By Our News Analyst
Though politics per se is arguably overriding it is sometimes necessary to branch into discussions of socio-economic issues which could be more portentous than pure politics. This is why I am drawing your attention to charity which is being given a very low rating in our society. “Good belleh” in Krio, our local parlance or linqua franca, means charity. This phenomenon becomes ironic when it is considered that the two main religions in this country namely Christianity and Islam have charity as their core values and more than 80 percent of the people profess one or other of the two religions. Abject poverty cannot be given as an excuse for the paucity of charity that exists. The factor responsible for this state of affairs is none other than GREED. Altering the mindsets of the people away from this phenomenon is a dilemma.
This brings us to the choice between charity in need and charity for football entertainment. Let me state that the squalor and misery all around us if we have the religious will and forget about politics and entertainment for a while. This is not to say that these two phenomena cannot be addressed simultaneously. In fact with truly religious people precedence should go to charity in need.
While in developed countries tons of food are wasted on a daily basis in a hunger–infested country like Sierra Leone three meals a day is a balanced rarity. It can be safely said that ten percent of the top echelons of our society can help to enable the rest of the population to eat two meals a day provided they eschew their extravagant life styles. It is sad to say that thousands of our own compatriots starve because of the effects of EBOLA caused by a negligent government of square pegs in round holes. Incidentally compare how serious and sober Nigeria scuppered the disease in its initial tracks.
The situation is more macabre in the sphere of medicine. How many times have we not heard the never-ending plaintive cry of our citizens for medical treatment abroad in this 57-year-old Republic? The shameless state would not come to their rescue because they are not Politically Exposed Persons. Sometimes help comes too late from some patriotic citizens and non-citizens.
Premier League returns to Sierra Leone and suddenly from nowhere hundreds of millions of leones are donated to clubs for ENTERTAINMENT. With the best of pleas on humanitarian grounds they would not oblige.
PROVIDENT FUNDS
Since these things are so it is expedient to initiate provident funds at Chiefdom, Constituency or district levels to address this bugbear. It can be done. Where there is a will there is a way. This giving should go beyond tithes and zackaat. Love is demonstrative. “If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels but have not love I am only a resounding gong of a clanging cymbal. 1 Cor 13:1. Is the Social Welfare Ministry reading?