A BAG OF RICE FOR SALONE POLICE – O yeah!
De Pa announced last week that all police officers in Salone would get a bag of rice (50 kilos) every thirty days. This comes several months after soldiers got theirs. So there should be smiles all round in police homes. We are glad too that our men in uniform will feel a little proud to return home at the end of every month carrying a bag of rice on their shoulders. Actually the money for this is coming from our taxes - not a presidential largesse like the one that caused the split among the Dollar Boys and Belgium Sellers. For those two groups, De Pa will look for their votes in November but for the police we demand the following:
- Stop collecting bribes on the streets of Freetown and at checkpoints up and down the country.
- Stop colluding with criminals who are busy stealing from and harassing the ordinary people everyday
- Stop killing cases at police stations at the request of the highest bidder
- Stop helping criminals make counter-reports just to abuse the system
- Stop giving people fake telephone hotlines that were dead even before they were launched with such great noise and fanfare
- Please give your spokesman a rest.
Now for De Pa, can you please have a look at the barracks where these one-bag-of-rice police officers and their families live? That should be interesting! And, by the way, why NOW? Hmmm. Twitter wishes every year was an election year.
PRESIDENTIAL LODGE
There is a place called LODGE in the west of Freetown. The area on King Harman Road, near China House, is called so because that’s where the Great Siaka Stevens lived for the better part of his presidency. Now, please do this for me: go to the lodge and see if it bears any resemblance of the home of EXECUTIVE PRESIDENT SIAKA STEVENS. We have problems with a lot of things Stevens did in his days but we believe he did his bit for our country and therefore deserves some respect.
The lodge has become a glorified market place selling all sorts of funny items. The heirs to that property are busy leasing bits and pieces of the place to anyone who turns up with a few pennies – complete disrespect.
We call on De Pa to immediately put state money into that place, take it over, throw those petty traders out of the compound and the surrounding area, do it up again and turn it into a National Museum of Sierra Leone Politics. We have not said an APC museum because we don’t want any of those partisan arguments you people like getting up to all the time concerning the money required to do that kind of project.
We have many people in this country who are willing to work on that. If we may ask, will that be part of the work of the Monuments and Relics Commission? Is this Commission still in operation?
SARAH BENDU AND THOSE 180 DEATHS ON THE ROADS
We have a lot of respect for Sarah Bendu of the road transport authority (SLRTA). We believe she is a very genuine woman who wants to make a solid contribution to the development of Sierra Leone. Serious questions have been asked recently about the ability of her institution to stop unnecessary loss of life to the frequent road accidents. In just five months of 2012, nearly 180 Sierra Leoneans have perished on some of the best roads in Sierra Leone. While Sarah thinks about that, we will like to call her attention to matters closer to home.
From Sarah’s flat at FBC, she could see all those rotten and blatantly overloaded unlicensed taxis and Okadas, risking the lives of students and the people of the mountain villages of Leicester and Gloucester. We will hold her personally responsible if any lives are lost on those hills in those taxis and on criminal Okadas that will not pass fitness tests even in lawless Somalia. We find it hard to believe that some of the taxis on that road actually passed the fitness test that SLRTA is supposed to be doing. As for the drivers, only OLD KOLO Kamara knows if they are qualified to be on the road. There is no Traffic Warden on FBC campus to stop overloading and to arrest unlicensed vehicles – it’s a lawless jungle.
Just to warn you ma’am, we are working on some interesting information from your institution, which we will share with the public if the last bits fall in place in the way we suspect they will.
We have absolutely nothing against Sarah but we are tired of her officials not doing their job as a result of which people are dying in road accidents. How long before her name is dragged into another mess?
CHRISTIANA AND HER DICTATORSHIP AT NEC
Interesting figures are coming from Belgium where our politicians are witnessing the final processes in this long chain of events leading to the production of a “credible” voters register. THIRTY-ONE THOUSAND PEOPLE with no fingerprints, NINE THOUSAND alleged double registrations, and so on. Instead of waiting for the details to come through, Christiana, Sierra Leone’s ultimate judge of morality and conduct has started speaking about what actions to take with respect to what are clear attempts to beat the system for which others are now in jail. Why should NEC try to be the judge in her own court?
