After President Julius Maada Bio shall have gone, SLPP (Sierra Leone People’s Party) politicians have to look back to see where they stumbled and map the way forward.
The party should go to the basics of tolerance, respect for elders, civility and elitism which were the credentials that earlier put the party in a class of its own in the country’s political landscape.
It is hoped that the party would get back its past glory only a complete overhaul or reformation. PAOPA’s stain on the ruling SLPP (Sierra Leone People’s Party) will go on for years owing to the style of leadership exhibited by President Julius Maada Bio and his team.
For decades, SLPP was known for civility and elitism and unity reflected in the party’s 13 palm fronds which represented the former 12 districts and the Western Area although the districts have now been increased to 16. Prior to the formation of PAOPA GROUP within SLPP, the party thought and acted as one. It used to be highly tolerant to all manner of people within and outside the party.
It was tolerant so much that APC (All People’s Congress) politicians could take up posts in the party when APC went out of power. Almost invariably, SLPP politicians too would also serve in APC government when their own party went out of power, a move that made Sierra Leoneans to see the two party as twins calling it “Alhassan and Alusine.”
Until his death in early 2016, former SLPP minister and flag-bearer contender, Joseph Bandabla Dauda was appointed Minister of Internal Affairs in the past APC government of former President Ernest Bai Koroma. Other former government officials also served in similar capacities in the Koroma-led government as well as prominent Southeasterners.
Following the declaration of Koroma President of Sierra Leone in 2007, he worked with the ministers of late President Ahmed Tejan Kabba for close to three months with full salaries. Koroma also sacked no ambassador, high commissioner and other principal representatives representing Sierra Leone abroad.
He however observed normal protocols of recalling them the same way any Western country could do. No gainsaying that the country was smooth and sweet as everything went on well even to the admiration of other countries. The degree of tolerance that prevailed those days became a tremendous benefit for the country as President Koroma became a global icon for which he was highly honoured when he took part in a trade conference in the UK in 2008.
With Koroma’s notion of moving Sierra Leone from aid to trade, several investors from different parts of the world knocked on Sierra Leone’s doors which were widely opened. The investors came in ploughed their resources and created job opportunities for a teeming population of jobless young men and women.
African Minerals, London Mining Company, SUCFIM Agricultural Company among others exploited the country’s mineral and agricultural wealth for the benefit of Sierra Leoneans since the country was democratic and peaceful. The Youth got jobs in the public and private sectors and contributed immensely to the nation building project.
With job opportunities, economic hardship is not as visible as it is today as every Sierra Leonean sees another Sierra Leonean as a brother’s keeper. With relatively good salaries, living cost was low and hardly one went to bed with hunger as a hungry man is an angry man, and anger knows no brother.
The old SLPP too was no difference. Prominent Southeasterners who were members of APC as well as other political parties also served SLPP and everything went well. Top Northwesterners held top posts in Kabba’s government, a move that made SLPPP of yester years most admirable.
During Kabba’s SLPP, Northwesterners’ presence was felt in state governance.
Momodu Koroma was Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Alfred Carew, Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Dr Kadie Sesay, Minister of Trade and Industry, Okere Adams, Minister of Agriculture, Dr Alfred Bobson Sesay, Minister of Lands and Country Planning, Professor Alpha Tejan Wurie, Minister of Education, Alberta Thomas, Minister of Health and Sanitation, Tom Carew, Chief of Defence Staff, Brima Acha Kamara, Inspector-General of Police, Dr Abdulai Timbo Chief Justice and Head of the Judiciary and the list continues.
In the Kabba-led aministration between 1991 and 2002, almost every region, town and village in Sierra Leone was represented in the governance project. A great number of Northwesterners in lower cadre jobs were also allowed to serve as no one was dismissed.
The influx of northerners in the SLPP which was largely seen as Southeastern-based raised several questions among Sierra Leoneans who see the party as one that is Northern Western. The high degree of political tolerance put Sierra Leone on the path of economic recovery and prosperity as it portrayed the country as one that transitioned from war to peace.
In the midst of unity and tolerance between the two political parties, Bio and his PAOPA men from the diaspora broke into the SLPP and defiled long-standing and cherished traditions. The PAOPA movement came into the SLPP from nowhere and radicalised a party which had gained reputation for peace, respect and civility.
