HOW CAN WE HAVE PEACE IN SIERRA LEONE WHEN THE PRESIDENT HIMSELF DOES NOT WANT PEACE ?
By Kabs Kanu
For peace to reign in any country, the President and his followers must love and cherish peace. Peace does not begin in the streets. It begins at the very top.
A country can have peace agreements, security forces, courts, constitutions and diplomatic missions, but if the person occupying the highest office does not genuinely love peace and his people, cherish their lives and respect their rights, peace will always remain fragile.
The president is not merely the most powerful citizen in the country. He is also the nation’s principal symbol of restraint, responsibility and reconciliation. His words can calm a nation—or inflame it. His decisions can open the door to dialogue—or deepen division. His attitude toward opponents can teach citizens tolerance—or encourage political hostility. Presidents Siaka Stevens, Joseph Momoh, Tejan Kabbah and Ernest Koroma had all their problems but one quality that set them apart was that they loved peace. They made mistakes but in the end they embraced peace.
In this day and age, Sierra Leone needs leadership that understands that power is not a weapon to be wielded against the people. Power is a responsibility to be exercised for the people. The days of macho, King Kong and Tarzan leadership are gone in Sierra Leone.
Sierra Leone has suffered too much from authoritarian attitudes, political intimidation, military interventions, violence and the abuse of state power to romanticize the image of the strongman and the big man with the big whip.
Sierra Leone does not need a president who constantly feels compelled to demonstrate how tough he is.
It needs a president who can demonstrate how wise he is. Rather, Sierra Leone needs leadership capable of listening, compromising, forgiving, negotiating and bringing people together. Real strength is not the ability to silence your critics. Real strength is the ability to listen to criticism without feeling threatened. Real strength is not the ability to impose your will. Real strength is knowing when the national interest requires you to reconsider your position. Real strength is not making opponents afraid of the presidency. It is making citizens confident that the presidency belongs to all of them.
President Bio often talks peace but does he really want peace? Do his extremist supporters love and cherish peace ? This is the uncomfortable question Sierra Leoneans must now ask.
President Julius Maada Bio has repeatedly spoken about peace, stability and national cohesion. But peace is not created by speeches alone. Peace is demonstrated through decisions. And when important national controversies arise, the president has a special responsibility to ask: Will this decision unite my country or divide it? Will it reduce tension or increase it? Will future generations thank us for this decision—or condemn us for it?
The Sierra Leone Labour Congress has publicly appealed to President Bio not to assent to the controversial constitutional amendments. That appeal should not simply be dismissed as another political disagreement.
It should be heard as a plea from an important national institution concerned about the direction of the country.
If President Bio truly loves peace, cherishes the Sierra Leonean people and wants to leave behind a legacy of national reconciliation, he should listen. Listening would not make him weak. On the contrary, it would demonstrate statesmanship.
A president must sometimes swallow his pride. But Maada Bio and his rabid supporters have no inclination to do so .
One of the greatest tests of presidential leadership is the ability to accept that one may not always be right.
A president has advisers. He has ministers. He has party officials. He has supporters. He has security officials and political allies. But none of these people can substitute for the conscience of the nation.
The president must ultimately ask and practice what is best for Sierra Leone, not what is best for his tribesmen, henchmen and followers .
There is a growing perception among critics that President Bio sometimes behaves as though he always has something to prove—as though backing down, reconsidering or accommodating an opposing view would somehow diminish his authority. His supporters have the same mentality . But the presidency is not a boxing ring or a macho contest. Sierra Leone is not a battlefield in which the president must win with every confrontation. Even President Stevens used to back down when he discerned that a particular course of action would plunge the nation into chaos.
A constitutional dispute is nothing to take lightly. Also, it is not a personal contest between President Bio and his opponents. It is a national matter that should be pursued in the supreme interest of the nation. The country should come first. Peace should come first but peace requires humility.
Every president eventually learns—or should learn—that political power is temporary. Presidents leave office. Governments change. Political parties rise and fall. But the consequences of presidential decisions can remain with a nation for generations. That is why humility is indispensable in the presidential office.
A president who genuinely loves his people must be able to say: Ok , Let us talk.” He must be able to say: “ Let us reconsider” , as President Ernest Koroma used to do .
He must be able to say: The President must always believe that “ I may be powerful, but the nation is more important than me.” That is true leadership—-The true leadership that President Bio lacks.
Sierra Leone does not need more political triumphalism. What Sierra Leone needs is reconciliation. Sierra Leone does not need more confrontation. A country as polarized as ours’ needs dialogue. Let President Bio realize that the Sierra Leone of today does not need leaders determined to prove who is stronger. We need leaders determined to prove who can build the strongest nation.
We hope President Bio will listen to the people of Sierra Leone who have spoken loud and clear. We don’t need Proportional Representation ( PR) or anything that will polarize our nation further and disturb the peace of the country. We want peace but to have peace, our President must also want, love and cherish peace.
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