get the new look Psychiatric hospital formally opened. Medical students would now be encouraged to take up psychiatry study, an area they were reluctant to venture into due to the unappealing nature of the very facility that’s supposed to admit patients, and the stigmatization of the patients and to some extent the workers.
SLFA GENERAL SECRETARY BRINGS GAME INTO DISREPUTE
We have been told many times that the General Secretary of the Sierra Leone Football Association has the proverbial NINE LIVES OF A CAT – that he was strong enough to survive any attack that would throw his counterparts abroad out of office. And yes, he has survived many attacks. He went before the High Court of Sierra Leone and walked free, he is constantly wrangling with his Executive Committee, we were once told that a letter suspending him from office was written and signed but there was nobody to deliver it to him. Our General Secretary also had a good media war with his footballers over the ownership of suitcases. Yes, suitcases. He is still in office, not having gone on ANNUAL LEAVE for about EIGHT YEARS.
Let’s put all of this to one side now and look forward to seeing him survive the latest wahala facing him. His own disciplinary committee has concluded that his actions off the field of play brought the game into disrepute. The General Secretary is fined FIVE THOUSAND NEW LEONES for VIOLENT CONDUCT towards match officials. The Premier League Board committee also fined his club, FC Johansen the same amount of money because their supporters misbehaved as some of them physically attacked a referee.
He is widely reported to have told sport journalists that he would fall back on his so-called judicial bodies to deal with the disciplinary committee of the PLB, calling their decision a JOKE.
We are waiting to see if Thomas Daddy Brima is going to keep a man bringing the game into disrepute in that office. Here is a man who has enforced PLB disciplinary measures against other clubs in the past now calling them a JOKE. By the way, why is he running to the same judicial bodies he blasted when they asked for his suspension over his inability to perform his role in an efficient and timely manner?
If this guy survives this, we will give up on TDB’s ability to lead anything. The General Secretary is the LAST person to bring the game into disrepute.
MASS EXODUS FROM TUNISIA, MASS DEATHS AT SEA
Professor Foreign Minister we promised to keep talking about this matter until you talk to the nation about things happening to BLACK AFRICANS in Tunisia. We know there are Sierra Leoneans in that country facing hell so we demand some answers from Professor Foreign Minister.
In the last week or so hundreds of BLACK AFRICAN souls have perished in the Mediterranean as the situation in Tunisia deteriorates. We know that some of those BLACK AFRICANS were in that country because they were looking for a route across to Europe anyway but they have now been forced out in haste because of persistent harassment in the host country. They now pack themselves up in unseaworthy vessels just to escape Tunisia. The Mediterranean has now become the graveyard for many BLACK AFRICANS. Is the Professor telling us that there are no Sierra Leoneans among these people dying at sea? Are we asking for too much by suggesting he should address the nation on that?
Some neighboring countries symbolically evacuated their people from Tunisia recently but we let our people down by pretending as if they were on a picnic. Professor should treat the people of Sierra Leone with respect. He needs to speak up on this issue. We will be back. Meanwhile, how about those Sierra Leoneans who died in that fire at their flat in Lebanon?
WHERE ARE THE TURKISH FERRIES PLEASE?
We welcomed the two Turkish ferries not too long ago with a lot of fanfare typical of the social media period in which we live but several months on we can’t feel the presence of those ferries. Is anything the matter? If they were waiting for the new airport to go into operation, they have no more excuses.
The vast majority of Sierra Leoneans cannot afford the alternatives on the west side of town and that includes airline passengers who are upper middle class Sierra Leoneans and the small expatriate community in this country. They turn up there because what we currently have at Kissy is real chaos – a risk not worth taking.
We don’t want to say much for now. We are expecting some answers urgently because when we used one of those that have been with us for decades the other day we prayed throughout the journey for God to keep us afloat because we absolutely gave up on the mechanics that drive ferries the moment we entered the vessel. Last weekend there were May Day calls on another one.
Please, let’s not put the new ferries in service because without them and the promised improvements at Kissy and Government wharf terminals, we have to keep praying for God’s constant intervention.
Copyright (c) 2023 (31 March 2023)
