By Sulaiman Banja Tejan-Sie
What culminated into a two-day sit down strike followed by a violent protest by some Sierra Leoneans in the opposition stronghold towns/city of the depressed East End of Freeetown, Makeni, Kamakwei, Lungi and Magburaka on that fateful 10th day of August, 2022 was not unexpected. The ugly incidents of that day turned out to be one of the most violent and macabre in our country’s turbulent history perhaps upstaged only by the January 6th 1999 rebel armageddon, when RUF rebels invade and laid seige to Freetown during the heat of our country’s eleven years civil war. At least six thousand people were maimed or killed in that most horrendous and cold blooded of circumstances.
The violence unleashed on that day was ostensibly orchestrated by a lone wolf who goes by the pseudonym Adebayor. The so-called anti-hardship march was coordinated and organized with the precision and finesse that belies the fact that it was organized by impoverished market women, house wives and unemployed youth most of whom are illiterate or semi-illiterate novices who hardly have an iota of the workings of cyber communication. Adebayor had since the accession of President Bio to power used social media particularly Whatsapp, to continually call particularly on his APC kith and kin and followers to destabilize and if possible overthrow the government of President Bio through a popular uprising by largely poor and marginalized foot soldiers like market women and marginalised youth. This time around, the planned three days of disobedience and protest took on much more prominence on social media for over three weeks before the event. It soon became an open secret that Adebayor and his largely low life followers had neither the sophistication, intellectual dexterity and certainly the funds to organize such a well planned invasion and destruction of lives-both police and civilians and government property. Although the devilish plot had long been described by government and the fourth estate as ‘’faceless,’’it was an open secret that well placed APC partisans, still irked by their stunning but rather unexpected pummelling at the 2018 polls were in cahoots with this semi-literate asylum seeker to destabilize the country and make it ungovernable. Theirs was to bring Sierra Leone into such opprobrium that would facilitate the mobilization of its gullible supporters who would then in their dream land eventually overthrow the elected government of President Bio. To this end, Adebayor was used as a front by his well heeled and fraudulently wealthy host of collaborators and sponsors both allegedly within and without the APC party and government. On a daily basis, they availed him with classified information about a few major decisions of government which when disseminated to his listeners, underscored the credibility and authenticity of his sources of information as he operates from the comfort and hospitality of his current hosts – The Netherlands. Consequently, Adebayor through this engagement gave himself an aura of invincibility which further credits him with an almost god like adulation among his near hypnotised acolytes.
Sierra Leone’s political history is littered with intermittent periods of violent insurrections which has certainly undermined its economic, political and above all its human capital development. Our current democracy is built on the blood, sweat and tears of our compatriots and our eternal gallant friends particularly Nigeria, the UN and other international partners who sacrificed all for us to live in freedom, justice, peace and relative stability. We have made great strides in our march towards peace consolidation, upholding the tenets of democracy and the Rule of Law. The relative peace we have striven to maintain has helped strengthen our ailing economy by attracting direct foreign investment in our economic diversification drive. Perhaps above all, we have witnessed two peaceful changes of government through largely free, fair and credible elections in the last two decades that followed the cessation of a decade of bloody and savage hostilities.The next set of elections for both Parliament and the Presidency are due in ten (10) months’ time.
It smirks of such cruel irony and rather sad and unfortunate that we have chosen (thanks to a reckless opposition), to celebrate twenty (20) years of relative peace and stability by displaying the same images of violence and destruction on radio, TV and social media that characterized our eleven years of violence and destruction of life and property. I fully subscribe to that famous adage by former German Chancellor Willie Brandt that “No political goal justifies violence.”
