NEW DIRECTION GOVERNMENT WHITE PAPER ON CRC OUT
The New Direction White Paper on the recommendations of the Constitutional Review Process initiated by King Messi is out now and the debate on its bold proposals is now in full swing. The State House ceremony at which the document was launched didn’t last long and a good many of those we spoke to after the event liked what they heard about certain issues and are looking forward to contributing to the ongoing national debate. As always, we will keep an eye on things in the best interest of the good people of Sierra Leone.
Even officials of the New Direction are aware of the storm of counter arguments coming their way on some of the proposals but we are not in North Korea so this is supposed to be normal stuff in a modern democracy. We like the resolve of Principal to go ahead with those proposals that can be implemented without getting the approval of NINETY EIGHT members of parliament and that the very controversial ones would not be “RUSHED” before the next general and presidential elections which are just over a year away.
At this stage we have to make the following points in the hope that our numerous readers would be guided as the debate continues.
1. Like what the Speaker of Parliament and a few other people said at the ceremony, the review of the 1991 constitution came out of the Lome Peace Agreement which ended the civil war in this country and the Truth and Reconciliation Committee going back more than two decades. The reasons for which the review was recommended were sound and we have already wasted a lot of time.
2. In this country everything is turned into a mighty political football. We call on all Sierra Leoneans to serve the nation at least on the issue. All the speakers stressed the need for people to think about Sierra Leone right now. We can only re-emphasize that.
3. We call on the government to quickly release a program to guide the nationwide consultation process so that people would make themselves available for such discussions while others want to monitor the process.
4. The so-called development partners should help provide the money and other logistics required to get the job done. Please don’t wait for the eve of the start of the nationwide consultation process to withdraw support like you did for the census. We hate unnecessary drama.
LESSONS FROM THE GREEN MOVEMENT CONVENTION
Jimmy Batilo Songa and his supporters are now coming to terms with their humiliating defeat at the Bo mini stadium. From our position up the stands we saw Batilo and his people leave the stadium crestfallen. Others openly insulted Principal and other party executives because they concluded that they had a hand in the defeat of their man. One woman in particular was so shameless in releasing a barrage of insults that even the well behaved police officers on guard had to tell her to control her emotions or face arrest for public order offenses. At that point she looked around to realize how isolated she was in her bad behavior.
We make no claim to knowing why Songa lost but like other ordinary Sierra Leoneans that are not inside the Green Movement we are at liberty to say a word or two on why from the outset it was clear to many that Songa would fail in his bid to oust the BULLET.
1. Jimmy was not in control of the list of delegates or the process of selecting individuals and institutions making that list. Where was this guy really going?
2. His main campaign strategy of mobilizing people outside the list to sing his praises on the streets and on social media was flawed inside out. With an electoral college like that, how did he convince himself that was a good strategy?
3. We are told he fell out with his main backers – those people who encouraged him to run in the first place. You should NEVER allow that to happen in politics.
4. When all is said and done, the delegates were scared about the prospects of the young diasporan who was never part of the struggle on the ground in Sierra Leone taking over the party and playing a big role in deciding who got party symbols and other important matters. BULLET is there because those delegates know him and they believe he is a safe pair of hands for now.
RASTA SENGS WHERE ARE WE NOW WITH YOUR SCRATCH CARD STRUGGLE?
Rasta Sengs was really out to set the good people of Sierra Leone up against WAEC when he went on social media and essentially painted WAEC as this shylock that was hanging around to drill money out of the pockets of poor people by selling scratch cards to those wanting to access exam results. Rasta Sengs likes going on social media to say this and that just to keep himself in the eyes of the public. That’s fine but dragging an organization like WAEC into that in such a negative manner was a big blunder.
WAEC doesn’t have many friends around for obvious reasons and they are always treated with suspicion and it is partly their fault. This is a matter for another day even though we believe that WAEC should not be going around looking for friends. They are not politicians and they should not be making compromises to gain favor.
Sengs gained a lot of praise for cutting off the scratch card fees for BECE candidates and he was looking to repeat that for WASSCE but WAEC was prepared to stop him winning plaudits at their expense. All documents in the matter have been released on social media and for us it’s a disgrace to be posting all manner of official documents on social media.
We said at the time and we are saying again that Rasta Sengs should avoid the rush to release results prepared by WAEC. He can do all his analyses once the results are made available to all schools. Pupils would go to their schools and pick up their results without paying a dime. Those who succeed and apply to enter University would of necessity be required to buy scratch cards to verify their results. What was all the fighting about then?
WAEC started using scratch cards long ago when Sengs was somewhere in America. The money they collect from that is clearly now one of their revenue streams so for Sengs to wake up one morning and decide to cut it off is wrong. Let him first pay his debts to WAEC then we will return to the scratch card debate.
HAS THE APPRENTICE ABANDONED HIS OLD MASTER FOR GOOD?
This land that we love now has FOUR resident ministers but one of them has a bit more to do. They are normally supposed to be the main faces of the government in the provincial headquarters. Some of them are not so resident in their areas of assignment but let’s just keep that nomenclature in place and pretend all things are equal for now.
Let’s look carefully at the recent reshuffle of the government and we are bound to notice that one of them now has a place at the cabinet table. So this is a special guy. He comes from the Tolongbo tradition.
Since his party was thrown out of power he decided to cooperate with the new administration, a significant departure from the path chosen by his party. Naturally, Tolongbo has let it known that they hate the man who once described himself as THE APPRENTICE to the ALL MIGHTY King Messi but was denied the opportunity to succeed his boss. We don’t know what else they can do apart from wishing him death.
With his new position at the cabinet table can we now conclude that his relationship with his former boss has broken down for good? Can we also now start thinking seriously about his future in Tolongbo? We ask because he could still maintain his membership of Tolongbo and tell the world he has been asked to perform a national service with the Green Movement.
This story is unfolding and we will cover all the twists and turns. We are hearing that a few other Tolongbos would soon join up. Our sources say they are fed up with King Messi’s strangling hold on Tolongbo.
Watch this space.
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