Two years back, the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) has never been at ease with members of the diplomatic community and Civil Society Organisations (CSO’s). The strained relationship between government and the two institutions is now clear as Sierra Leone heads to the polls in June.
Members of the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) has attacked the international community for being silent over what they refer to as threats by Samura Kamara. Kamara is the Presidential Candidate of the main opposition, All People’s Congress (APC), the second oldest political party in the country.
On Wednesday 14th June, 2023, the APC candidate issued a 72-hour ultimatum for the resignation of the Chief Electoral Commissioner (CEC) and other commissioners owing to what he called stark incompetence. The APC Presidential Candidate is not okay with the manner of Konneh’s appointment, voter ID cards and failure to release the disaggregated voter registration data among other issues.
It is not yet clear what action APC will take if the commissioners fail to step aside. The SLPP Chairman, Dr Prince Harding however wanted the the diplomatic community (the EU, US, UK, AU, ECOWAS) to condemn Dr Samura Kamara’s statement which they see as one that threatens the country’s peace and security. “SLPP is surprised by the silence of members of the diplomatic community and civil society organisations to condemn APC’s systematic pattern of inciting violence and threats to undo our democracy, peace and national security. At the very least, we expect the international election monitoring bodies to issue a statement on the validity or otherwise accuracy of the claims made by the APC Presidential Candidate. Failure to do so would undermine their role as moral guarantors of our democratic governance,” a press release of 15th June, 2023 reads in part.
SLPP sees Kamara’s press statement as nothing more than what they call a compendium of unsubstantiated claims, conjectures and blatant inaccuracies. Abdul Will Kamara popularly known as Adebayor is singled out in the SLPP press release as APC’s mouthpiece allegedly sponsored by ex-President Ernest Bai Koroma and Dr Samura Kamara. In most of his campaigns, President Julius Maada Bio is blunt to reduce Adebayor to a mere idiot taken care of by Koroma and Kamara although evidence to support such claim is non-existent.
The verbal attacks at ambassadors and high commissioners by the ruling party is the latest in the series. A tweet that recently went viral on social media platforms shows President Bio’s readiness to marching orders to the diplomats. “If the international community meddles into our politics, I will ask them out of the country,” the tweet reads.
President Bio however has reportedly denied the text saying it does not come from him.
Quite recently, Honourable Emmerson Lamina of Coalition For Change and Dr Sylvia Blyden took on the EU Ambassador and the British High Commissioner, Emmanuel Muller and Lisa Chesney respectively. They accuse the diplomatic officials of political interference especially taking sides with APC.
The statement uttered by the EU Ambassador that more crowds showed up in the North-West than in the South-East for registration became a thorn in the flesh of SLPP politicians.
Although he belongs to a different political party, Emmerson Lamina went at great lengths in urging the Speaker of Parliament to summon the EU Ambassador to parliament paying little or no attention to the diplomatic immunities and privileges enjoyed by Muller and Chesney.
Not long after Lamina and Blyden went at loggerheads with the diplomats, threats of protests against the diplomatic community in Sierra Leone was heard almost everywhere in the South-East.
Despite the euphoria generated in the initial stage, the move for protest has been buried in the waters. Blyden and Lamina’s actions on the ambassadors as well as rumblings of the protest ceased after the visit of the British Foreign Secretary, James Cleverly.
During his visit, he spoke only to President Julius Maada Bio, Dr Samura Kamara and the UK High Commissioner. It was after the meeting that events took a sudden twist. Honourable Lamina and Blyden seemed to have retired to their trenches.
Many say the two officials have been cautioned to watch Bio’s foot steps so that they do not share the fate of APC’s erstwhile Publicity Secretary, Cornelius Deveaux who leaped in the dark when he urged former President Koroma to declare a persona non grata against the former British High Commissioner, Guy Warrington.
Had Koroma listened to Deveaux’s call, the persona non grata would have seen the high commissioner leaving Sierra Leone before elections.
The erstwhile APC Spokesman never knew that a transition was imminent as he failed to watch Koroma’s foot steps. The role of the international community in the governance systems of most African states cannot be under estimated especially in post-conflict and donor-driven countries. Sierra Leone is a post-conflict and donor-assisted after the war ended in 2002.
The country, most times, has its annual budgets financed by donor communities. Last year, Sierra Leone has a budget deficit of trillions of Leones, and the international community became the only source to turn to for aid. Apart from budget funding, Britain and other countries have sponsored several projects relating to governance, rule of law and human rights among others.
EU, in particular, played great role in revamping Sierra Leone’s infrastructure after years of destruction. Sierra Leone also will hardly forget about the important role EU and other partners played to end the war in Sierra Leone.
Since uncontrollable political ambitions and interest was one of the main causes of the conflict, the international community have been keeping a watchful eye on Sierra Leone to prevent another conflict. The monitoring role began in 1996 even before the end of the war.
Since APC had been in governance for decades, the international community particularly the UN worked hard to ensure that SLPP was brought back to governance.
A UN official, James Jonah was allowed to conduct the elections just to ensure that SLPP win the election. After Tejan Kabba exhausted his two terms, the writing of a transition was very clear on the wall.
The little-known and resented Berewa was chosen to confront ex-President Ernest Bai Koroma. Berewa was defeated, and power was transferred to the APC. Almost invariably, in 2018, President Koroma was forced to accept a regime change although APC was highly popular with the masses at that time.
APC’s popularity became clear when it won close to 70 parliamentary seats and nine local councils as opposed to SLPP which had only 49 seats and six councils. What a big margin between the ruling party and the main opposition? The only answer is that regime is the only way out to prevent conflict. Now, the time is here, a regime has been pronounced since President Bio has failed the nation.
Bio and his henchmen who do not want to go after naked failures employ the services of proxies and surrogates to attack the diplomatic community, an act they embark on at their own peril.
If Tejan Kabba and Ernest Koroma, despite their sound accomplishments accept regime change, what about Bio whose achievement is just a drop in the ocean in five years.