 EDITORIAL Generations yet unborn will blame President Kabbah for failing to develop Sierra Leone Just a few years to go to the end of his rule, President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah will find his rightful place in the Hall of Infamy like most of Sierra Leone’s former leaders except he makes a dramatic recovery to show he is a man of business before the curtains go down on his infamous stewardship. Kabbah has disappointed Sierra Leoneans beyond the nightmarish dreams of everybody in the hapless country .Never has there been a leader on whom the nation larvished so much hope like Kabbah. The people of Sierra Leone were even ready to lay down their lives to defy the RUF/AFRC junta to ensure that an overthrown Kabbah returned to power. Their reward has been a Presidency that has thrown feces in their faces. tThe government has woefully failed to reciprocate the sacrifices of the people . At a time when Sierra Leoneans should be breathing a sigh of relief that the government they preferred over the junta had lived up to their expectations by alleviating some of the socio-political and economic problems, the people are only full of regrets. Economic and socio conditions have worsened and they are worsening in Sierra Leone. One has to be an ordinary man in the street to comprehend this. Fleeting vacationers and those receiving reasonable respectable salaries in the country are not the best persons to understand the parlous and harsh economic realities. The person who understands it most is the ordinary man in the street whose income and wherewithal are so meagre that , in the face of the escalating cost of living, he cannot provide a single meal for his family. By our tradition, a man’s best endeavor is to provide daily for his family.But when the breadwinner of a family has been rendered completely useless by social and economic condition, family cohesion itself is weakened and social problems and abberations take over. It is no wonder that there are so much juvenile and adult delinquency, prostitution and other social evils in the country. While President Kabbah and his ministers do not carry all the blame for the chaotic economic situation in Sierra Leone, at least they should have been seen to be making some honest efforts to alleviate the problems. But this is just what is lacking in this SLPP government—Honest endeavour and enterprise to improve conditions in the country. The people cannot accept the over-worn excuse that there is no money in the government kitty when different realities greet their eyes eveyday. They cannot accept the government’s lame excuses when everyday they see or hear about Kabbah’s ministers and government officials putting up mansions all over the country and and buying palaces abroad. While most of the populace can barely stand on their feet because of hunger , poverty and diseases, how can anyone convince them that that there is no money in the country when they see mansions sprouting all over the country, constructed by ministers or government officials ? There is only one explanation : Money is abundant in the country but it is being monopolized by those in power. And this is grossly callous and wicked. How can the ordinary man who cannot afford one square meal a day for his family understand the government’s excuses when ministers and government officials cruise around the city in expensive limousines that their salaries obviously did not provide ? The same “yuki-yuki”( Institutionalized corruption ), wilful misuse and waste of government money and natural resources, insensitivity to the suffering of the masses and flaunting of ill-gotten and vulgar riches that were the order of the day during the 1960s to the 1990s have continued during the SLPP rule. If President Kabbah feels that when he retires he will enter Sierra Leone’s Gallery Of The Greats, he is mistaken. People will forever cry on his name . Whatever illusions people once had that Kabbah was better than Siaka Stevens have evaporated, especially in the light of the continued harassment of journalists and the imprisonment of Paul Kamara, the use of live bullets to disperse students demonstrations, the storming of the university campus by government security forces and looting of the students’ dorms and the human rights abuses reported in newspapers everyday. Kabbah still has the opportunity to recover, deliver and preserve his legacy from calumny. He has to , first of all, establish accountability in the handling of the country’s money and end the orgy of economic feasts being presently enjoyed by his ministers and public officials. Secondly, the President must fire those officials who are not delivering anything but only live to filch by day and fish government money and properties by night. Thirdly, the government should try to establish price control and stop the fleecing of the poor people by hawkish business men and traders. Fourthly, it is high time that the government restored the basic amenities of life to the people, like pipe-borne water, electricity , good roads , well-functioning government hospitals and schools and colleges. Sierra Leone is sitting on abundant blessings of natural resources.With diamonds, gold, iron ore, bauxite, and other natural resources in our possession, we are too rich not to be the wealthiest nation in West Africa. There is no reason for the suffering in Sierra Leone. Absolutely no reason at all. |
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