The leader of the All People’s Congress (APC), Hon. Ernest Bai Koroma yesterday while addressing party stalwarts at their Hannah Benka-Coker Street headquarters, blasted Vice President Solomon Berewa for misinforming Lumley residents.
He said when Mr Berewa was addressing a cross section of the Lumley community yesterday he accused him of not committed to the peace march and that he had just left that morning for Bonthe and other parts of the country.
“This is not true because I am here addressing you. He was deliberately trying to misinform the people so that they will cast their votes for him, and also trying to paint himself to the international community that he is committed to peace which he is not committed to,” the APC leader noted.
Continuing he stated: “How can I take part in a peace march when my supporters cannot go to some parts of the country to campaign freely? I will not take part in such peace march when all things are not going on well and try to pretend all is well.”
The APC leader averred that they also got intelligence reports that the SLPP had released some notorious criminals at the Pademba Road prison to beef up its thugs for the runoff election on Saturday.
“The people of Sierra Leone are tired of the SLPP and Berewa cannot fat the pig on the market day. He has lost the election, and when I take over as president of Sierra Leone I am going to unite entire country,” Hon Ernest Bai Koroma concluded.
Subject: THE WIND OF CHANGE HAS COME
From: MUSA KAMARA
To: All
Date Posted: 13:47:12 09/07/07 ()
Email Address:
Entered From: luna.hypair.net at 194.50.180.4
Message:
I am quiet sure and by the power of the ALMIGTY GOD,Sierra-Leoneans will seize this golden opportunity.We pray and trust in God with glee and your highness and power will overshadow evil as all indications have demonstrated.God Bless Sierra-Leone,Her people,Hon.Earnest Bai Koroma,Hon.Charles Margai,Mr Sam Sumana,APC/PMDC.To all forumites,despite our alterations in political views,we are all Sierra-Leoneans and will remain to be so.I hope our opponents will not regard us as enemies and will join us to celebrate victory for our beloved Mother land.
Subject: SLPP TAKES THE LEAD IN INTIMIDATING JOURNALISTS.
From: Reporters Without Borders
To: All
Date Posted: 13:37:03 09/07/07 ()
Email Address:
Entered From: c-69-140-34-194.hsd1.md.comcast.net at 69.140.34.194
Message:
Journalists ae being intimidated in Sierra Leone.Click on link.
Subject: Re: SLPP TAKES THE LEAD IN INTIMIDATING JOURNALISTS.
From: Hashim
To: All
Date Posted: 14:40:25 09/07/07 ()
Email Address: [email protected]
Entered From: at 82.152.159.13
Message:
Well, if true ,then at least the people of the world can read about all the undemocratic stuff the SLPP is milling . But as usual ,i’ve a hunch over the least veracity of this Northern Star News bullentin . Any report from Segbwema ,Bo or just what can this APC marrauders have got to tell the civilized world about the Mario Conteh wahala . Obviously ,it was the SLPP rep. who went out with his ‘hit men ‘to kill Ernest Koroma and all the rest of the APC power hierachy in the north . You mean you guys just can’t see anything wrong with this APC despite standing to loose the coming run-off due to its own silly hooligalism and barbaric tactics being employed to ‘woe’ voters tomorrow . I only hope that no one is going to slap Ernest Koroma and again tie up Bio or Mondeh for it, as with Nyuma in BO.
Even the election observers are astonished at the spate of APC violence despite leading in the initial national ballot . But ,boy ,monkey nar monkey yah -APC will always be APC unless Jesus returns to save its soul if it ever remain standing after tomorrow’s tsunami .
With little effort ,Koroma’s APC would have got the final say had the party leadership urged its sobel and RUF punks to desist from harrasing and intimidating peaceful citizens especially those from other parties who didn’t vote for them . Such a pronouncement should have followed with the sacking of ‘leather boot ‘from Koroma’s entourage and the immediate expulsion from the party of anyone caught or suspected perperating any act of violence against non APC members or sympathizers . Such a bold leadership would have undoubtedly endeared Koroma and his party to many in the South Eastern regions whose votes the party dearly needs to clinch a final victory. Ah! but the APC being the same old man remain fully sunservient to its violent modus operandi as the only way to win any legitimate elections in Sierra leone.