Omissions
One of the failings of government that the alleged conspirators took advantage of is its rather weak communication wing. The Strategic Communications Unit hit the ground running in the embryonic days of this government by total and consistent engagement of both social and electronic media on not only government’s going ins and coming outs, but on the pressing issues of livelihood and government’s strides to ease the burden of the global economic shocks on the people. These include the admirable increment of retirement pensions from a paltry 30,000 old Leones to 250,000. Distribution of funds to the most vulnarable groups including the disable. With time however, it became more of a reactive propaganda contraption than a pro active development communications outfit.We need no rocket science to know that we all saw this looming castastrophe coming. Adebayor’s incendiary posts on social media together with those of clear APC supporters/foot soldiers texts and comments on radio phone-in programmes particularly in the east end of Freetown, were clear pointers that a dastardly, well machinated and coordinated plan was afoot to unleash mayhem on Freetown and the other northern strongholds of Freetown, Makeni and others. It also amazes me that the so called high profile often vociferous civil society organizations who are normally quick to lash out at government at the drop of a pin remained eeriely silent in the face of those dangerous social media posts and incendiary outbursts on the print, electronic and social media by bellicose opposition rabble rousers. The government police Cyber Unit perhaps is even more culpable for fiddling while Rome burned. They have always claimed to have the knowhow and the wherewithal to identify and apprehend cyber felons. How they sat on their oars all this while as Adebayor and his ilk plotted what may amount to a terrorist insurrection beats my imagination. Sometimes, I am compelled to give currency to those who hold the view that the APC maintains a long stranglehold on members of our primary forces. Some proof of such could be seen in the shake up in the military where some upper echelon staff may seem to have violated ONS’ MAC-P’s instructions in the follow up to Bloody Wednesday. Some reliable media people have also confided that some police Fourth Columnists within the SLP may have sold out their now deceased colleagues by allegedly collaborating with sections of the incendiary mob that laid siege to Freetown that day. I will single out NACEED under the usually competent communicator Khalilu Totangi as an institution that has achieved a lot in the area of civic education but they could have done much more with additional support and funding particularly in this most turbulent of times.
Hardship or Insurrection.
There is no denying the fact that the last few years have been really difficult ones as the economic burden visited largely on the world by the twin shocks of COVID and lately the Russia Ukraine war took their toll. On our home front, the prices of basic essentials like fuel and foodtuffs have sky rocketed several times over. The burden on the poor has been suffocating to say the least and it is within their legal limits to demand a peaceful protest so that they could cry louder for government to be more pro active in ameliorating their plight. I am of the view that the better organized and discernible protest by women led by the prickly head of the Unity Party Femi Claudius Cole should have been given the political space to trumpet their grievances in a peaceful protest.
Fast forward and with hindsight, the realizationis is dawning on me that the government particularly the police’s denial of permission to that group carries a lot of weight. The reason is simple. Based on what I saw on that bloody and fateful Wednesday, I have come to the conclusion that the ordinary man and woman in our country as a result of the high level of illiteracy and ignorance haven’t the capacity to discern between a peaceful and orderly protest and that of riotous vandalism. Many I have straw polled believe that to the ordinary Sierra Leonean citizenry, a protest is an opportunity to loot and find an outlet for ones grievances against a sitting government by destroying public property and attacking ones real and perceived enemy. Allowing such a protest can be even more incendiary in a situation like ours where there is a sharp ethno-political divide and desperate poverty and corruption. I also find it difficult to accept that this carnage-not a protest- was about the peoples’ harsh economic situation. The hardship now biting our country is clearly national. This being the case why was the so called protest only limited to the opposition strongholds of Freetown, Makeni and Kamakwei etc.? do the so called protesters want us to believe that hardship is only limited to APC strongholds. Are the people of Karene, Falaba, Kono, Bo not clamouring under the same dire economic conditions? If it was a protest against an asphyxiating economic burden why did they have to cold bloodedly butcher an unarmed innocent regular police woman who got caught up in the melee? Why did they resort to the slaughtering of policemen who were firing teargas to disperse the crowd.Why did they disarm and butcher to death a policeman who had his gun in his hand but refused to fire at them even as he was being chased and eventually captured? What did that innocent policeman who got caught up in the crowd do to have his car smashed and had to escape for dear life? why were they also attacking public property and burning police stations? if it was not ethno-political why were all the key actors of this conflagration key APC supporters/foot soldiers and also northerners?
