Dr. Sama Banya
30 October 2012
Voters will be doing a great service to this nation when they vote the APC out of State House on November 17. This is a regime that is steeped in corruption and other governance misdeeds up to their nose.
It is a party that would not want to lose this election, for fear of the consequences – principal among which, is the prospect of being asked to give an honest account – if this could be applied to any APC government, of how they have conspired during the last five years to rob the people of their right, while making themselves filthy rich.
They have tried many of the tricks for which they are notorious and unless they are closely monitored, they may get us into a catastrophe – worse than the combined atrocities of Foday Sankoh and Johnny Paul Koroma.
Victor Sengu as a young man has not been in any gainful employment for as long as I have known him. His only credential is that he is the son of Paramount chief Sengu Sahr Kalan of Kissi Tongi chiefdom, which constitutes constituency 04 in the Kailahun district. That in itself probably means nothing in today’s Sierra Leone.
But Victor holds the unenviable position of chairman of the Kailahun district APC branch. But under the APC, that has entitled him to have TWO ARMED OSD PERSONNEL as his personal security.
It would not surprise me for a moment if Maya Kaikai, Sahr Mokuwa, Lamin Vonjo Ngobeh and other APC party stalwarts have personal armed OSD attached to them or worse still, of being in official possession of arms and ammunition.
Because of such reckless behaviour on the part of this government, Victor Sengu’s OSD personnel raised the political temperature in Kailahun a few days ago, by firing shots in the air during an APC rally.
Is this not a foretaste of things to come?
Talk about dirty politics out of a mad desperation to remain in power, the APC has devised one of the crudest advertising gimmicks that anyone can imagine.
It takes the form of a short documentary showing the “Pa’s” successful performance in development – Wilkinson and Spur roads only of course; Bumbuna (5%), agriculture and food security with tractorisation -concentrated in the non-rice producing districts of Bombali and Tonkolili.
Then suddenly, and this is where the disgustingly bad taste comes in, a photograph of “Ernest’s great Tormentor” Retired Brigadier Julius Maada Bio appears and is then splashed over with a red liquid purporting to be blood and the picture fades.
What are the APC trying to depict, that he is a murderer with blood on his hands?
Let them be warned that unless they keep this campaign at a decent level, WE ARE QUITE CAPABLE OF DOING TO THEIR LEADER WORSE THAN SYLVIA BLYDEN’S TWO HEADED QUADRUPET.
A government which can sink that low has no business asking voters for a second term. I repeat, there is only one alternative and that is to vote them out.
O SULAIMAN MOMODU
Sulaiman Momodu was a relatively young man when he edited the Concord Times newspaper. He now contributes regularly and much to his credit impartially on current affairs, under the title of “BEYOND BORDERS!”
Recently he has been commenting on the current November political environment and doing so in an objective manner.
That readers, is a far cry from the behaviour of some other so-called political commentators who are as impartial as Satan when he has to adjudicate between evil and good.
Sulaiman Momodu’s latest commentary, which I found equally brilliant, objective and fair, carries the title “Questioning The Credibility Of NEC.”
He says quite rightly that since 2007, when Christiana Thorpe sold the result of the run off Presidential election to the APC’s Ernest Bai Koroma, we in the SLPP have felt cheated not just in the cancellation of the results from 477 polling stations – 426 of which were in our strongholds and doctoring of the figures.
We know for a fact that fiddling with the figures notwithstanding, she announced the results on totally wrong figures, figures which had been calculated over and over by NEC’ Carlos Valenzuela.
The fact of the matter is that our loss of confidence is not just in the independence and credibility of the chairman, but in her integrity as well.
Even with the combined cancellation and fiddling with the figures, the SLPP’s Solomon Berewa did beat Ernest Bai Koroma by a 125, 000 votes.
Honest and patriotic Sylvia Blyden would confirm this. I disagree with Momodu’s hypothesis though, that the SLPP may have cheated by over-voting as the NEC chairman had alleged.
The woman never produced the certified result from any of the 477 polling stations, a result which in each case would have carried the combined signatures of the Presiding Officer and the polling agent for each candidate.
That was all that was needed to enable her to debunk our repeated denial of over voting. How devastating that would have been for the SLPP. But all she ever did was to announce the figures, an action that was hailed by the likes of late Awoonor-Gordon and other Thorpe defenders.
I would advise Sulaiman Momodu not to dare take a bet on the question, because Christiana Thorpe and NEC will NEVER produce the figures.
She had covered her crime by hastily removing all election results and all related matters from the NEC website, with what I previously referred to as indecent haste.
HARD HITTING CHARLES!
He did it during the opposition SLPP party convention just over a year ago. He has just repeated it at the launching of his PMDC’s campaign in Magburaka, in the Tonkolili district.
In typical Charles Margai form, which had forced the APC chairman Birch Conteh to leave the SLPP convention when he lashed out at the shortcomings, the failed promises and the corruption of the APC government.
Charles has repeated it in Magburaka where he urged his audience not to hesitate to accept the bribery gifts of money and rice, as they were not from the pockets of the APC leaders, but assets which belonged to them – the people.
“Take them and use them for yourselves, they are yours, money stolen from you. But DON’T VOTE FOR THEM, otherwise you’ll find you’ll end up talking to yourselves as you walk along.” Terrific Charles.
Please remember to deliver the same message and with the same gusto, especially to our people of the Kailahun district where the APC appears to be concentrating all their energy.
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