*SORIE’S COLUMN
TRUE STATE OF OUR POLITICAL ENVIROMENT*
The primary problem of the last elections was not for unemployment, inflation or foreign policies, but the role of hypocrisy in the politics of Sierra Leone.
Civilization and patriotism would have eliminated the hypocrisy, but the devil of discrimination exhibited its strength via the support of some political institutions, consumed by ideologies of despotism.
Campaigns are mounted on discriminations rather than the real issues of unemployment, foreign policies and inflation in Sierra Leone.
We must, in any circumstances, condemn wrongs against our democracy and always glorify the goodies that will help sanitize and develop our democracy; this is fundamentally, not practiced by our very players and their supporters in the politics of Sierra Leone. This government is therefore seeking to fix the blame for the past, rather than accepting its own responsibility for the present and the future economic collapse. Leaders who lack vision will always predicate their failure on past system they assume, was being misplaced. The unbearable increase of unemployment is due to ineffective and inefficient policies; many people are of the belief that the unemployment rate is caused by partisan politics. Sierra Leone would have escaped poverty and the present category of its GDP, at the bottom of the poorest country, if this government was sensitive to the misappropriation of public fund, and impartially implement all recommendations by the Auditor’s General Report. Transparency and accountability seem to be enemies to politicians in this government, who are bent on sucking public funds for personal benefit; lawlessness and indiscipline are now fashioned into the political pageantry by the organizers of corruptions in this present government.
In the inception of the President’s first term, he declared war against poverty, corruption, lawlessness and indiscipline. These, on the flip side, were rather declarations to celebrate them. In evidence, immediately after the declaration of the war against corruption, a fearless and seasoned Journalist, Sallieu Tejan Jalloh, the Proprietor of the Times SL Newspaper, mounted an investigation against a senior cabinet minister, the Chief Minister then, Prof. Francis, in respect of a One Million Five Hundred Thousand United States Dollars, which the Journalist alleged was clandestinely received into one of his bank accounts at EcoBank, believed to be proceeds from bribery. On the other hand, the Journalist who was supposed to be given the protection and encouragement to conclude his investigation and reveal the information, was arrested by the police upon the instructions of Prof. Francis, with intention to prevent the journalist from further investigation, which would have led to an absolute revelation on the issue. This was a test case for the Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) and the central government to have manifested their seriousness and impartiality towards the fight against corruption.
Subsequent developments of many financial misappropriations and financial irregularities that were investigated and published by an International Media hub, Africanist Press, showing systematic corruption style and pattern that present government institutions and apparatus are using in fashion to cargo and embezzle public funds. Some publications even indicted the Office of the President in fake hotel receipts fraud. Because of bad governance and lack of patriotism, these revelations were never paid the attention by Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) and the government that they deserved, in turn; huge monies allegedly taken from the consolidated funds were paid to media houses to combat against a genuine and impartial crusade against corruption in this government uncovered by the Africanist Press.
This government is insensitive to the growth of corruption and poverty. Imaging that our GDP is still a double digits, yet the government is unnecessarily stretching the wage bill to its elasticity limit, for the sake of political compensation to those who are loyalists to their party. Duplicity of functions in this administration is sworn to the establishment of more ministries and agencies.
Our Presidential Lodge that must be political sanctity as a temple of quality political ideologies for development has now turned to a social club for singing, dancing and an extreme social field of crusade. Our purposes for doing the census are not honored for development purposes, but rather for political power sustenance and the road for economic destruction. Our country’s image is rebranding itself with massive corruption, unemployment, and currency depreciations. Sierra Leone on the verge of collapse, and moving too fast like Usain Bolt.