The whole nation is waiting to see how you people will deal with this serious situation. It’s easy to run NEC as a dictatorship but trying to take the rest of us for a ride is more than trying to climb Mount Everest with the speed of Usain Bolt.
We need clear and logical explanation of what is happening in your dictatorship as soon as our politicians return. We don’t want to hear Miatta French on air. She talks down on people just like Christiana of Saint Joseph’s, Sisters of Cluny.
AFRICELL - THE NO. 1 PHILANTHROPIST; BUT HER CHILDREN ARE STARVING
Mobile Phone Company AFRICELL is attempting to dismiss nearly a dozen young people on their payroll just because they are trying to assert their right to a decent wage and the right to belong to a trade union. They issued letters suspending their staff and after two days they withdrew the letters. What is all this chameleonic way of managing a modern company about?
We are hearing a lot about IB Kargbo’s dealing with AFRICELL, which we are investigating. As Minister of Communication, he should be working with all of these companies in the interest of the people. We have no evidence of corruption or other forms of wrongdoing so far, on the side of minister Kargbo, but we expect him to use the authority of the government to create an enabling environment for our brothers and sisters to work peacefully and fulfil their dreams.
We are almost concluding now that the Minister is at best lukewarm and at worse totally indifferent. Now the managers at AFRICELL have deployed armed men at their premises thinking that the troubled young people will attack. This is not the way to treat people who are so dedicated to duty.
By the way that Special Assistant to the Minister of Labour who is messing up negotiations with the workers and doing double-act should just try and do an honest job and stop profiting from the sweat of our people in a most dishonest manner. AFRICELL, we are not xenophobic, but we demand that our compatriots and our laws be respected even if some foolish government officials ask you to ignore them.
THE SLFA, LEONE STARS AND THE GOOD PEOPLE OF SALONE.
Last week was a real rollercoaster for Sierra Leone Football. The country had just made a remarkable leap on the FIFA rankings overtaking great Nigeria. We were very satisfied at the turn of events. Even De Pa claimed some credit. What else can a man facing a very tight re-election bid do? Then the Sierra Leone Football Association also joined in saying that the position was not only achieved on the pitch but also at the FA secretariat. In other words, football administration played a part in the rankings. We are not sure but we can live with that too.
Then the tables turned. We woke one morning to the news that the high court had taken control of the FA utility bus for failing to complete payment for the building of the very Secretariat, at Kingtom. The debt has been hanging for the last seven years. Then the National team was defeated by Iraq of all countries in a controversial international friendly. Then bailiffs put the FA secretariat under lock and key – it was now a property of the court.
Next day, the national team is humiliated by Jordan, 4-0 in another friendly. All this is happening about a week before the much-improved Cape Verde squad lands in Freetown for a World Cup qualifier.
We have talented players in the national team, but please excuse us, we want to sound a little realistic and say the road ahead is bumpy. When is the election, please?
RACISM + FOOTBALL = UNACCEPTABLE
It was great to hear Isha Johansen on that popular sports program on Eagle FM on Monday. Thanks for your insights. We wish you well. We are however disappointed that you made some racist comments which did not go down well with many people. This election is beginning to look too bloody for our liking. We hold no brief for Rodney Michael but to have made such sweeping statements about Lebanese people against Sierra Leoneans was a real low in that unnecessarily long interview. You realized you were making racial comments but you told the nation you couldn’t care less even if FIFA was informed. Isha don’t squander the little goodwill you enjoy.
We blame Pa Alie Sesay who has responsibility under the media code not to allow such racist comments on his program. He completely lost control of his own programme and allowed Isha to slaughter basic media ethics on his watch. Come on Isha, don’t get too hypertensive at this late stage, who knows you could be the one to rescue the FA. We will not be so lenient next time.
