By Sidie Yahya Tunis
Monday January 23, 2006
When I read President Kabba’s Christmas address to the nation on the website, I immediately felt the urge to response as it was filled with misleading information and self entitlements, but then also decided to wait as I had hoped that one of the opposition political parties will respond. Since they did not, I do not think that it would be fair to the Sierra Leonean people for that address to go without response.
One of the most fascinating things about the president’s speech is actually crediting himself for achieving national security in our country and claiming that his focus all along has been nation security and that he is happy that he achieved it. Well Mr. President, I first want to remind you that in 1996, when you gave your inaugural speech to the nation, you main focus in that speech was poverty reduction, something that you have to date failed to achieve, but of course you will not the country that. Hypothetically however, let us say national security was your main focus, just how did you achieve this. If you cared so much about national security Mr. President, the 1997 coup would have never taken place in the first place because the entire country now know that you knew about that coup at least a week before it happened and you did nothing stop it from taking place. Do you know what your negligence did to our country and its people Mr. President? Not only did it set our country back economically and developmentally, but it also caused the death of thousands of Sierra Leoneans and left many more amputated. The 1997 coup was reversed, thanks to the help of Sierra Leoneans and the Ecomog troops, not you and you were reinstated. What else happened after that? You did nothing to strengthen the security in our country and you were kicked out again causing the death of more Sierra Leoneans. You know it hurts when you consider all these things and yet tell the people something completely different. Indeed, our country is secured Mr. President, but who should really be given credit for that? I believe you know the answer and it is definitely not you. Sierra Leoneans will always remain thankful to the international community especially the British and the UN, the same international community your foreign minister is now discrediting, for saving our country from the senseless war, which could have been averted if you were security conscious enough.
Putting the 90’s aside, if we are to consider the current activities in our country, you are doing nothing that is in line with national security and in fact everything you are doing now directly jeopardizes national security. First you went to Makeni and manipulated the SLPP convention, thereby imposing your not so healthy and very unpopular VP on the people, then you fired and or intimidated all government officials that refused to vote for Berewa at the convention, then made a trip to London with your Vice President where you both planned and called for Charles Margai’s arrest and now have come up with the most recent bombshell, the arrest of Omorie Golley for subversive behavior. A man you once praised for contributing so much to the peace process in our country and so one that has recently been some how very close to you. Are all these things really in line with national security? What should have really been outlined your speech, Mr. President are the following:
- Your failure to reduce poverty, which you promised our country
- Your failure to improve the quality of life of our people
- Your failure to rebuild our roads and other structures in our country
- Your failure to provide our people with electricity and water supply
- Your failure to improve the quality of education in our country
- Your failure to keep our country and its cities clean and create employment for our youths and many more failings in your ten years in office.
As a Sierra Leonean Mr. President, I have no reason to believe or trust in anything you say because all you really did for Sierra Leoneans is bring us terror and sufferings and believe you mean, you will go down in that country’s history as the worst President ever simply because you let down that country more than any leader it has ever had and that country also sacrificed for you more than any president ever elected. People actually lost their lives for you in standing against the AFRC because they had so much hope that you will change things in that country, but you turned out to be a nightmare and all those hopes of a better Sierra Leone were crushed and now you want us to follow Solo B so that he can continue your dream of poverty reduction (yes indeed). Well, we would rather have someone else reduce our poverty, but not Solo B. He is already made it categorically clear that he is the right man to continue you policies. I don’t think we want anymore of your policies because they are definitely not good for our country, but only for you and your Ministers. Here are however some of the things that you achieved as President:
- Helped people like Momodu Koroma become multi-millionaires overnight
- Made the country’s judiciary your personally property and ran it the way you wanted
- Manipulated the international community into donating millions of dollars, which made way into your personal bank accounts and the bank accounts of your cabinet Ministers
- Brought corrupt people from former regimes to help you corrupt our country more
- Turned Freetown into a generator city as its residents gave up on public electricity
- Kept our country in the bottom three at world ranking
- Manipulated some SLPP stalwarts into helping corrupt the party and drive out its true members, thereby failing to carry out its values and foundations upon which it was built.
Bravo for these achievements, but please ensure that the people of Sierra Leone elect their next President freely and fairly and please refrain from the political witch hunting and bogus arrests of citizens because we surely want to continue enjoying the peace we have in our country now and surely do not want to see another image of you on television crying at Lungi Airport.
Leave a Reply