Sierra Leone Telegraph: 14 August 2021:
The government of Sierra Leone last night announced it has lifted its ban on churches and mosques’ Sunday and Friday worship, a measure imposed by the government to help curtail the rising numbers of Covid infections, hospitalisation, and deaths.
According to the public notice issued by NACOVERC, there has been a significant decline in the number of reported cases of infection in the last few weeks.
Although churches and mosques can from next Monday, 16th August 2021 begin congregational worship, other measures have been kept in place to encourage social distancing and sanitation.
But critics of the government say that the government has changed its policy on mosque and church worship because of threats by religious groups to stage public protests and civil disobedience.
Lets don’t fool ourselves, religious places, or any places of indoor mass gatherings, or out doors gathering, have always act as supper spreaders of this deadly covid19 virus since it onset at the back end of 2019.The Chinese government, that was the first authority to recognised that mass gatherings of people is the only place that the covid19 virus will able to survive, and reproduce itself, and frankly love to be in the company of careless people, with no sense of responsibility to themselves and their communities, was the first government to induced mandatory lockdowns measures in Wuhan province of China to steam its infection rate amongst it populations. At the time the Chinese government got a lot of stick from the western press for doing what they at the time thought was the right thing to do for their populations .
Despite the screaming headlines denouncing the Chinese government as dictatorship on steroids for putting in place strict lockdown measures on a population of sixteenth millions or more people on self isolation, it turns out few months later countries around the world were following the same foot steps the Chinese government took.After all it was the only sensible option there was to tackle the virus. The Bio government is doing the same thing. But least we get complacent, because he is allowing people to go back to their places of worship, understandable as its sounds, as cases numbers are down in our country, people who are not vaccinated, should trade cautiously, because even countries like Australia, Israel that thought they are about to wave good bye to this deadly virus, due to the successful vaccination programmes there governments implemented amongst the vast majority of their populations,some parts of their countries are going in to partial lockdown again due to the the unacceptable levels of infections amongst covid19 deniers and the delta virus . So when you think you are home and dry, covid19 is always hiding in the conner, to try and throw surprises at you. Yes easing of lockdowns is nice.
We have to get our lives back, because all the things that we used to take for granted, if anything Covid19 have thought us to value it again. Who would have thought at the start of 2020,that President Bio, or any other president for that matter, will place restrictions on your travels, like the simple task of getting into an okeke, or Poda Poda, from PZ to UGun Turntable, or visit a Church, or a mosque, or even traveling from one part of Sierra Leone to the other will be subject to government say so.? That is what covid19 have done for us. I hope we Sierra Leoneans appreciate what we have more in common, than what divide us. A lesson taught and a lesson learnt.
This is a common sense approach what evidence did Nacoverc have to include religious places in their ban. As far as I can see you only need to go to Lumley and other market places to be infected as majority of people don’t wear face masks. Places of worship must remain open and follow covid guidelines which is more likely to be followed than in other public spaces.