BY KABS KANU
Cocorioko Publisher
Any journalist worth his salt will at one time or the other or perpetually in his life face threats of arrests, physical harm , ostracization, imprisonment or murder.
Such is the nature of the journalism profession and the onerous tasks ahead of journalists to the extent that it is a patent fact—-Nobody can be a true journalist , especially in the Third World countries without undergoing threats of arrests, detention, physical attacks and even death. BUT TRUE JOURNALISTS MUST NEVER ALLOW THEMSELVES TO BE COWED. TRUE JOURNALISTS NEVER BOW TO NATION-WRECKERS.
Journalism is not a profession for the faint of heart or pushovers. Only tough, thick-skinned, unbending , fearless and gritty individuals make good journalists.
Every profession has its distinguishing features. For journalists, the feature of the profession is not the moments spent behind the editorial desk. Rather, it is the time spent lying on the cold slab of the prison floors or the excruciating days spent in the court defending yourself against court cases for libel, sedition or treason. It could even mean the difference between life and death. As a journalist, you have not really done your job if you have not faced any of the above-mentioned hazards or gone to jail.
A journalist that is afraid of arrests, jail, beatings and death has found himself in the wrong profession. The best journalists who have later won accolades and left rich legacies in life have been the men and women who said it as it was, who stood up to every peril and who thumbed their noses at demagogues , social, political and moral derelicts , dictators, hirelings of thieves and nation-wreckers and even the thuggish and foul-mouthed dregs of society who have issues with the truth or are paid to help resist it.
Our primary duty as journalists is to expose the truth and it is a duty we must never renege on, whatever the threats we receive from society . In fact, the more threats, the more determined and unmoved we must be because a journalist never faces threats unless he is writing the truth, hitting the right chord and making a tremendous impact. Nobody has time for a limp, ineffective , lazy and cowardly journalist.
We must continue to expose corruption, tribalism, dictatorship, human rights abuses, discrimination, disenfranchisement, bogus elections and criminals who havedipped their hands into the national coffers and turned the Consolidated Fund into their personal checking accounts.
The SLPP President Bio government is the worst government we have ever had in Sierra Leone since Independence in 1961. This SLPP government is the most corrupt, the most tribalistic, the most unprogressive, the most unproductive and the most abusive and anti- people in the history of our nation.
Journalists will be doing a great disservice to the profession, their consciences and the nation if they fail to expose the destruction being wreaked upon our nation by this reprobate government . We, patriotic Sierra Leoneans , must continue to expose this government, and hit it where it hurts most, regardless of the threats from paid sycophants and bootlickers of the government . We cannot allow ourselves to be intimidated by hirelings of this morally- bankrupt SLPP government .
I spoke to Chernor Bah of the Africanist Press, the newspaper that is presently shaking the world with its bombshell exposures of the alarming corruption being perpetrated by President Bio, his flamboyant wife, Fatima, the Thief Minister David Francis and other officials of government . He laughed off threats by this depraved government to sue him to court in the U. S for exposing its grand and damaging corruption and economic destruction of the country . He is not the only journalist or political activist being threatened by this government . But all those the government wants to silence have vowed to continue exposing it until it is removed from power in 2023.
Journalists must refuse to be silenced . They must take up the mantle and fight on in the interest of our people and children yet unborn. We must continue to expose this SLPP Government, whatever threats it mouths. We must not be moved.
In the cause of the people, the battle to save Sierra Leone must continue.
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1Kamanda Joseph Abu
