From darkness into darkness

Raymond Dele Awoonor-Gordon: Sierra Leone Telegraph: 29 October 2023:

Conscience whispers, but interest screams aloud. We’re truly moving to an era where a lot of Political-Fiction, will become Political-Fact in the not-too-distant future which would transgress laws, precipitating the intervention of an external squad that would seek to neutralize our constituted authority and help switch political loyalty to the nation away for electoral convenience.

As we beat our chests in adulation of the end result of the political impasse, let us realise that we have simply been sold a dummy in an elaborate scam. Sincerely, the outcome and agreement of the charade called dialogue for national reconciliation, sounds like a perverse flatulence of a tramp as it failed to serve as a moral rectitude for transformational agenda which some of us had hoped.

Instead, our political class abandoned internal values, circumvented all known laws of decency, and subjugated laid down principles to their whims which must have added extra pleasure to the palate of those in the circus ring. Indeed, some of us might just love the argy bargy on show in the circus, but unfortunately, as the actors wear their gold bracelet amid the fulfilment of whatever they have been promised, WE ARE THE ULTIMATE LOSERS OF A BROKEN AND FLAWED SYSTEM.

In the fog of war, truth is always an orphan and while Sierra Leone has encountered light and darkness, until we all come together and agree that what is bad is bad… we mock ourselves and dance naked in the town square simply because INTEGRITY and CHARACTER MATTER.

Why, as a nation and institutionally, do we constantly go to the bottom of the barrel in an attempt to excuse the inexcusable? The madness that has led to where we are, is symptomatic of a pandemic that pervades the entirety of our political space leading us into the underworld of the dark arts, where the unenviable and the disingenuous have indirectly been given legal cover to enjoy the freedom of their bizarre creativity in our ever-twisting mythical tale.

The undertone of that document, is a cheap ‘Get-out-of-jail free’ for some of those who have not only milked this country dry but who held this country by its jugular while feigning innocence or trustworthiness and concealing their true, often deceitful, nature; dragging their adversary and indeed the country, through the slime and sludge of stinking sewage and turning a terminal disease into a showcase, like a rotting carcass inviting vultures to feast.

To me, the triumphalism being exuded is not a matter of certainty that this will go anywhere to improve our system simply because in addition to our ethno-political and social divide, it will take something near apocalyptic to reset the brains of a large percentage of our population who have sublet their intellects to others in classic herd mentality. That accounts for the primal scream therapy and subsequent celebration being indulged in, by citizens whose attendant goals are against a government and not the promotion of national interest.

No one owns the truth, and it belongs to none. It does not change and does not care whether you agree with it, like it or hate it. Therefore, as we writhe and moan in the motif of our animal farm and under the birth pangs of what is ethically uncharitable, the being-implemented stench-in-town, is an attempt to shove political delusions down the oesophagus of the people whose overall interest has been shown as easily expendable.

German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, warned “beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster… for when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes into you.” While the government displayed a chicken-hearted disposition to its avowed commitment to a new direction, the opposition was exposed as a desperate group more interested in covering its shame and seeking soft landing for issues that has nothing to do with the election, which is why it failed to take the constitutional legal route.

The outcome left me flummoxed especially during the signing ceremony when the representatives of both parties were seen laughing like mischievous brats salivating over a juicy secret known to them only about the mysteries of acquiring, keeping and mastering power to perpetuate the family legacy.

Then, I couldn’t help myself from letting out a burst of deep, loud, hearty laughter reading between the lines and seeing that with the government seeming helplessness, the supposed document, whose plumes of white smoke appears to some as signifying victory and a solution-banner to all our woes , exposes high-stakes amoral political malevolent intentions or qualities that smack of cheap demagogy and a play on the emotions of our people by those involved in our farcical theatre of the absurd.

My exposure to contrived manipulation has been limited to what is credible and since we have all been unavoidably smeared with the mess of the raucous and mayhem post-election sewer and tainted with its stench, the biggest misconception in the on-going political drama is the illusion that it will strengthen our nascent democracy while completely ignoring the range of contrast emotions around the issue and the fact that when the music stops, there’s always another carnival round the corner.

Then, like now, the subliminal beats from the drums of war will again take the centre stage as a result of the slightly simplistic recurring veneration of ‘stolen mandate and faltering narratives’ that our partisanship is cementing.

The government failed in not allowing this to be a test of our nascent democracy. It was an opportunity for all the tiers of governance to be allowed to show the much-touted slogan of Sierra Leone first and commitment to cleaning the Aegean stable, of its entrenched stench. The executive needed to show its determination to uphold and implement the spirit and letter of the constitution.

But of course, those with the moral obligation to speak the truth are often immune compromised; even where they are aware that the fear of the truth is injustice; and equally, a bought or negotiated justice amounts to injustice.