From the views expressed by conflict experts, this invasion carries all the five elements of terrorism: attack on the state in the person of the police, attack on state institutions, attack on public property, criminal intent to cause fear and mass murder and destruction of property with lethal weapons and violent attacks on the unarmed civilian population. From a legal point of view, this protest seem to have all the hallmarks of treason or conspiracy to commit treason such as conspiracy, overt acts, criminal intent and activities aimed at the furtherance of treason. It is too early to reach the above alleged conclusions since no one is guilty of any criminal act until proven by a competent court of the land.
Due Process
There is however one issue on which I am unequivocal. That is the issue of due process.The wanton destruction of life and property and the almost avowed threats by the protesters to take over the state must be thoroughly investigated and if chargeable offences are levied against especially those who bear the greatest responsibility, they must face due process.That is they should be made to have their day before a duly constituted court of the land and if found guilty, face the full force of the law. The government should also seriously explore every possibility of getting the Dutch government to extradite Adebayor so that he can answer to the allegations of incitement levied against him by the court of public opinion.
Conclusion-The Way Forward
The issue of youth unemployment and empowerment has always being a major challenge in our country. It is estimated that over 70% of our youth population are functionally illiterate and lack any form of gainful employment. It is also an indisputable fact that our coutry folk are saddled with one of the direst of economic conditions our country has ever experienced. While the government has put in place quite a lot of pro poor mechanisms to cushion the effect on the most vulnerable, a lot more needs to be done. One of governments notable intervention is the removal of all taxes on some of the most basic of essentials like rice and
flour. In spite of all this intervention however, greedy businessmen have formed a trade cartel against the struggling citizenry by hiking the prices of these comodities almost on adaily basis, in their nefarious bid to maximise profit. The government must carry some blame though.Taxes were removed on these essentials to ameliorate the suffering of the people with a consequent decrease in the prices and make them more available and affordable. So in this regard, government should not sit idly by as these shylocks exacerbate the suffering of the people.The way forward is comprehensive engagement with especially the importers of these commodities to facilitate the affordability of these essentials down the supply chain.
We need no education on the fact that our poor unemployed youth are easy prey for those who seek to unleash violence mostly for their own political ends. These youth are readily affordable because of their poor desperate circumstances. Therefore, the government must avail considerable resources to youth education and employment. One way this can be achieved is the establishment of viable and free technical and vocational skills training institutions at chiefdom level. All agree that governments all over the world cannot employ everybody. A major positive of vocational education is that it affords the beneficiary the opportunity of self employment. Developing institutions along the OIC line would be the way to go. Most self employed youth in our country today are products of OIC and other skills institutions. Government should also encourage private commercial houses to enhance youth employment, this can be consolidated by encouraging greater foreign investment.
Civic education is key.The majority of our country folk and uneducated youth have little or no grasp of democracy, diversity management and multi ethno-politico-cultural tolerance.Our politics has become more tribal and regional particularly in the post Tejan Kabbah era.This means there is a compelling need for greater civic education especially the aspect that emphasises peaceful co-existence irrespective of tribe, religion and political diversity. NaCEED has done a stunning job in this direction. More needs to be done but that can only be done with greater funding and support. A coalition of NaCEED, civil society, the Peace Commission and political parties should be funded and supported towards this direction
Of utmost importance also, is that the government should work with political parties and civil society to create a free and secure political space for free expression and assembly.This should by no means be a one off privilege. The right to free speech and assembly should be ingrained in our democratic polity no matter who is in power at any given time. By this, citizens will be given the opportunity to find an outlet for their pent up grievances in a peaceful and secure environment, for as the late great John F. Kennedy said, ‘those who make peaceful expression impossible make violent revolutions possible’.
