Known for its swing voting, Kono district is no permanent friend to any political party. Kono voted for SLPP (Sierra Leone People’s Party) in 1996 and 2002 under Tejan Kabba. They threw their weight behind APC (All People’s Congress) in 2007 and 2012 under former President Ernest Bai Koroma. In 2018, Kono district switched over to the Coalition for Change party founded and led by former Vice President, Chief Sam Sumana.
The style of voting clearly indicates that the district has a permanent interest in development, but no permanent political friend. As June 24, 2023 election approaches, Kono is widely seen as a landing place for political parties to canvass for votes. The ruling SLPP is already in front of the queue to land in Kono district.
First Lady, Fatima Bio who claims descent from Kono is already campaigning in the guise of sanitary pads distribution. When watched on the surface, one would discover that Mrs Bio’s move is just a distribution of pads. If however, the surface is scratched deeper, one would realise that it is a clandestine campaign ahead of 2023 elections.
Quite lately, President Julius Maada Bio himself has been in Kono district on several occasions on visits. At one point, he was booed at by school kids as he tried woo them. Another time, he was abandoned in a mosque in Kono. Arrest of teachers followed the humiliation of the President, but nobody ever questioned the cause.
However, President Bio is constructing what he referred to as a state of the art science university sponsored by the sub-regional bloc, ECOWAS (Economic Community Of West African States). But, the university comes 92 years after the discovery of diamonds in the diamondferous district. Suffice it to say the project is late. No more diamonds in Kono after much exploitation since the 1930s. Kono descendants have also viewed the university project as a pacification scheme, but will Kono be pacified?
The answer is left to the headline. Kono got SLPP’s negative side as early as 2018 when Bio was pronounced President of Sierra Leone. A number of Kono residents were subjected to physical attacks and forced to flee their homes. Sporadic and uncontrollable violence swept through Kono raising questions about how Bio’s presidency would look like in coming years. Many sought refuge and safe havens in the Northern part of Sierra Leone.
Such Northern towns of Massingbi, Makali and Matotoka among others played host to a large number of Kono migrants. Other parts of the country also saw similar spate of violence making Bio’s democratic transition, a semblance of a military takeover. Nowhere in the civilised world does a party which has taken power resort to political thuggery and violence to citizens it intends to govern. Post-election violence is not the only negative SLPP legacy but also the infliction of darkness in one-time bright and electrified district.
It was under Bio’s watch that an electricity generator was forcefully relocated from Kono to Bo without justification. The action plunged Kono in total blackout for months, if not years, with no remorse on the part of government.
Similar action took place in Makeni where a forceful transfer of a thermal plant resulted into several deaths. It is just a year or two after electricity was restored to full blossom in the in Kono district. SLPP’s unfairness to an illustrious and industrious son of Kono, Chief Alhaji Sam Sumana has not faded from the minds of the Kono sons and descendants. On two occasions, Chief Sam was deprived of his benefit by SLPP government.
Former President Ernest Bai Koroma and ministers of government have received their ex-gratia while Chief Sam is yet to receive his. Government cites Sam’s sacking in 2015 as the cause. Security details were also removed from him without just cause. What an unfair and contemptuous treatment to a former Vice President? Sam’s sacking is not the cause; it is mere political hypocrisy.
During campaigns and rallies, in the 2018 elections, President Julius Maada Bio condemned Sam’s sacking and used it as a campaign tool and score card. While in opposition, SLPP released a press release strongly condemning the dismissal. The illegal sacking of Chief Sam Sumana is mentioned in the 2018 SLPP manifesto which condemned it in all forms.
SLPP’s Governance Transition Team report of April, 2018 also criticised Chief Sam’s dismissal. The report stated, in no uncertain terms, that the dismissal was an infringement on the political right of the Vice President. At the launching of a ‘White Paper’ at State House, President Bio also vilified the past APC government for removing Chief Sam from the Vice Presidency.
All these specific instances point to SLPP’s hypocrisy towards the former Vice President. The question of why Sam Sumana was offered guards by SLPP government still lingers when they know quite well that he is a sacked Vice President. SLPP is also unfair to the former Minister of Local Government, Finda Diana Konomani who is another noble and prestigious daughter of Kono district.
She was reduced to a mere object of harassment and arrest by SLPP government. For years, Diana Konomani has been battling it out in the Appeals Court in respect of adverse findings from the Justice Biobele Georgewill Commissions of Inquiry. She breathed a sigh of relief only when the Appeals Court was satisfied that Diana’s hands were not on the loot. The court found out that Diana, in her ministerial capacity, had been ploughing and not plundering.
As if that was not enough, Diana was also a subject for intermittent waves of arrest by SLPP government especially for her resistance to the 2021 Mid-Term Census.Several negative occurrences also took place in Kono since SLPP came to power hurting many. Will Kono forget all these wrongs in a short moment and vote in Bio again?