The PAOPA movement started in 2012 when Bio was elected flag-bearer and presidential candidate for the party, a period in which Koroma had completed his first-term mandate. Bio took the nomenclature of ‘Tormentor’ as he was widely seen as a man who would bravely take on Koroma and his APC government in the elections.
Radical Southeasterners especially the youth reposed great confidence in President Bio as the man who would decisively deal with then President Koroma in the ballot box. Bio had militarily dealt with APC as he was among a group of young army officers who overthrew then government of President Joseph Siadu Momoh in April, 1992.
Bio also masterminded a successful palace coup in January, 1996 against Captain Valentine Strasser who was flown to Neighbouring Guinea and abandoned there. Although Bio’s coup plots were seen as demonic, the world congratulated him for steering a process that saw the political transformation of Sierra Leone from military to civilian rule.
SLPP therefore greatly hoped that he would bring them victory again in 2012 as he knew how to deal with APC. Their hope was however shattered when Bio lost the elections to Koroma who was widely seen as one of the most successful Presidents in Sierra Leone’s political history when compared to successive Presidents of post-independent Sierra Leone.
Koroma delivered on his promises especially in his five thematic areas: energy, infrastructure, health, education and agriculture which were the yardsticks against which the past APC government would be assessed. Koroma was confident enough to appeal to Sierra Leoneans to feel free to vote for him if they were satisfied that he had served them well.
The incumbent President Koroma did not campaign too much as he was quite hopeful that his good works would earn him the votes required to win in the first round.
It came to pass when Koroma was announced President of Sierra Leone for another second term, a move that threw a bombshell into the SLPP camp. Bio was not satisfied with the election results which he challenged in the country’s highest court, the Supreme Court of Sierra Leone.
However, a legal error in the litigation process made the court to throw the matter away. Bio who could not bear the pangs of the defeat sought haven in the UK where he sojourned for another five years. He would travel to Sierra Leone from London to attend to political matters as his thirst for the party’s flag was not quenched after he lost.
But, there was a conundrum as SLPP constitution said any candidate who contested the presidency and lost once became an ex-officio. As ex-officio member, Bio was no longer supposed to take active part in the party’s affairs, but could render advice as and when necessary.
It was this clause that that affected Berewa who became ex-officio after he lost to former President Koroma in 2007 general elections. Unlike Berewa, Bio never accepted an ex-officio status as he eyed the party’s flag for the second time.
After much effort to make Bio comply with the constitution ended in failure, senior officials of the party saw coercion as the only way that would compel Bio to submit to the law, but a big stumbling block lay in their way. SLPP Grassroot members had been brainwashed into believing that only Bio knew the tactic of taking power from APC.
With his innocent and cool-looking personality, Bio won the hearts of key SLPP politicians including Dr Prince Harding, a notable personality in the SLPP. Former President Koroma too fell for Bio’s cool moves despite Bio’s poor record of human rights abuses and extra-judicial killings in the days of the National Provisional Ruling Council (NPRC).
In continuation of the political tolerance built over the years, Koroma got along with Bio very well, a move that brought about ‘sell-game’ allegations against Bio. The intimacy between Bio and Koroma made SLPP members think that the duo had conspired for Koroma’s third term.
Bio tapped the largesse of APC politics to the anger of senior APCians. Koroma was said to have provided housing facility, allowances and stipends for Bio who was the opposition leader at that time.
As if that was not enough, Koroma would attend international conferences including UN General Assembly with Bio. Bio’s rosy and cosy relationship with President Koroma made him a strong man within his SLPP camp as the zeal which senior SLPP politicians bore to boot out Bio out of SLPP was whittled down.
As smart he was, Bio wasted no time in exploiting his relationship with the then President to establish the ‘PAOPA GROUP’ which marked the radicalisation of a once peaceful and civilised party to the annoyance of Sierra Leoneans and the international community. Regardless of whatever meaning accorded to PAOPA, the terminology connotes forceful and violent acquisition and exercise of political power to achieve a goal regardless of whatever means employed.
The SLPP youth were turned into vicious thugs overnight the day the PAOPA movement was launched within the party. They would not hesitate to publicly insult and assault anyone seen as a threat to Bio’s political existence in the party.
Former NGC (National Grand Coalition) leader, Dr Kandeh Kolleh Yumkella fell victim to vicious thuggery in the hands of Bio’s guys when he was seen as an obstacle to Bio’s flag-beareship. Yumkella, a former UNIDO (United Nations Industrial Development Organisation) Director-General had gained wide recognition and popularity among key SLPP members especially academic elites.