The legislative needed to show resilience in displaying commitment to its own guiding rules and principles of separation of power which frankly speaking is a total illusion due to its composition; while the test of the independence of the judiciary would have come under scrutiny in the controlled and conservative cauldron of ideal jurisprudence since there is a clear institutional procedure that runs the gamut from the stage of apprehension up to adjudication.

As for the fourth estate of the realm, the media, heavily dyed in ethno-political colours, its unwillingness and inability to present an unbiased and balanced view in the mould of the bold activists of the past was and is a testimony to the depth of its depravity. Little wonder nonentities on social networking platforms with internet prattle dramatically powered the trend of discussion in a turbulence of their warped belief and a rallying cry of the zealous with righteous indignation.

A once cultured and refined society of class and breeding, it is sad how much we have betrayed our once-precious historical past and failed ourselves; in what is a demonstration of our dysfunction and inability to align collectively with the noble commitment to the implementation of the elusive dream of a new beneficial Sierra Leone.

As our charade becomes the dog show, what the current political anomaly in Sierra Leone, especially when we are lamenting the many woes of our country illustrates, is the fact that the nation’s problems do not really transcend tribe, region, and parties; seeing that now, the orchestra has become a symphony.

Like an eraser, life’s experiences should help you erase your past mistakes and put you in a better position to correct your wrongs and rewrite your story. In our case, we continue to defecate in our pants in a laughable bid to distract from the fact that we had wet our pants in the first place.

Despite the mounting evidence of strangulating economic conditions, the often-vaunted claims of illusionists, who say they are champions, offering hope to God’s depressed and lost people, in search of a mandate that is only a metaphor for self-preservation, unequivocally indicates that they cannot come to equity with clean hands even as their hostile power tussle emits the putrid theme of the nakedness and madness that siphons energy from the aspirational ideals required to change our ugly narrative.

Unfortunately, despite no partisan emotional investment in the political brawl between the two parties whose antics over time have brought us to where we are today, I am an admirer of the dreams of a better Sierra Leone more than the history of the past or the present acrimonious, unproportionate reaction of petulance for the entertainment of an international audience, which has created a gaping cancerous wound some now see as a thing of beauty.

My only partisan affinity is with the truth. However, as the English social theorist, Harriet Martineau propounded, it is exceedingly difficult to discern which is worse; the wide diffusion of things that are not true, or the suppression of things that are true. Both are terrible. The only victims are the truth and society. But society suffers more than the truth.

Truth does not care who accepts or rejects it, it remains what it is. But society suffers delusion and unnecessary division when it rejects the truth and embraces lies and propaganda, forming its opinions and beliefs from carefully curated falsehoods.

Therefore, whether we like it or not; or whether we want to continue to bury our heads in the sand, the truth remains that we are at a crossroad which will determine the sort of society we leave for our generations unborn.

Our zigzag path which once saw us slide down the valley of death stems from the growing debauchery, official and unofficial deceit, the political and socio-ethnic hypocrisy, the Dracula blood-sucking syndrome and thirst for power as well as the desperation to acquire wealth beyond the reasonable needs of normal human beings which fuels the steam of head in search of power.

That is beyond sad, especially when you add the demonic spirit of domination and exploitation and lack of love as well as unpatriotic tendencies, that certainly still exist; albeit, manifested in disparate forms… and which add to the real plagues eating the very fundamental foundation of our society and standing as the core to our progress.

In our effort to build blocks to a brighter future, a forensic examination of the agreement which is meant to pluck a diamond from our coal, reveals that we are still skidding on the slippery marble floor with the proverbial Ming vase gingerly balanced. Would it drop? Only time would tell.

Birds that grew up in a cage think other birds flying are sick. When abnormalities become normal and the normal becomes abnormalities, then this is an indication that the agents of neo-colonialism, as well as some of those who are meant to be our leaders, have messed up our heads for so long that we don’t even know that what we are going through and the life some of us see as watermark image, are not actually the normal way that things ought to be.

Sadly, we have missed yet another opportunity to act before our lamp runs out of oil again. Our ‘new’ generation of ‘leaders’ have again failed to further bury the selfish and ethnic graveyard of politics of the past.

If we really want to turn the country around, we cannot continue using the same failing style, while seeking for solutions to our deteriorating state. Let us encourage progress instead of trying the clawing crab in a bucket fight to change the course of our trajectory.

Meanwhile, let us not rejoice when our enemies are surreptitiously destroying us as we are then complicit or in acquiescence even though we thought we had seen the future and hoisted its roses. The bad and the ugly of our politics dressed in borrowed coat of many colours that dazzles the eyes from focus.