By Kabs Kanu
The Government of President Maada Bio has gone berserk as if on a sinister mission to abort something.
First, the questionable abortive military coup –which the public increasingly believes was stage-managed by the SLPP, during which the Pademba Road Prisons was emptied of its inmates , which has led to speculations that it was done by government forces to provide a future excuse for its failure to release previously-detained military officers and political prisoners it had secretly executed . It is one of the conditions in the forthcoming Tripartite interparty dialogue that all political prisoners detained be released , with the opposition APC to provide a list of all the detainees. With the men believed to have been executed, the SLPP would use the alleged prison break to excuse its failure to provide the detainees for release.
Then came the fake photos of Amadu Koita at the Pademba Road Prisons, superimposed from a Nigerian newspaper pictorial on the SARS protests , which many people think was done to place Koita–one of the men arrested as suspects in the attempted coup–at the Prisons to prove that it was indeed broken into by the coup plotters.
Then, there was the invitation extended to former President Ernest Koroma to proceed to the CID to be investigated for the alleged coup attempt, which has been widely described as a witch hunt to abort the forthcoming tripartite peace dialogue.
And now amidst all the bruhaha over the alleged coup attempt and the investigations and arrests going on all over the country, the SLPP Government has gone berserk to institute punitive measures on the leaders of the opposition APC. Within a pace of two days, the Court of Appeal, which had been dormant, suddenly sprang into action and not only dismissed the appeals of former President Ernest Koroma and APC Presidential candidate, Dr. Samura Kamara against the findings of the Commissions of Inquiry but ordered the immediate arrest of Dr. Samura and also ordered both men to pay to the state monies amounting to millions of dollars ( Even though it was one of the agreements of the peace communique signed by the SLPP and APC that all politically-motivated cases must be dropped ).
There is no doubt that these recent decisions from the Appeals Court are all part of the grand designs of President Bio to frustrate and intimidate leaders of the opposition APC also to avenge the perceived roles they are playing to hold him to account for his bad governance and rigging of the last elections . It is also to frustrate their efforts to play any commanding role in the forthcoming Tripartite investigations that will likely bring massive embarrassment to President Bio and even force early elections.
#Main Law Courts Building in Freetown, 12th December 2023: The Court of Appeal has ordered the immediate arrest of former presidential candidate of the All Peoples Congress (APC), Dr. Samura M.W. Kamara and ordered the Undersheriff to hand him over to the Anti-Corruption Commission for investigation over his involvement in a “shady and secret deal” involving the sale of shares owned by the Government of Sierra Leone in Sierra Rutile Limited (SRL).
Honourable Justice Ivan Sesay (JA), presiding, Honourable Justice Alhaji Mohamed Momoh-Jah Stevens (JA) and Honourable Justice Fisher (J) unanimously ordered the Appellant (Dr. Samura Kamara) to refund to the Government of Sierra Leone the sum of USD727,364.00 within fourteen (14) days, or provide evidence of the loan agreement entered into by the Government of Sierra Leone with SRL in 1992.
It could be recalled that the Commissions of Inquiry were set up by the President of Sierra Leone, His Excellency Dr. Julius Maada Bio, in line with Constitutional Instrument No. 64 of 2018, pursuant to Section 147 of the Constitution of Sierra Leone, Act No. 6 of 1991.