However, Bio and his men knew well that if not checked, Yumkella’s growing popularity represented a big obstacle to Bio’s victory within and outside the party, and the only way to check the popular man was to beat him up. Like Yumkella, Chief Somano Kapen, former SLPP Chairman was equally molested and driven out of the party.
Another ex-SLPP chairman, John Oponjo Benjamin and other senior party officials were targetted for violence. Like others, he too abandoned the party to the thugs.
For Bio’s flag-bearership and presidential candidacy, SLPP headquarters became a military barracks or battlefield as a day hardly passed by without seeing fist-throwing at each other, and the police would come in to put situation under control. But, repeated flare-ups of violence and thuggery rendered police effort meaningless. They are always at each other’s throat to pave way for Bio’s presidency.
Consequently, Bio became an SLPP flag-bearer for the second time through violence and he also became battle-ready to face Dr Samura Kamara in the 2018 polls. Bio showed his readiness to take back State House by whatever means possible when he started confronting former President Koroma.
Bio, at one time, was bold enough to put the presidential motorcade to a halt for several minutes and did away with it.
In several media interviews, Bio made mixed responses about his approach to political power. When asked about the past, Bio would render apology to Sierra Leoneans for the extra-judicial killings during NPRC but also threatened to overthrow APC if the party ruled in the same way it did in 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.
Threats that if APC was announced winner of 2018 elections, he would resist the election results by means of warfare were also made, and such threats partly contributed to his election victory.
Bio hit the ground running the night he was sworn in at a hotel in Freetown in April, 2018.
SLPP thugs who fought for Bio’s victory quickly transformed into vigilante groups and went after what they called rogue government ministers to recover stolen assets. A high court judge who was mistaken for an APC minister had his vehicle forcefullytaken away by the thugs.
Ex-President Koroma’s daughter also came under attack carried out by the splinter groups. In a state of fury, Koroma said in a widely circulated video that “either Bio was not in control or not sincere with what he was saying.”
This statement could be interpreted to mean that Bio might have promised Koroma of keeping the peace throughout SLPP leadership and none of his relatives would be gone after. Koroma’s daughter got back her safety only after Rado Yokie went to the scene. Yokie who was the sacked mines minister held a de facto command and control of the thugs who were all over Freetown unleashing violence in the immediate post-election period.
Yokie was among those who were arrested in 2008 for torching APC’s regional office in Bo city, south of Sierra Leone. Bio’s PAOPA started with violence and ended in violence.
Adopting the Machiavellian notion, Bio knew it was the end to be achieved and not the means that matters. In Bio’s PAOPA, the creation of a one-party state in the 21st century Sierra Leone by means of extra-judicial killings, indiscriminate arrest and detention of opposition politicians, incarceration, harassment and intimidation, terror tactics, unnecessary proclamations of public emergencies, enactment of draconian laws and the regulation in detail all aspects of man’s life were among many means pursued by Bio to realise the one-party project.
He still continued his thuggery before, during after June 24, 2023 elections. He openly rigged the elections and was bold enough to draw daggers with the international community accusing them of doing nothing for the country. Many said was deceived by the glamour and aura of power, but his authority is at a low ebb as a possible indictment by the International Criminal Court awaits him.
Funding cuts by US, UK, EU and other inter-governmental agencies has brought Bio’s government to its knees as he cannot pay government workers especially the army and the police.
Sierra Leoneans including government workers have threatened big demonstrations here and in the diaspora to see that Bio is forcefully removed from power. Monday’s protest will determine whether Bio would still remain in control of Sierra Leone.
The question of how will SLPP look like when Bio shall have left SLPP lingers among key party members. The only response is: the party should go back to the basics of tolerance to opposition parties, respect for human rights, civil liberties and freedoms, respect the rule of law, democratic principles and build peace and national cohesion with the old folks playing a big role in the process.
Formed in 1960, SLPP is the oldest political party in Sierra Leone after NCSL (National Council of Sierra Leone) which was founded and led by one of the early Krio pioneers, Dr Bankole Bright.
NCSL had died decades back since it could not withstand the political heat of the 1960s.
As the most senior political party, never again should old SLPP politicians allow the party to dragged to the dustbin by young guys who took wives only after they came to power.
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