The registration drive that was suggested by the All Peoples Congress (APC) executive has been rejected by a large section of the APC support base. The grassroots supporters say they will not register until they also know if their votes were tallied during last year’s discredited presidential elections.
It must be recalled that while the chief returning officer who also doubles as the chief electoral commissioner of the electoral commission of Sierra Leone (ECSL), Mohamed Konneh, was giving the first 60 per cent of his vote tallying that placed the incumbent in a significant lead, the district of Port Loko was still tallying the votes cast.
While also making the decision not to register with the main opposition, APC stalwart Kemoh Sesay said in a recorded audio message that he still does not know if his vote was counted as he has not been able to access the data, and would want to find out about the fate of his vote that he cast for the APC presidential candidate, Dr. Samura Kamara.
Kemoh Sesay and many grassroots supporters and members of the APC say their votes were not counted.
The call by the APC executive came about from the party’s recent NAC meeting where the flagbearer and party leader, Dr. Samura Kamara, was visibly absent. There is currently a serious rift in the main opposition that has seen many of the executive members calling for the party to move on from the 24 June, 2023, presidential election outcome and start preparing for the 2028 election cycle agenda of the ruling party government.
Many of the grassroots supporters see this call as open betrayal of their cause to make sure that every vote was counted and reflected in the election result that was widely rejected by anyone that had anything to do with the election, except the ruling party government, the president and the ECSL.
“We will not register! The executives calling for registration of members are sell outs. They have been compromised. There is no way they can now take this stance without the plausibility of there being some form of inducement from outside. We know that many of them will sell their souls for a brown envelop from the party government to cure their ‘suck-air’. We will only register after we have found out if our votes were part of the counting that chief Konneh delivered when he declared the president as the winner of the election. How can the APC executive that was once behind this advocacy to end electoral impunity and injustice now turn around and tell us to start registering?” asked the upset grassroots APC members.
The aggrieved partisans informed nightwatch that by calling for the party to move on from the tripartite process, the APC executives “are saying that they have accepted president Bio’s win last year and that it was free, fair and credible”.
It must be noted that not long after the chief commissioner made his declaration on the presidential vote, leading foreign embassies, international and local elections observers, others in the international community and the main opposition APC all rejected the vote. Even the regional group ECOWAS and the African Union (AU) also said the result was not reflective of the vote. There were claims of mathematical and statistical inconsistencies in the released result, with those who raised such an objection saying that it was impossible for the president to have won the election on first ballot. Meanwhile RRFs from the APC collected from 70.2 per cent of the polling stations put Dr. Samura Kamara at 57.15 per cent while the incumbent was below 40 per cent. The ruling party and the ECSL have not shown how the president won the elections.
“The division in the party is hurting our unity. We do not expect all of them to believe in this cause but we expected them to remain committed with the kind of unity that is expected of any household going through difficulties. There is no way that president Bio won the last presidential election and so for these executives to be saying we should prepare for 2028 is tacit approval of president Bio’s win and a vindication of Mohamed Konneh. So what happened to the votes from Port Loko? How many other people were disenfranchised with them not knowing how the voting happened on 24 June, last year? What kind of a democracy are we if we cannot all view our voting record? The APC executives must find it in themselves to believe and acknowledge that something funny happened with our votes and must join the rest of the party in demanding that we get electoral justice,” the grassroots supporters demanded.
The active APC members and supporters say those calling for registration should start by registering themselves as they are confident that the entire party and all supporters of the rule of law will kick against such a call. They say they feel abandoned by the party at a time they desperately needed their support and direction.
“The executives are employed by us the members the stakeholders. We pay their salaries and the name they make out there is because we elected them. They should seek our advice and direction and inform us on any decision before making such decisions. They should also seek the interest of the party, especially as it has to do with the grassroots. We are against this call to register in the middle of the unfinished tripartite process,” concluded another grassroots member.