Certainly ,it’s no hidden fact that the APC has been busy intimidating the SLPP strong base in its banal effort to thwart any strong pull by the amalgamated SouthEastern electorates who are bewildered by the voting results in the entire north . That besides ,the APC has readily ( through its narssisitic mis-education campaign ) prepared the mindset of its holistic followers that anything below winning tomorrow should naturally be transalated to nothing less than ‘ thieving ,rigging ,etc ,etc ), regardless of what the monitors will say . So the party is not actually entering the race with any intent to canvass for votes ,but as a mere formality since Mr. Ernest had ‘earlier won the votes’, and that the run-off was just an SLPP ploy to hoodwink Berewah and his party into the Presidency . What a travesty .
My guess here is that the intimidators realizing the backlash of their of terror campaign in the Southeast ,have already resigned to nothing but further violence as defeat ( as it happened to Weah in Liberia ) is glaring in Ernest ‘s face from all corners of the country. Until yesterday ,i had always maintained the absolute perception that academic accomplishment was a key to enlightment ,but most of my die-hard APC guys have proven me otherwise .
Tejan is not well prepared to handle the fallout from the cloud of violence engulfing the elections atmosphere ,so may i urge all peace loving patriots to pray and pray hard for tomorrow and the other day . Indeed a very challenging moment in our national history.
kehtamia
Subject: Re: SLPP TAKES THE LEAD IN INTIMIDATING JOURNALISTS.
From: Saidu Daphay Turay
To: All
Date Posted: 13:55:32 09/07/07 ()
Email Address:
Entered From: pool-70-108-205-198.washdc.east.verizon.net at 70.108.205.198
Message:
The SLPP Party is disgruntled, disillusioned and in disgrace. They are hanging on to the last straw for survival. The APC Sun Rays are blinding their vision, thereby profusely sweating with eyes peppered with their perspiration. Alas! it is too late to amend for their mistakes, APC will give them twenty more years to reform. PMDC, Charles Margai will be next president of Sierra Leone-we will stand by him, we will accept in the poro, gbangbani and orjeh societies because he is patriot and a true Sierra Leonean to look beyond the boundaries of sycophancy and tribalsim in which the SLPP championed their beliefs and policies.
Subject: Re: SLPP TAKES THE LEAD IN INTIMIDATING JOURNALISTS.
From: Saidu Daphay Turay
To: All
Date Posted: 13:54:55 09/07/07 ()
Email Address:
Entered From: pool-70-108-205-198.washdc.east.verizon.net at 70.108.205.198
Message:
The SLPP Party is disgruntled, disillusioned and in disgrace. They are hanging on to the last straw for survival. The APC Sun Rays are blinding their vision, thereby profusely sweating with eyes peppered with their perspiration. Alas! it is too late to amend for their mistakes, APC will give them twenty more years to reform. PMDC, Charles Margai will be next president of Sierra Leone-we will stand by him, we will accept in the poro, gbanbani and orjeh societies because he is patriot and a true Sierra Leonean to look beyond the boundaries of sycophancy and tribalsim in which the SLPP championed their beliefs and policies.
Subject: Re: SLPP TAKES THE LEAD IN INTIMIDATING JOURNALISTS.
From: Bambay Lans Kamara
To: All
Date Posted: 18:10:33 09/07/07 ()
Email Address:
Entered From: c-71-197-104-25.hsd1.ca.comcast.net at 71.197.104.25
Message:
People should stop smoking whatever it is they smoke because there is no sense in writing while high as evident. The news is written in English but the fact is most people can read but cannot comprehend. Please some of you commentators must go back to read the information, understand it then make responses. Is this what you are responding to or you are still waking-up from the celebrity wanabe slumber if it is the latter, you better quit because it is beyond your comprehension because it is First World refined politics. Again, is this what you just responded to my God, munku na munku!
