By Umaru Fofana
When the man who came a close second in the leadership contest of the opposition Sierra Leone People’s Party declared for the ruling All People’s Congress party nearly two weeks ago, it was perhaps the biggest political news story and news storm here for sometime; probably since the Timbergate scandal that rocked the office of the Vice President.
Big as it was, common sense was thrown through the door. Denials in places where heads should be buried in the sand took centre stage. To my mind, Usu’s declaration leaves the SLPP in tatters in as much the same way as the Timbergate scandal left the presidency in a shameful and shambolic way.
Even if it came after he had been expelled from the party, Usu joining the APC is akin to Hillary Clinton endorsing the presidential bid of Senator John McCain after the sometimes nasty primary race for leadership of the Democratic Party in 20072008. It is a blow, and it may prove the single biggest factor against the bid by the opposition leader Julius Maada Bio to become president in November.
Agreed that Boie had actually gone before the razzmatazz of two weekends ago. Those who had either campaigned for him – and some won positions for themselves in the party such as Lansana Fadika – or who had themselves run and lost such as Ambassador Leigh all went to the APC ahead of him. Call him a sore loser he was clearly gone – both by his comments and the lack thereof – even before he did go publicly.
The fallout from Boie’s switching of sides will depend on how his former party respond to it. Their denial that it hurts is certainly a nonstarter and honestly nonsensical. Saying more vitriolic things about him will be stupid too; and vice versa.
Now, significant as his departure may be, Boie proved a bit too arrogant and took some of his supporters for the fools they are not. First, most of the crowd that turned out that weekend were APC diehards – NOT Usu Boie fanatics. And I sensed dishonesty and arrogance in Boie as he tried to make people believe the crowds were his.
But more significant were those names of people he submitted as having come with him as members of the APC. That sucked! It sucked not only because he took those listed for granted but also because many of them had their names listed without their acquiescence. I did not know the list existed until I went to Makeni last week. Eleven of those I could later identify on the list because they are of my relation and had mentioned it to me – said that their names were listed not at their say-so and that they had not switched sides even if they had supported Usu Boie’s bid for leadership of the SLPP.
Another group said to me that they were being told – and made to believe so – that Boie would be named the presidential running mate of incumbent president Ernest Bai Koroma widening the already wide rumour race for the second name on the Koroma ticket. They say that’s why they agreed to cross with him to another party. Some of them excoriated the SLPP and Maada Bio for not choosing their man as the running mate. And I tell you what…President Koroma is not helping his bid to continue in State House with the prolonged agony and anxiety, depending on who you are supporting to be his number two man. For a bit of digression, in an interview I did with Solomon Berewa in 2007 as we approached elections, I put it to him that procrastinating the naming of his running mate could come to hunt him. Of course he shrugged it off. It certainly proved a contributing factor to his defeat.
But back to Boie and his joining the APC in 2012, a lot of his supporters who went with him have their hopes pinned on the impression that he will be named running mate. And that feeling if it turns out to be false could just shift some of the Boie supporters back to whence they came even if he no longer has space there – in the SLPP.
I have been watching the interview series by SLBC’s Joseph Egbenda Kapuwa in the run-up to the leadership convention of the SLPP. Interesting what Usu Boie says about the APC, the party he is paying glowing tribute to today. You would expect a sleek party to be exposing those inconsistencies rather than denying the all-too-obvious fact that his joining another party is of no consequences as some of them have suggested.
You have to blame the elders of the SLPP for their party losing Boie, who, even if he did not look presidential, gave the party a sense of a huge following the capital Freetown which is the traditional stronghold of the APC party. If the elders in the SLPP had not taken open sides with candidates they could very likely have salvaged the situation that led to their loss of the man.
It is unlikely Boie joining the APC party will bring any significant votes from the Mandingoes many of whom seem to support the SLPP because of former leader Ahmad Tejan Kabbah, although some argue it goes way and far beyond that. Like I stated in the piece previous to this, I was in Karina when he last visited before his declaration. A good number of the papas and the mamas were angry that he sounded indecisive or ambivalent as to who he would support in November’s election. I have to say that I have not visited since he was expelled. The consequence of that could be different to what it would have been had he left the party they had supported him for.
But just before SLPP begins to massage themselves into thinking that Boie’s membership of the APC is of little or no consequences, they must remind themselves that elections are won or lost in Freetown and perhaps in Kono as well. Boie has the ability to keep Freetown red now that he is no longer green.
But what does that do to his future political ambition? To my mind that is considerably diminished. He can make a great Minister of Mineral Resources, make no mistake. Far better than anyone President Koroma has appointed to that position. But that is not what he eyes. Even if he accepts that for the time being, assuming Koroma wins in November, it cannot be as a waiting room to run to lead the APC. The queue is too long for him to make any headway in that direction. A wait in the SLPP could perhaps have worked for him in that if Bio fails to defeat Koroma, he would have found it as easy to lead the party as, to use another US allusion, Mitt Romney has found it to lead the Republican Party with the defeat of Senator McCain in 2008. Whatever happens, Boi’s presidential ambition is dead and buried…the same way he seems to be determined to make Maada Bio’s.
