CHOLERA SPREADING AND KILLING; POLITICIANS CAMPAIGNING
Will the politicians surprise us for the first time in Sierra Leone by calling a halt to their campaigns to concentrate on fighting the cholera that is killing the very people who are supposed to be voting on November 17? The president may have declared the situation a national emergency and international help may also be pouring in but to pretend that things are normal enough for politics, politics and more politics looks insensitive to us.
The number of those being killed by the epidemic keeps rising everyday but the few of us who have survived simply because we have the means to keep a high level of personal hygiene pretend as if those Sierra Leoneans deserve to die. We are not asking De Pa to think about postponing the elections and extending his term of office, we are asking him to properly mobilise the entire country behind the effort to defeat cholera. We are only at the start of it according to many experts.
We agree with the Chief of Staff that cholera is a disease caused by under-development but we also think the failure of politics and governance leads to under-development and eventually diseases like cholera. The Chief is an extremely intelligent man so we don’t expect him to use this short cut any more. Actually, we suspect he was trying to stop political finger-pointing over the cholera emergency. We think that will be completely disingenuous and in bad taste for any political party to do. However let’s not forget that campaigning and campaigning while the people are dying is also in bad taste.
ANOTHER POLITICAL PARTY COMING SOON
We have received information from a group of Sierra Leoneans who will soon establish a new political party to try and address a problem that has the potential to seriously change the political landscape in Sierra Leone. The publicity officer of this new party told us they will formally launch their organisation in the next two weeks and that they will field in candidates for all seats across the country. Their candidates will be selected from among those who failed to get party symbols in the two main political dinosaurs of Sierra Leone.
The spokesman asked us to appeal to all people who feel genuinely robbed of the symbol by party operatives because they collected cash from less popular candidates, to turn up at the National Stadium to hear the leader of the new movement speak.
Observers have described the new party as the biggest hope for true democrats in Sierra Leone. We however refused to answer their other question about whether the new PPRC chairman has finally started work in his new office. A source that wishes to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals told us the new PPRC boss so missed his old office that even after his swearing-in, he was seen checking out some files inside that big building near the Cotton Tree. De Pa has taken the horse to the stream but can he force it to drink? Up with the new party! Up with the fact that all things must come to an end, good or bad!
JOURNALISTS ARE CROSSING THE POND – GREENER PASTURES?
We are keeping our eyes wide open until nominations close. Only at that time will we be able to determine how many of our colleagues have dropped their pens or microphones and joined politics. We have no problem with their decision to switch over but we are still not convinced hearing the reasons they have put forward so far. And behaving like all ordinary people, we are genuinely afraid that whatever puritanical zeal they have now will be overshadowed by wider political party considerations and five years later we will be talking about the same issues that Herbert George-Williams spectacularly failed to tackle.
The people of Freetown understand the issues. How can any Mayor convince us that it was a good idea to spend our money building that failed concrete jungle inside Victoria Park? George-Williams came out of jail with a kind of mini float parade but what can he tell us about this park? How can he justify spending nearly Le 1 billion to demolish the former city hall? We could have put up a modest building for the council somewhere in Freetown with that money. Now squatters have moved into Victoria Park and we have an open space splattered with faeces where city hall stood yesterday. Council workers haven’t been paid for months.
The enormity of the task facing the prospective Mayor makes the job unenviable. We wish them well anyway. Our trade is facing a big challenge. Will the last journalists leaving the trade please drop the SLAJ constitution at the museum.
ACTING CITY MAYOR FOR MAYOR
Someone please help us tell the Ag Mayor of filthy and lawless Freetown City that he has no moral high ground to beat his chest about his “accomplishments” as either Deputy Mayor or Ag Mayor. We heard him on a local radio station the other day citing as his achievement the payment of salaries of workers. If this is an achievement what cannot be, we wonder. He also boasted that he recruited people from his ward into the Metropolitan Police. Well that is called abuse of office which is a corruption offence. So he did not allow due process to be followed in the recruitment of Met Police rather he used his influence to bring onboard people in his ward! Hahaha...wonders never end in this country of corrupt public officials. We will return to this in due course, Alhaji Gibril Kanu.
WHEN WILL THE YOUTHMAN RE-GAIN CONSCIOUSNESS?
This is no joke, we are fed up with the young people of Sierra Leone saying one thing and doing something else. Listen to them talk in Ataya Bases, in their songs and on radio about how they’ve been exploited by politicians over the years, how they will resist any attempt by politicians to use them anymore for their political ends and you will be glad that the scales have finally fallen from the eyes of our young people.
Now wait for the elections to draw nearer and discover that nothing has changed. The same young people will be out there fighting and wounding each other, destroying properties on behalf of the same politicians. Ashobi women will dance on the streets in endless political rallies. They will form Koroma or Bio support groups and make outlandish claims about how relevant they are to the election of the president. How did we end up with this myth that is Abacha Street?
Nowadays when we hear young people complain about marginalisation, we just dismiss them as people who have no moral backbone, ready at all times to sell out for far less than thirty pieces of silver.
SUNAKATHI AFTER FASTING
Our Muslim colleagues have just completed a cardinal Islamic article of faith – fasting. It is a usual thing for fasters to provide Ifthar (Sunakathi) for each other. However many people have intimated us that this year’s Ramadan was the “hardupest” since records began. They could neither send sunakathi for their loved ones, nor did they receive any from anyone. So much for the progress made in the land in the last few years. No wonder De Pa was busy distributing Free Bees on the eve of Pray Day during that show ride. Sumakathi after fasting. Only in Sierra Leone!
