BLACK OUT BLACK OUT BLACKOUT EVERYWHERE, WHY?
As you probably know, we don’t exaggerate things at Politico. We have, in fact, always prayed to God that we be very measured in the way we describe events and write about people on the pages of our newspaper. It’s from that angle that we want you to look at this statement: “As far as electricity supply is concerned, we are back to the period just before the SLPP were defeated in the elections of 2007”. Things are very bad indeed.
Last week the Public Relations Officer of NPA, was on Culture Radio talking about the dramatic turn of events – it was scary. He spoke about “LOAD SHEDDING”, that Kabbah-era expression that only meant, ELECTRICITY SUPPLY NOT GUARANTEED.
The old/new minister, Oluniyi (still not clear what happened between this minister and that NEC guy around the elections) told the parliamentary committee on appointments that Bumbuna was down and that it would take some time to bring it back to capacity. We believe that we have neither heard enough nor heard the real truth behind the mystery that is Bumbuna.
In the early days of De Pa’s government, all ministers queued up to take credit for the restoration of reasonably good power supply using Bumbuna. It was as if they were all Ministers of Energy. A week ago we asked one of the old ones why things were so bad now. He gave us the gory details of the situation but pleaded with us not to publish the story. Respecting that, we have decided only to use what he told us as background material as we work on a major piece on electricity to be published soon.
This is where we are now: Kabbah Tiger has re-appeared, over-head cost of managing small businesses is steadily rising and the signs are not good. Even in the best of times, large parts of the city were still dark so this talk about load-shedding will not hold. We need the government to stand up and tell the people the real situation of Bumbuna and JICA. Tell fren true nor pwell fren.
PUAWUI DOWNS HIS PEN – WHAT’S NEXT OLDBOY?
Prolific syndicated Columnist Dr Sama Banya, commonly known as Puawui has withdrawn from this daily business of writing in some of Freetown’s daily newspapers. Our information is that he now wants to concentrate on writing his memoir.
On the face of it, that should be a great move. There were many senior journalists who didn’t write their memoirs before they died. Imagine Franklin Bunting-Davies, Sam Metzger and Ritchie Awoonor-Gordon. So if a medical doctor who spent a good part of his life behaving like a journalist decides to, we appreciate him.
But would Puawui have pulled back so soon after “November 2012, Sharp 12” had Osuofia won? We don’t know.
Anyway Puawui is a great writer, very tenacious and intelligent. He took a lot of battering from his detractors in the course of him defending his party, the SLPP. He was strong and courageous and he gave as much as he got.
As regular readers of the Puawui column, even though – as you might expect – we didn’t always agree with what he wrote, we feel compelled to make the following contribution to the book. This is the way we think the book should be laid out:
BOOK TITLE
PUAWUI AND THE BATTLE FOR THE SOUL OF SALONE POLITICS –Published by FreeMedia Group Publications, Freetown
Foreword
To be written by one of the following people: Maigore Kallon, Alhaji UNS Jah, or M. A Sandy.
Chapter One
Here Puawui should talk at length about his childhood, his family, early education, his first love and his worldview on graduation as a medical doctor.
Chapter Two
This should cover his early years in politics, his meeting with Siaka Stevens and that decision to join the APC and his highs and lows of being a minister or Vice President. This chapter will also contain details of his political battles with his opponents, including Dauda Sandy until he was sacked by Siaka Stevens.
Chapter Three
Eating humble pie and returning to the SLPP. Puawui must include that meeting with Foday Sankoh in Abidjan and the loss of his briefcase in Paris. He should also talk about the beginnings of his Puawui column and the dedication of the rest of his life to the defence of the SLPP even in times of crisis like in the last six years. His brush with several other people of the pen like the late Ritchie Awoonor-Gordon and indeed their possible re-union in the great beyond, God knows when?
Chapter Four
A tell-it-all account of the calculations and planning that took place for elections 2007 and 2012 and whether he is now out of politics for good. He should please provide good character sketches of people like John Benjamin, Charles Margai, Usu Boie (in his SLPP days), Robin the son of Fallay, T. M. Borbor-Sawyer, the sacked minister who is still using our vehicle but with the license plate covered. Boys, you nor geh shame ba?
Chapter Five
The old man can write anything in this chapter. If he decides to share some royalties with us because we have helped with the lay-out, we will reconsider and do Chapter five and the epilogue.
Good Luck Puawui!
ELECTION IN CONSTITUENCY 92 – PMDC SAYS “UNU TRY DAE…WE NOR MIX”
Pass by the NEC office in Freetown these days and see how deserted the place is. Christiana’s day in the sun is gone; police and soldiers have been withdrawn, politicians are in fact now scheming about the possible successor to the former Sister of Saint Joseph’s Sisters of Cluny and the rest of the staff aren’t quite sure what a post-Christiana period at NEC would look like. Amidst all this, they have just remembered that they still have to conduct a parliamentary election in constituency 92.
We are told that a few days before the general elections, the PMDC candidate for the area was killed on the back of an Okada. With full respect to the dead and the bereaved family, he would probably be alive today if Bababode had thought about taking reckless Okada riders off the roads when he served as councillor under disgraced Mayor Herbert George-Williams.
Now the PMDC has told Christiana they are not interested in any election in constituency 92. So left with the PMDC, she could go ahead now and complete her 4-for-4 without any further waste of taxpayers’ cash and time.
This will be the worst election in terms of turnout. The reality of life in Sierra Leone now is beginning to sink in. Only a handful of people will be so idle to go voting again. There are three independent candidates taking their chances in the coming elections. We wish them well. Just one independent candidate in parliament will at least confirm that Hare Krishnas, Buddhists and Adina Bayehsor people can also go to heaven.
BABABODE’S OPERATION WID: HOW FAR SO FAR?
Long live Great Mayor Bababode of the historic city of Freetown! Lord Mayor what’s the position now with Operation weed or WID? We applaud this effort. You are the only Mayor to have attempted to clear the streets in this way since Alfred Akibo-Betts.
All the other politically-correct ones shouted on roof tops but did nothing substantial. They will tell us the central government intervened but they neither told us in such plain terms nor resigned. But Lord Mayor, do you know how much money has been collected so far from all those cars towed from the streets? Do you think we need to know, as your loyal people?
Honestly, we think moving people from Siaka Stevens Street and emptying them along Charlotte, Howe, Rawdon streets, for example, only attempts to place sticky plaster over a festering wound. The true solution to the problem is probably out of your purview but let’s hear you speak about it in public just to convince us you know your way around this area.
Soon, we hope, politicians will be courageous enough to tell adolescents who sell razor blades, mentholated balm and parking spaces on the streets that that wasn’t the best way to prepare for life ahead in difficult Sierra Leone. Never mind the AGENDA FOR PROSPERITY.
AGRICULTURE MINISTER GOES TO MADINA
We respect the agriculture minister, Dr. Sam Sesay. He is a professional and he is doing well in this government. We predicted he would keep his job and De Pa agreed with us. But minister sir, we hate the fact that you allowed school children to be taken out of school to welcome you to Madina the other day. We saw them in the pictures.
Minister, we know that sometimes salamutu (sycophantic) Head Teachers organise such programmes to impress ministers. We finished with that Siaka Stevens attitude a long time ago. Let’s keep children in school. That’s where they belong.
