Since the start of our political journey as a nation-state, a government headed by an All Peoples Congress (APC) party regime has proved to be much better than the Sierra Leone Peoples Party (SLPP) in terms of governance and the social and economic development of Sierra Leone.
This is the contention of ranking members of both parties’ executives and citizens who, based on their honest appraisals of the respective initiatives and developments programmes appear to conclude that life of Sierra Leoneans with an APC government, no matter the circumstances faced by their regime, is far better than when it is the SLPP as clearly exemplified by what they are now feeling and reeling with under the current SLPP regime headed by President Julius Maada Wonie Bio.
THE MARGAIS
In 1961, Sierra Leone and her people were not ready for Independence from Great Britain but following the trend of the times – the wind of change was blowing for subdued peoples around the world and everyone wanted to be independent and running their own affairs, Sir Milton Margai and his cohorts pushed for us to be granted self-rule. Apart from his role in our independence as a nation, Sir Milton was a closet tribalist and was sadistically power hungry and a despot who wanted to silence all forms of opposition against him and his SLPP as a way of creating a pseudo state with the SLPP as the sole political party. This tradition, has unfortunately characterized that party with its resurgence under the ‘Paopa’ pseudonym. When the party re-emerged in 1996 with a level-headed and nationalistic-minded leader in the person of Alhaji Dr. Ahmed Tejan Kabbah, his nationalistic approach grinded the biles of most of his party mates, who wanted a win-all-and take-all approach. By the time President Kabbah left power onto his death, he was completely isolated by most of his key party followers then, simply because, he failed to follow and adopt the Sir Albert Margai tradition of rule. Paradoxically, former President Kabbah had made it known in his campaign for the SLPP flagbearer race that he admired the late Sir Albert Margai’s system of rule. This could have been the bait the seasoned administrator may have used to garner support from the narcissist SLPPs at the time. He turned out completely at variance with that mundane system of rule to adopt an open and pluralistic administration with appointments spread across tribes and regions.
Back to the historical perspectives of the commentators, after the death of Sir Milton Margai in 1964, his younger brother, Sir Albert Margai assumed the reins of leadership of the SLPP much to the chagrin and discontentment of other fitted and more liberal party members, including Dr. John Karifa-Smart, and soon started to show his true colours and what the nation would be like under his party’s leadership.
“After his brother died, Albert took over and started passing bad laws, and ruled with hatred, jealousy, and tribalism. There is no development footprint that you can speak of except maybe their party’s role in the opening of the building of parliament. The present chamber of Parliament was opened by the Duke of Kent in the eve of Sierra Leone’s Independence celebration. According to history, the architectural firm Karmi, Melzer, & Karmi was commissioned for the parliament’s design. The father-and-son team, Dov and Ram Karmi, who were also involved with the design of Israel’s own parliament, the Knesset, are footnoted in history as the architects of Sierra Leone’s Parliament. There is nothing to write home about development wise the Margai brothers except for introducing bad laws and policies to oppress the people and the opposition and construct tribalism to keep the people apart from seeing each other as “one country and one people”. I believe that Albert executed the secret plans of their party, only that he probably did it worse than Sir Milton would have done it. Honestly, this trend started by Albert Margai has been our leadership history: tribalism and passing laws that can really be described as bad for the people and state,” stated an SLPP executive who said he spoke according to his estimation of the role of the Margais on the SLPP leadership trajectory.
SIAKA STEVENS (PA SHEKI)
Fondly called “Pa Sheki”, Siaka Stevens made Sierra Leone a Republic in April 1971 and became our First Executive President two days after the ratification of the constitution by Parliament.
“Yes, Pa Sheki ruled from 1971 to 1985. Although one of his fist actions was to declare the APC as the only legally recognised political party in the country, that law was the idea of the SLPP’s Albert Margai. Unfortunately the SLPP lost that election and we got to implement the one-party system of government that the people were okay with except that they didn’t want it under the SLPP. It was an idea the SLPP was going to usher; it was originally theirs. Imagine based on their development trajectory since then if we had an SLPP president instead of Pa Sheki at the helm? Siaka Stevens built so much apart from the stadium that still carries his name. The old man created institutions, our economy performed very well, and we had access to our staple food and the exchange rate with the dollar was good. In 1975 the Leone was more than the US Dollar; by 1985 it was Le5 to a Dollar. While other West African countries were going through coups and countercoups, Sierra Leone was saved from this by Pa Sheki’s strong grip on power,” continued an APC executive who said Stevens set the development trajectory of the APC and the party has since adopted that as a tradition.
JOSEPH SAIDU MOMOH
Towards the end of Siaka Stevens’ tenure Sierra Leone was at an economic and political crossroads. Stevens’ leadership had tightened the space for critical voices to emerge, even after West Africa had quieted down in terms of military takeovers.
“Siaka Stevens saw the sign that the end of his tenure was not going so well. There was discontent although the people were not able to openly state this by way of protest action. After Stevens handed power over to Joseph Saidu Momoh, the former head of the Sierra Leone Army continued with Pa Sheki’s developments by constructing Cockerill and other institutions. In an effort to maintain the peace and national cohesion Momoh recruited 70 per cent south-easterners into the military. Unfortunately he was overthrown by Captain Strasser, Julius Maada Bio and others,” an APC executive narrated.
