Events unfolding in the realm of the diplomatic community signify hope for the main opposition, the All People’s Congress.
On the official launch of the renewed partnership between European Union and the local elections watchdog, the EU urged the government to recognise 2022 and 2023 as the stipulated dates for the elections.
“The country needs to have a fixed date for the presidential elections so that there is predictability,” an EU document reads in part.
The hope for the opposition lies in the disagreement between government and the diplomatic community regarding the date for the local council, parliamentary and presidential elections.
It has been widely reported that government was going to fix 2022 and 2023 as dates for the local council and general elections respectively owing to the outbreak of Corona Virus Disease.
Government’s move has not gone down well with the diplomatic community who opposed the dates set by government for the multi-tier elections.
Extending the elections to a year indicates that the New Direction’ Government wanted to lend a leaf from the Koroma-government which extended the 2017 elections to 2018 owing to the Ebola outbreak in May 2014 which the government spent two years to fight.
Former President was lucky for his elections date to be accepted as he enjoyed a cosy relationship with the international community.
The outright acceptance of President Koroma’s elections date by the international community may not be divorced from his good governance model and credible human rights record.
The New Direction’s case is different; the government, by all indications, does not enjoy a cosy relationship with the international community.
Human Rights record in the ‘New Direction’ and its respect for international conventions and treaties is nothing to write home about.
The international community became disappointed in the first week the New Direction government was ushered into governance.
Despite its repeated promises of national cohesion and unity in the governance of the state, the ‘New Direction’ exhibited ruthlessness and thuggery against former government officials who they accused as thieves and plunderers.
The government let loose vicious and ruthless thugs against officials of former APC government in what they describe as an operation for the recovery of stolen state assets.
The service of police officers who supposed to execute such duty was never utilised.
Panic and instability grips the state in a period the government was supposed to think well and draw the governance map for a decent and civilised modern state.
The brutality that occurred in the streets was taken to the supreme law making institution, the parliament of Sierra Leone.
Members of Parliament of the main opposition, All People’s Congress were brutalised and humiliated by police personnel in a manner ever seen anywhere in the world.
Police brutality ordered by the clerk of Parliament, Paran Tarawallie against opposition MP’s was the first in the political history of of Sierra Leone.
The brutality will, no doubt, go down into the annals of national history of Sierra Leone.
The brutality was not legally justifiable as it was carried out to impose a speaker of parliament on parliamentarians and to cut down the influence of the opposition in parliament.
In what appears of a continuation of violence by other means, about 16 APC parliamentarians were held to ransom through a court injunction that was slammed on them.
The injunction restrained the parliamentarians from attending or taking part in any parliamentary proceedings until the court said otherwise.
Since that period, parliament has always seen an uneasy calm in its well.
After protracted and acrimonious proceedings, a verdict that stripped the opposition of ten parliamentary seats was simultaneously announced by two judges of the high court of Sierra Leone in May, last year.
On the same day, nine runners-up of the Sierra Leone People’s Party in the 2018 elections were sworn as parliamentarians and APC headquarters was put under siege by state security operatives.
Teargas canisters and bullets were fired into the main opposition headquarters by police and military personnel, a move seen by many as the greatest policing disaster in Sierra Leone.
To worsen an already volatile situation, a report authored by a team led by Professor David Francis indicated theft of billions of Leones by the former government.
The accusation led to the setting up of a Commission of Inquiry (COI) where former government officials were expected to appear and render account of their stewardship to the nation for the past 11 years.
The commission was not widely accepted by the main opposition and referred to it as a kangaroo-styled commission of inquiry owing to the absence of rules of evidence to regulate the COI’S practice and procedure.
Although section 150 of the Constitution of Sierra Leone, 1991 is a fundamental provision that makes it imperative for rules of evidence to be presented in parliament in the form of a constitutional instrument, the provision was blatantly ignored by the ‘New Direction’ government.
Past government officials were going to be coerced to appear before the COI in spite of threats of “robust resistance” by the erstwhile, APC Public Secretary, Cornelius Deveaux.
Nerves were calmed down by the wisdom of the lead commissioner, Justice Biobele Georgewill who said nobody would be forced to appear before the commission.
The COI has completed its work as a report has been submitted to government, and a ‘White Paper’ is pending.
One of key recommendations made by lawyers representing government at COI is to ban past government officials from holding public office for five years and to confiscate their property.
Whether past government officials who now constitute the main opposition would accept the COI findings is a wait-and-see and affair.
As the ‘White Paper’ was about to come out, Covid-19 struck in March this year and destabilised government plans.
As government grapples with the devastating virus, threats of releasing the ‘White Paper’ is rife.
The threat has been seen by many as a subtle method to water down the effort of the opposition.
Currently, Sierra Leone is caught in the twin evils of economic hardship and Covid-19 making it hard for the people of Sierra Leone to survive in an easy way.
The economic hardship is evidenced by queues on the streets to collect EU money in the form of aid.
Discussions in by men in the streets indicate that the people of Sierra Leone need a change of government.
The ruling SLPP has smelled the rat and want to postpone the 2023 elections at the annoyance of the international community.
The disagreement between government and the international community definitely signals hope for the opposition.
The APC must come together and solve their internal problems to take over governance of the state in 2023.