By Umaru Fofana
The happenings are frightening. The signs are threatening. Our democracy seems to be on the throes. Internal democracy within our political parties is on the ropes. The quickest, easiest and most effective way of strengthening national democracy is by entrenching internal democracy within political parties. That seems to be on the wane. And if you believe the notion that democracy is the worst form of government apart from all other forms of government then we will all, and must all, uphold its tenets, however painful it may seem to us and our interests.
To be democratic is like to be pregnant. You either are or you are not. No half way. And like the saying that “no short cut to the top of a palm tree”, no pun intended, democracy has to come about through the normal route. There must be free and fair contests through an open and credible system. The right and freedom of all who qualify and wish to run for office or position should be able to do so.
The recent delegates’ conference of the governing All People’s Congress leaves a lot to be desired in this regard. Yes, it was peaceful and we must all salute them for that. But the invoking of a clause in the party’s constitution that puts selection at par with, if not above, election is not democratic and it fundamentally needs to be revisited and changed. It is a provision that is in the interest of neither the party nor the country. It only serves the interest of a few members of a clique within the party at a particular point in time.
If what obtains in our political parties was what obtained in the Democratic Party in the United States, Barack Obama who is so revered by our politicians including those in the APC and SLPP, would not have become the presidential candidate of his party. The openness in that party regardless of who knows or favours a candidate was responsible for the history Obama made.
It was interesting how candidates who just few hours before voting had expressed their unequivocal determination to run for various positions at the APC delegates’ conference buried their ambitions in disappointment and frustration. This is a blatant fear of democracy or the ballot box by those in charge. When such gets entrenched within a political there is the proclivity that those in power even at the national or state level will react angrily to basic democratic challenge to their authority.
The leadership of a party should not use the power and authority they command to impose their choice of leaders on the people and punish those who dissent. Again that has the tendency of being exported to the national level.
The APC has everything to lose with such grip on power at and by those at the top. A party cannot continue to cohere under such an arrangement because it is ineluctable that it will breed disgruntlement among its ranks. It could even boil down to a rumpus and burst and soak the larger society by disturbing their peace and quiet.
It has been bandied about that consensus, which some of my friends in the APC have referred to their selection process to be, means the majority consenting. Nothing could be further from the truth in this regard. A good number of those who wanted to contest and those who wanted to vote for them were forced to back off. A friend of mine of over fifteen years, who sounded very confident of being elected to one of the positions on the eve of the election, called me back on the following day to say that he had been forced to step down. He would not go public on it. Internal party discipline is extraordinary in the APC. But many in the party abide by it not because they wish to or that they respect it. Rather because they are coerced to. The consequence of doing otherwise can be dire.
I was at the APC convention in Makeni in 2009 or so. Mohamed Lankulay Bangura who had challenged President Ernest Bai Koroma’s leadership in court in 2005/6 was the acting National Organising Secretary and had pulled off a fantastic delegates’ conference. He wanted to run for the position to become the substantive. Clearly and openly the party leadership did not want him to. And he was embarrassed at least twice in my presence. Delegates were openly coerced into not voting for him. And the weight of the party leader and president was brought to bear.
But it was somewhat satisfying then that at least voting did take place. Unlike the steady gains the APC is making at the polls as cited by president Koroma in his statement at last week’s conference – the steady increase in their number of seats in parliament from 1996 to 2012 – their internal democratic gains are reversing from voting in the Makeni convention to selection in the 2013 conference in Freetown. If this is not a reversal of internal democratic fortune then nothing else can be.
It is not good for a party or any group for that matter, to be changing its constitution to suit those in authority. I will allow the third term debate, as propounded by Leonard Balogun Koroma, to pass. And will deal with the third term debate as has been somewhat ingenuously explained lately to mean – namely President Koroma leading the party for a third term. Nothing could be more dishonest than saying so. Unless someone is saying that he was never elected as party leader in Port Loko which led to that court action by ML Bangura and others. Can someone count how many leadership contests in the party he has won since? But even if it were true that it means him going for a third term, his popularity within the party – I take it to be genuine and not because he has state power and resources at his disposal hence the hero-worshipping – should not be reason for an amendment to the party’s constitution if that affects him directly.
Another thing I think the APC should guard against is having someone as a party executive or official and a Minister of State. Interests are almost natural to conflict in these situations. When do you use state resources for party business? The telephone bills that are paid for by the state to perform state functions used to make calls on party matters, to just name one. Imagine as a government spokesman and a party spokesman, when and where do you draw the line? It does not correspond to good democratic tenets, to say the least. The time that he is paid to work for the state is also spent to work for a political party. Besides, it does not even bode well for good political party administration which takes away the party officials when they should be planning for the party.
The main opposition Sierra Leone People’s Party are not exempted either from this oblong practice of internal democracy. Of some sort it has to be said because they have managed to vote at their delegates’ conference even if the voting has been questioned many a time. From Makeni in 2005 to Freetown in 2011.
Now, their simple majority way of choosing especially their flag-bearer is retrograde. It does not suit the country’s complex polarity either within or outside of party politics. The framers of our country’s constitution made no mistake when they recommended a runoff in the even no-one gets to the threshold; Although I am not sure about the rationale for that 55% threshold. 50% plus one vote makes a lot of sense to me.
The lack of an absolute majority in the SLPP for a flag-bearer in part explains the heated internal wrangling and opposition to the candidacy of Julius Maada Bio last year. And that opposition within the opposition continues even today making them unable to provide alternative views on the many things that are not going right in the country. Itself a disservice to the nation.
The manner as well in which Solomon Berewa was chosen as the party’s flag-bearer in 2005 left it in ruins and cost them power. Those at the helm at the time bullied the rest.
As if they learned nothing from that, they also changed their party constitution in Bo after they had agreed tin Kenema that they would make it reflect and address lessons learned from mistakes of the past. Despite having agreed in Kenema that no executive member should run for the position of a flag-bearer, they threw that to the gutter when they met in Bo. And because they apparently wanted to skew things against John Benjamin, the Chairman of the party was the only executive member barred from running. The appeasement policy for Mr Benjamin then has caught up with them today and the chicken has come home to roost.
I look forward to the day when ordinary members of the country’s political parties will have a say in determining who leads them at all levels including being awarded a symbol to run for council, parliament and State House. As opposed to individuals forced down the throats of party members, or delegates, as the case may be. And I cannot help but wonder sometimes and ask: where is the PPRC in all of this?