“Sierra Leone: Dangerous Climate of Hatred On Eve of Presidential Election Run-Off
Reporters sans Frontières (Paris)
PRESS RELEASE
7 September 2007
Posted to the web 7 September 2007
“Reporters Without Borders is alarmed by a wave of threats and attacks on journalists by supporters of the two candidates in Sierra Leone’s presidential election run-off tomorrow. Many cases of violence involving members of the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) and the opposition All People’s Congress (APC) have been reported in the past two months.
“The run-up to the second round of the presidential election should be an occasion for the media to take their distance but the divisive, partisan journalism prevailing in Sierra Leone has fuelled violence and exposes journalists on all sides to danger, especially those who refuse to conform to political party dictates,” the press freedom organisation said.
“We make a solemn appeal to all political party activists in Sierra Leone to show, on the eve of the polls, that their victory will not unleash a wave of vengeful violence,” Reporters Without Borders added.
There have been cases of hostility and violence towards foreign journalists resulting from claims in some pro-SLPP media that the elections are being rigged by the UN and western countries. Canadian journalist and AP stringer Rob Mackie, for example, was assaulted by SLPP activists as he filmed APC candidate Earnest Bai Koroma and Charles Francis Marghai of the People’s Movement for Democratic Change (PMDC) on 31 August in Kenema, Sierra Leone’s third largest city, located in the east of the country.
A few weeks before that, Katrina Manson, the correspondent of the British news agency Reuters, was thrown out of SLPP headquarters by angry activists when she went to interview the party’s secretary-general, Jacob Jusu Saffa.
The two radio stations that belong to the SLPP and APC have particularly helped to fuel the tension between their supporters and hostility towards the international community. The Independent Media Commission, whose job is to regulate Sierra Leone’s media, asked the two stations at the start of this week to “tone down” in the hope of restoring calm in the final run-up to the second round.
The party media themselves have not been spared in the climate of hostility and political violence. The staff of the SLPP-owned weekly Unity were the target of repeated death threats from 26 August to 1 September. The SLPP’s spokesperson, Victor Reider, said the journalists received threatening and insulting SMS messages on their mobile phones from people claiming to be APC members.
The staff of the APC-owned weekly and radio We Yone have been threatened in the same manner, according to Dennis Ayodele Smith, the head of the APC radio station. On the evening of the first round, on 11 August, the premises of Awareness Times, a pro-SLPP weekly that has been criticised for its inflammatory articles about the opposition and the local UN mission, were attacked by APC activists after rumours circulated in Freetown that its publisher was hiding voting urns there.
But the media most affected by the tension have been the independent newspapers, caught in the verbal crossfire between the rival presidential candidates. Several journalists are in hiding while others have gone into exile.
Olu R. Awoonor Gordon, the editor of the privately-owned Peep ! Magazine weekly, received an anonymous call on 18 August from the mobile number +232 (0)76 314-613 promising him that he would end up as “dead meat.” Gordon had just brought a libel suit against the pro-government Concord Times weekly for reporting claims by two SLPP leaders that he was plotting to provoke violence.
At the same time, Tatafway Tunoe, the editor of the privately-owned African Champion weekly, was assaulted by the bodyguards of A.M. Kamanda, a traditional chief in the eastern city of Koidu and an SLPP supporter. Tunoe’s deputy editors, Idrissa Sillah and Mohamed Koroma, have meanwhile received many anonymous calls threatening them with death.
The streets have also become dangerous for journalists trying to cover the elections. SLPP activists used sticks to beat Ansu Moigua, a journalist with the Koidu branch of the privately-owned radio station Talking Drum Studio-Sierra Leone, on 27 August after he photographed an APC poster that had just been ripped by a group of youths wearing T-shirts proclaiming their support for Vice-President Solomon Berewa, the SLPP candidate.
This was just the latest of a long list of disturbing street incidents. Freelance journalist Hashim Tejan was roughed up on a Freetown street on 6 August, two days before the first round, because the T-shirt he was wearing was red, the APC candidate’s colour.
Reporters Without Borders defends imprisoned journalists and press freedom throughout the world. It has nine national sections (Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland). It has representatives in Bangkok, London, New York, Tokyo and Washington. And it has more than 120 correspondents worldwide.”
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