Sierra Leone Telegraph: 15 June 2024:
Sierra Leone’s main opposition All People’s Congress Party (APC) has announced it is suspending its membership and involvement in the Tripartite Committee established by the international community, in the wake of controversial presidential and general elections held in June 2023, which independent election monitors and observers say were significantly marred by irregularities, fraud and malpractice.
The purpose of the Tripartite Committee, which is made up of the ruling SLPP, the opposition APC, and the international community, is to investigate the country’s post-war elections – examine electoral laws, systems, and processes; and make recommendations that will prevent future rigging of elections.
The decision by the APC to suspend its engagement with the Tripartite Committee comes just weeks before the Committee is to publish its much anticipated report, which could decide the fate of the government.
In its statement published yesterday, 14 June 2024, the APC said: “You will recall that the APC outrightly rejected the 24th June 2023 multi-tier elections results but chose to participate in the October 2023 internationally moderated cross-party dialogue held at the Bintumani Hotal.
“This was a bid to foster peace, national cohesion, and to seek an amicable resolution to the then political impasse. Regrettably, the SLPP government has reneged on its promise to take the necessary steps to ensure the full implementation of the National Unity Agreement.
“Furthermore, the government has also aided and abetted the refusal by ECSL to release vital data and information needed by the Committee to be able to examine the final outcome of the June 24th 2023 elections, including the 60% announced results.”
Many have questioned the sincerity of the SLPP government and President Bio in establishing the Tripartite Committee. The decision of the APC to pull out of the investigation process will most certainly convince opposition supporters and those sitting on the fence, that the country’s electoral commission and the ruling party have something to hide.
APC’s statement also reads: “The terms of reference of the Tripartite Committee explicitly states under section 4(2) that the committee shall ‘request access to all relevant documents, records, and information necessary for the conduct of its examination’.
“This mandate unequivocally empowers the committee to demand all pertinent documents from the ECSL and all other EMBs to ensure a comprehensive review.
“However, despite our best efforts and interventions from development partners and friends of Sierra Leone, the ECSL has continued to obstruct the process by failing to produce the requested documents.
“The APC party would like to reiterate that demanding the ECSL Commissioners to release their polling station-level results, backed by the Results Reconciliation Forms (RRFs) to substantiate their announced figures, is critical to this review process.”
The decision of the APC to boycott the elections investigation comes following the visit of Senegal’s President Bassirou Diomaye Faye to Freetown, where he is believed to have conveyed the request by ECOWAS leaders to President Bio to ensure that the Tripartite Committee is allowed to complete its investigations with the full support of the government, including granting access to all documents and data relating to the June 2023 elections.
But the difficulty for the electoral commission is that the integrity of the polling station level results of the June 2023 elections have been significantly compromised, and in many stations – non-existent.
This leaves the tripartite committee with a serious dilemma in completing its report which is expected to be published by the end of this month.
One likely outcome of this latest political crisis in Sierra Leone is that the opposition APC may have to go to the Supreme Court, with monitoring and oversight from international Judges to obtain an order forcing the electoral commission to either publish all disaggregated polling station results or hand them over to the tripartite committee.
IIt is unfortunate that all that is visible are a group of self-serving, close-minded politicians; one driven by ambition, the other by a desire for power. Let us keep Sierra Leone in our thoughts and prayers.
Please, if anything bad happen to Sierra Leone, the international committee should be blamed because Africa and the people depend on them to solve the problem of Sierra Leone peaceful and in the interest of the people.
It’s too early to judge them but SLPP has no fault in the outcome of the final decision, it is the international committee.
Your conclusion for APC to go the Supreme Court is a good suggestion. In the first place, it was a complete insult to our sovereignty for the APC to call to an outside body to make then kings of our land. We don’t need any outside government or body to tell us who to lead us; the APC party in governance rejected the idea for an outside body to tell us that the President was wrong in sacking his vice, while our Supreme Court agrees with him. On the other hand, we don’t need outside body to supervise our courts. If the APC party ruled that out to protect their government, we will reject with every fabric of our soul.
Let the APC party has provided leadership for our country for almost 2/3 of our independence life and has conducted more elections to the displeasure of sections of the country but never did the displeasure led to holding the country to ransom as the APC has done. In 2012, Bio and the SLPP were not happy with the results, and in their face, the electoral Commissioner told them to go to police. The Supreme Court looked at their case but did not even invite the electoral Commissioner to testify. Though this is a president of miscarriage of justice, we will set it aside and accept the Supreme Court decision. As it stands now, the so-called tripartite is gone.
The main opposition All People’s Congress (APC) Party announced the suspension of their participation in the Tripartite Committee over what they claimed to be a lack of transparency from the government to ensure that data of the 2023 election results are provided by the Electoral Commission for Sierra Leone.
Now, I remember raising concerns about the clear disagreement at the signing ceremony of the Terms of Reference of the Tripartite Committee at the New Brookfields Hotel in February this year. While Dr. Emmanuel Gaima, the government representative was saying that they don’t have the power to subject the Electoral Commission to an investigation, Dr. Kaifala Marah, the APC representative was very insistent that they will examine the June 2023 elections including the release of data by the Electoral Commission.
So the Tripartite Committee started with confusion and it seems it is ending with the same disagreement. Our politicians should be ashamed of themselves, they can’t dialogue or agree on anything that will get us to focus on what’s important for the people even when the International Partners are babysitting them. It’s just their parochial political interests, nothing about the progress of this country.
We are at the mercy of the International Community again, they will have to intervene to address this stalemate instead of focusing on supporting our development programs.
In all of this, it is we, the ordinary people who will face the consequences, our politicians aren’t sincere in whatever they’re doing, their only interest is to either consolidate or get power. Some US$1.5 million from the United States government is being wasted on what could become a fruitless endeavour in a country where citizens are still grappling with basic social services.
Even when we were asked to pray it seems nothing has changed but on this holy day in the Islamic calendar may Allah answer our prayers for this country and save us from those politicians who don’t want to see us progress.
This agreement was flawed from the start by the refusal of the chief electoral commissioner to release polling station data of the election results despite observers reports that the elections were not credible. This is not about going to court as others have already done so with their cases thrown in to the long grass and neither is it about a re-run of the elections. Any agreement for a resolution of the current political discourse must investigate how we got here and prevent it from happening again.
Mohamed Konneh may think he is helping the President but collectively they are sowing the seeds of political instability in the country.
The Sierra Leone’s APC Party selection of its currently imposed Leader – Dr. Samura Kamara – does not augur well for the future of Sierra Leone. Some of us remember that he was APC Foreign Minister whilst about US$4.1 Millions were STATUTORILY allocated to and for the “REFURBISHMENT OF THE SIERRA LEONE CHANCERY IN NEW YORK”; this building is continuingly and currently scaffolded. This money had been extracted, criminally misappropriated and spent without any accountability. This happened before PAOPA SLPP Maada-Bio’s tenure. I understand this crime is still before our criminal courts for processing – a politically meaty bone to Maada-Bio. I will now try putting this on FACEBOOK etc.
Just another “Dakay” idiot. You need a brain transplant
When a party has been so corrupt that it depends on the international community for assistance, ah well.