If there is one word that can be used to describe the ruling regime under President Julius Maada Bio, it is unprocedural. The unprocedural actions of PAOPA are too many to list here, but the latest is sure to affect PAOPA’s returns at next year’s polls. With just 15 months to go for the holding of the next presidential and general elections, the topic of the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party – SLPP’s deputy flagbearer is hot in the party’s corridors of power.
Having been un-procedurally endorsed as flagbearer of the SLPP where Bio was also made party leader, a lot of people this medium spoke to said they were taken aback with the president’s decision not to announce Vice President Juldeh Jalloh as his running mate right away, although he retains the deputy party leader position.
‘After his 2007 elections victory, former President Ernest Bai Koroma, after he was endorsed as the party’s flagbearer for the 2012 elections, announced Chief Sam Sumana as his running mate. That was before the issues that led to the Chief being unconstitutionally fired. We see that EBK was continuing a legacy presidents of Sierra Leone have of replacing their vice presidents.
‘Since Bio did not announce Dr Jalloh as his running mate then, we started expecting a repeat of this leadership tradition in Sierra Leone of not expecting a vice president to go on succeeding the president as leader of the nation. Now the whole world knows, the cat is out of the bag that Bio is making moves to replace Juldeh with Dr KKY. Like Sam Sumana KKY will not come to the SLPP to play second fiddle to anyone, maybe expect the President,’ said Joseph K., who described himself as a SLPP loyalist.
Hoping to get a better sounding of the idea of President Bio replacing Dr Juldeh Jalloh, this medium spoke to several Fullah and other folks in the Central Business District of Freetown. Suffice to say, many Fullah tribesmen were up in arms with the idea that Maada Bio could replace Jalloh. ‘If the rumour is true, then Bio should know that he won’t get any Fullah vote. We Fullah people might have all our differences, but when it comes to the projection of our tribe, we are united. No Fullah person worth his or her salt, no matter what party he or she belongs to will vote for Maada Bio if he replaces Dr Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh,’ said an already disappointed F. Barrie.
Miss Barrie said for the Fullahs, unity is more than party considerations. She said since the days of Pa Sheki, the Fullah people in Sierra Leone have been making concerted efforts to reach and break the glass ceiling in governance. She said that it was an open secret in Sierra Leone and indeed other Mano River Union (MRU) and ECOWAS countries not to allow Fullah people attain to the presidency of the state.
Ms Barrie said: ‘It’s as if we are being denied our right as citizens of these countries not to be allowed to head them because some of them consider us as all being from Guinea. When White people came here, they met Fullah people here. We have been in Sierra Leone for over four hundred years. We have shown ourselves as capable of running a state and have done from Cameroon and Nigeria all the way to Mauritania. Today, a Fullah man is running or heading Africa’s leading economy and most populous state, Nigeria. Why is it that Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia are having a problem accepting that Fullah people are citizens and hence should have the same chance of being presidents of these countries? Having since independence ruled successful economies in Senegal, Mali, Nigeria, Cameroon, Gambia, etc., why not Sierra Leone?’
For Joseph Bockarie, he sees duplicity in how ‘Fullah people have been systematically left out of the presidency in certain West African countries’. He said: ‘While Sierra Leoneans complain about Guineans not wanting a Fullah president, we Sierra Leoneans are hypocrites because we won’t entertain the same thought. Why do you think so many APC supporters didn’t vote in 2018 or were against Dr Samura Kamara? I will openly tell you that it was because Dr Samura chose Chernor as his running mate. Not only was the party not ready for Samura as Head of State, they were still not ready for a Fullah vice president.’
One of our highly placed SLPP sources said Dr Juldeh Jalloh wasn’t President Maad Bio’s first choice as vice presidential candidate. ‘The need for a candidate to use to counter APC was central to PAOPA. While KKY and Kelli might have been sound choices, Juldeh, it was strategized by the men at PAOPA, would wrestle Fullah votes from across the divide. PAOPA knows that Fullah people are dedicated to the cause of seeing one of their own in the presidency. Many people in the party will tell for free that the actual fallout with KKY and Kelli was over the choice of Juldeh over them.’
Adding to what our source had to say, Mr Bockarie noted that ‘those on the outside thought things were looking good for Fullah participation in our governance space with Dr Juldeh, but now they know that it was done to copy the APC move with Chernor Maju Bah. Bio never wanted Juldeh but settled for him to wrestle the Fullah votes and their money from the APC’.
For Mr Leigh, he said he noticed that something was up with President Bio’s first move to limit Dr Jalloh with the creation of the role of Chief Minister, ‘which is almost a duplication of the VP’s roles’. ‘Bio is a user; he can’t be trusted. Now that Dr Juldeh had served his purpose, the president was looking for a way to sack him. And sadly, Juldeh gave Bio just the reasons he was looking for. President Bio had wanted to do it during the closure of the Guinean border with Sierra Leone over Juldeh’s interference in Guinea’s tribally heated election having the Fullahs on one side versus the Soso and Mandingoes on the other. But PAOPA was forced to back down as election was a time of high emotional and national tension in Guinea,’ said Mr Leigh.
Leigh went on to say that President Conde’s closure of the border has been blamed for everything that has gone wrong with Bio’s tenure. Bio’s unprocedural ways of running the state coupled with all his failed plans was compounded by the spikes in prices of goods and services that started with the border closure during the economically depressing COVID-19 pandemic induced inflationary period.
‘Well, Bio finally found reason to justify sacking Dr Juldeh with LAC matter. He fired the Attorney General for that bad advice, but what about Dr Juldeh, the Inspector General of Police and all the others on the Clemency Committee? The president found out that he couldn’t fire Juldeh because that’ll mean firing the IG and all others on that committee,’ said Mr Leigh. ‘The only way to get him out is by replacing him with KKY in move that they hope will convince Fullah people that Juldeh is being replaced with KKY to give the party a better chance of winning 2023. But the Fullah people will not buy it. They will see Bio’s move as treasonous not only against our pride of seeing one of our own as President of Sierra Leone but also against all we have been doing financially to keep this government afloat. We will vote against SLPP all over this country if PAOPA try this,’ he added with a promise.
Seeking word on the SLPP announcing President Bio’s running mate was met with displeasing looks by partisans this press tried to talk to.