NPRC, AFRC JUNTA
President Momoh was overthrown by the National Provisional Ruling Council (NPRC) in April 1992. A civil society activist whose advocacy is focused on democracy and the rule of law said, “There was no development under the NPRC, under Bio after the palace coup against Strasser, and under Johnny Paul’s AFRC (Armed Forces Revolutionary Council). This was a time of war and these military guys emptied our national coffers before they handed power back to the people.”
Under the NPRC, the CSO head said the only accomplishment or development worthy of mentioning under Strasser and later under Maada Bio who had executed a palace coup against Strasser was that they organised elections before peace that saw the return to democratic governance under Ahmed Tejan Kabbah.
“But under the NPRC there was no development. There was no electricity, no roads were constructed, no infrastructure development, nothing. All these guys did was to suck the country dry. After they handed power over to Kabbah he was overthrown in 1997 by the AFRC of Johnny Paul Koroma. What was interesting about Koroma’s rule is that although Sierra Leone was sanctioned by the international community for nine months, during which time no ships docked at our ports and there was no food, we had electricity throughout. Kabbah ordered a military intervention and said he would rule Salone even if there were no people left. This is in contrast to what Momoh had said from the same Guinea after he was similarly overthrown: he refused for a military intervention to restore him to power fearing the worse for the struggling masses. This is the difference between a leader who cares and someone who doesn’t, which is the difference between the APC and SLPP respectively,” the CSO head noted.
AHMED TEJAN KABBAH
Ahmed Tejan Kabbah had his work cut out for him. He wasn’t expected to do much except guide the country back to normalcy after five years of death, destruction and mayhem.
“Unfortunately after Kabbah was reinstated he wasn’t able to do much development wise. This greatly affected him as he was unable to give or restore electric power back to the people. The era of the ‘Kabbah-Tiger’ when Sierra Leone was the darkest country in the world has come to define Kabbah’s rule. He really lost power to Ernest Bai Koroma because there was no development; especially that electric supply across the country had become a serious problem. Kabbah set a record with how dark and loud (generators) the country became,” the SLPP executive narrated.
ERNEST BAI KOROMA
Called “Messi” by his fans and supporters, Ernest Bai Koroma, or EBK as he is also fondly called, is Sierra Leone’s most successful president development wise that set many records that will not be easily equalled by any president that is not development oriented.
“During the 2007 elections campaign EBK promised that he would restore electric power to the city and country in under 100 days, and he did. Before EBK it took between several hours to days on end to travel from Freetown to the provinces. Even in Freetown to get from the city centre to Lumley would take you hours. But look at the peninsula road and other roads across the country today. Ernest was so successful fixing the city and country he even found time to develop his hometown and others, whose developments only rival Freetown’s. Ernest passed good laws, laws that aid development and build people and nations. He accomplished so much the people called him ‘Messi’ or ‘World Best’,” the APC executive continued.
JULIUS MAADA BIO
Maada Bio took over from Ernest Bai Koroma in 2018 and soon started to show his true colours, much like Albert Margai. Although he had warned the SLPP executive to be weary of allowing Bio access to power in the party, Kabbah’s partisans didn’t listen, although Bio was very instrumental in Kabbah’s 1996 elections victory.
“Pa Kabbah considered Bio too tribal. Although he is not Mende, Bio sees himself as the continuation from the Margais. Although he had a great example to follow from EBK, Bio decided to do exactly what he came to accomplish, not to develop the country but to enrich himself the way he didn’t during the 90s. From allowing for the GTT report that called the regime under EBK a ‘criminal racketeering enterprise’ that set the stage for the commissions of inquiry and the white paper for prosecution to the removal of 10 elected APC MPs using the courts and the imposition of the Speaker of the Fifth Parliament, we can see that Bio was not interested in development. We have returned back to the era of Albert Margai under Maada Bio and the Kabbah Tiger. All this regime can show despite all the promises to fight corruption, block financial leakages and a hopeful legacy of leaving the country’s laws strengthened, is among others tightening the democratic space, cosmetic developments you can’t really say were his, electricity supply is worse although he is also the minister of energy. Our roads network across the country is in need of serious repairs.”
“The people of Kenema and Tihun are still waiting on Bio to keep his development promises to them, ask Kenema Boys. Corruption, tribalism in the civil service or government employ, passing bad laws, drug smuggling, money laundering, unnecessary travelling with a large entourage to boot, the shooting of protesting civilians, runaway hikes in the prices of goods and services, more taxes without proof of how they help solve our problems, disregard for the rules and procedures of law, stealing the people’s mandate to lead, and lack of peace and national cohesion have come to define leadership under another SLPP regime. To be honest and fair without any modicum of prejudice, Maada Bio is the worse president or leader Sierra Leoneans have ever experienced, although we were misled into thinking that Bio and his government were going to make serious changes to our governance, social and economic narratives,” the CSO head noted.
Meanwhile, Sierra Leoneans including ranking SLPP and APC executives have said the country and people are better off under an APC than an SLPP led government, crowning Ernest Bai Koroma as the greatest.
“Imagine what Sierra Leone would have been like today if EBK had ruled for 20 years?” asked a polio victim who continued: “When EBK was president he did so much for the disabled community and the country!”