PRINCIPAL IN UGANDA: BECAREFUL THE LESSONS YOU BRING HOME SIR
It was great to see our Principal greeted with full honours by the president and the good people of Uganda while on a state visit to the East African country. Well done! We have seen pictures of a military parade, cultural dancing and really warm handshake with the president of the country, Yoweri Museveni.
The reports we’ve seen so far speak of discussions about trade and cooperation. We know this sounds like one of those documents dusted off the shelf of the ministry of foreign affairs in Kampala and adapted to fit Sierra Leone. We’ll see.
What we want to do in the meantime is to warn Principal about trying to bring some of things he must have heard in private meetings with Museveni. For example:
1. The point must be made that Museveni ended his country’s economic and socio-political free-fall when he swept to power from the bush after a long guerrilla campaign. But he has been at State House for more than THREE DECADES. That’s one example we don’t want to hear about even in our neighbourhood let alone our country.
2. Museveni’s police would arrest and try, and imprison anybody who tries to challenge him for the top job including opposition politicians and even third-rate musicians. We will not accept that here sir.
3. Museveni is very rude about his countrymen and women who are part of the growing LGBT community in that country. They are marginalized for what they are. Ours is a true democracy where we don’t go making presidential decrees about what people do in their bedrooms.
4. Principal please don’t bring home Museveni’s favourite habit of sending his soldiers across the borders of his neighbours to chase his perceived opponents. We don’t want any more trouble with our neighbours. There is no Joseph Kone around here.
5. Dear Principal we know you can’t do rap music. We know that. Museveni can actually rap. So please don’t try it at home because even the Great Jimmy B will struggle to help you. We are your humble citizens and we mean well.
SEWA GROUNDS MARKET CONSTRUCTION: HOW FAR ARE WE?
This market project was one of those flagship projects that Red Camp Mayor Morgan Heritage was running with all over the place until he found himself in hot pepper soup with the ACC. The rest they say is history. In fact that’s how the Sewa Grounds market has now become a Lazarus project waiting for Principal to wake it up from the dead.
One of these days we will ask for permission to take a comprehensive look at what has been done so far out there. This is a failed project that Biobele should have an interest in.
Rawdon and Howe streets have been taken over by petty traders who were allowed to occupy those streets by De Pa while they waited for Sewa market to be completed. Now the traders have made those places their permanent homes, much like Abacha Street. That’s not good enough.
We really need somebody to stand up and tell this nation what the story is behind the collapse of that project – inadequate funding or corruption? What is it? We are quite sure work came to a halt long before the election that swept Red Camp out of office. So we ask again, what went wrong?
If we don’t get a swift answer to these many questions we will be left with no alternative but to compel the new Mayor of the Sun to answer our questions through the Access to Information Commission. There is no escape as we represent the people of Sierra Leone. We have already prepared the request we intend to send to the commission. Answers and more answers please.
DESPERATE YOUNG MAN FALLS TO HIS DEATH FROM KENYA AIRWAYS
So you are sitting in your backyard garden with your family having a nice evening in one of the communities along the flight path of planes coming in to land at Heathrow Airport – one of the world’s busiest – and suddenly the body of a young man comes crashing into your garden from a Kenya Airways plane as it came in to land. What will you do?
We have to be honest with ourselves and see this as nothing but the highest point of desperation – the point at which people lose all their senses and decide to risk life and limb to go over the horizon where they believe the streets are paved with gold and people live happily ever after.
We have serious questions to ask the Kenya airways and airport authorities where this London-bound plane took off from.
1. Who was this man and how did he get into the luggage hold where he apparently froze to death?
2. How come with all the horrendous terrorist attacks on the good country of Kenya, this man was still able to pull this off?
3. What would have stopped him from detonating a bomb onboard the plane?
4. Could it be then that this is criminal enterprise specializing in people smuggling?
5. How many people have successfully reached London by the same means and how many more are in line to take the same chance?
HENRY STREET IS NOW A GLORIFIED PERMANENT CAR PARK
Let’s be clear from the start that Henry Street is not the only street now being openly used as a garage, a parking lot or some glorified scrap yard. This is a short, very tight street that has suddenly become the main parking are for many people. And they have zero regard for other road users. They expect you to be quiet and pretend as if all is well.
So here’s the point: we hold the Mayor of the Sun totally responsible for this mess, for while she is either on Twitter or taking a cup of tea at Bicentenary House, Henry Street and other parts of the city have simply exploded into illegal parking areas on her watch.
What is difficult about working in line with the road safety authority to clear Henry Street and any such places in Freetown? The Mayor appears to have ceded parts of the CBD to street gangs who now collect parking fines around. We remain seized of the matter until it is solved.
PEOPLE WITH DISABILITY AND THEIR MISERY HOME ON PADEMBA ROAD
Are the political leaders in this country telling us they’ve not seen the misery at that camp for people with disability near Pademba Road Prison yard? When we say politicians we mean both those in government and those in the opposition. Maybe you’ve not seen the place because you are always in your well air-conditioned SUVs doing WhatsApp, so let’s help. Coming into the centre of town from the west end of Freetown where almost all of you live, this misery camp is located just after the walls of the prison to your right.
We urge those dealing with disability issues to visit that place and see the human misery we are talking about. When the occupants moved in there in the days of King Messi, there was public outcry because people knew what the place would become before long. An attempt to move them on was thwarted by a government minister who thought it was politically unwise to do that at the time. He told a radio station that he had the support of King Messi. Now we call on the New Direction to do something NEW.
1. Move those people out of that misery camp and re-settle them in a reasonably dignified place immediately.
2. No need to create a colony of people with disability. They are normal people with families like all of us. Help them re-integrate with their people and start small businesses. Where were they before they moved to that place?
3. Demolish that building which was gutted by fire in the days of the NPRC – more than TWENTY years ago and build something decent on that land which is a property of the Ministry of Works.
4. It will not be easy to do what we are asking now because the occupants will resist having settled down all these years and some hypocrites will back them purely for political reasons, but this is where political will is required.
5. That done, all the raw sewerage flowing down to the main Pademba Road – Campbell Street junction will be gone. Let’s end that disgrace.
Published in print on 4 July 2019
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