Sierra Leoneans are bewildered and baffled over the undeserved praise for the Julius Maada Bio regime by some development partners when the present government in Sierra Leone remains much allergic to civil and political rights as well as democratic freedoms in circumstances wherein opposition politicians are always clamped down on, on orders from above, in the last five years so.

It is unimaginable for a whole organization as big as the Commonwealth to be provoking Sierra Leoneans in the unfair award of President Julius Maada Bio with a Commonwealth Flag for Peace. Flag for Peace for what when Sierra Leone is so corrupt and very much unstable?! Public sector corruption under the Bio administration is the order of the day. There has been no real political and democratic freedom in the last five years. Investments and businesses are largely crippled with bad trade and investments policies with so many businesses folding and fleeing the country to safe business and investment havens. Herein is the United States Government’s Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) with the Chief Executive Officer Alice Albright dishonestly advancing Sierra Leone’s Compact grant for the failed, despotic and corrupt Bio government. Funding thresholds for sectoral boosts in the areas of energy, fight against corruption, political and democratic freedoms are mere misplacements of priorities by the US Government and the MCC. They better caution and direct their interventions towards developing other areas of governance instead of funding Bio and SLPP’s campaign for June polls.

What has been sensed is a conspiracy being plotted against Sierra Leoneans to earn the failed Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) and Bio a second term, which appears to have backfired. In a governance of undemocratic policies and actions wherein opposition figures such as All People’s Congress’s Sidi Yayah Tunis and Karamoh Kabba, Unity Party’s Femi Claudius-Cole, and National Grand Coalition’s Dr Dennis Bright were all arrested and detained at separate times by this very government, there is no need for a body as Commonwealth to be titivating misrule, facade of democracy and unpeaceable actions with a Flag for Peace award to Bio under whose watch civil and political rights are being violated with complete seizure of democratic freedoms of opposition politicians.

These, coupled with what Sierra Leoneans have been through in the hands of personnel of the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces and the Sierra Leone Police on 10 August 2022, during a peaceful demonstration which turned out to be a bloodbath, there is also no need for the Commonwealth Peace Flag award to be in town in honour of the despotic ruler. It is thus deemed as untimely, inappropriate and largely considered by Sierra Leoneans home and abroad as provocation by the Commonwealth. President Bio himself is fully aware that the nation he is leading is not peaceful as his dispensation has come along with fresh wave of instability to Sierra Leone since April 4, 2018, to date.

Is it that the same international community that imposed him on this nation five years ago, again wants to do the same thing? Sierra Leoneans and friends of the Sierra Leone are saying a big no to this plot and are undaunted in their resolve to not accept perpetual failure for the second time. The Commonwealth should in fact be ashamed of themselves to provoke Sierra Leoneans with such deceitful award for peace to a president who has in the last five years presided over the killing of hundreds of Sierra Leoneans at the Male Correctional Centre, on Pademba Road, Freetown in the name of containing a jailbreak. A leader whose regime instructed the killings of innocent civilians at Tombo, Lunsar, Mile 91, Makeni for peaceful protest for a thermal plant that the government forcefully relocated to where they wanted to provide energy and electricity supply  when the country is not powered. A government and a leader that ordered the killing of a lad in Tonko Limba, Kambia district north-west, and other parts of the country thus deserves no peace award.

For the Commonwealth Peace Flag award to Bio on the eve of the presidential elections is seen as a clear betrayal and political plot against the people, considering the level of human suffering being imposed on the masses under the watch of the Bio-led administration.

The award gesture therefore sounds untrustworthy and hypocritical on the part of the Commonwealth and its entire leadership in London, His Majesty King Charles. Though King Charles was not yet on the throne during the August 10, 2022, bloodbaths in Freetown and other parts of Sierra Leone, yet Queen Elizabeth II of blessed memories saw it all in the news before her sad demise.

That being on record we therefore see no reason why the Commonwealth should be in Freetown and deviously awarded President Bio with their Peace Flag.

Sierra Leoneans and the world over know that their country is not at ease, nor peaceful at all in the real sense of peace and stability, because the peace has become more fragile despite huge capital investments made by the very international community in restoring permanent stability to Sierra Leone after the 11-year civil conflict.

Yet the last five years of Julius Maada Bio has been unstable, with political, democratic, socioeconomic, and other freedoms being trampled upon by state-sponsored violent perpetrators under the guise of security details with orders from above. Since Bio assumed office on 4 April 2018 to date Sierra Leone has not been really peaceful. Opposition politicians and ordinary citizens are under constant pressure from armed security forces for despotism. Arms proliferations has also been one of the huge challenges militating against peace and stability in Sierra Leone. There are gun men everywhere roaming public gathering and functional events almost all over the place in the country, such as marketplaces, public transport terminals, café shops and other highly populated civilian communities, for which President Bio does not deserve a Commonwealth Peace flag award at all.

For the MCC coming in to fund and bankroll the SLPP presidential campaign is an unfair game plan on the part of the US government. The MCC is not expected to be here now especially that much of what they allocate funds for are not done and the Bio government has failed in providing energy and water supply. The MCC should also be ashamed of themselves to be always giving praises where they are not due, thereby endorsing misrule, tyranny and despotism. Seventy to ninety per cent of Sierra Leoneans cannot access water and electricity. Not even those in the greater parts of the Freetown municipality could adequately access energy and water supply. What then the MCC is advancing grant for?

The MCC support to the failed SLPP Bio-led administration is a mere misplacement of priority. Had the MCC CEO been able to visit significant parts of Freetown she would have been able to know that they were being deceived by government’s reports on gains made in regular power and water supply to communities, businesses and individual homes. The MCC givers do not have researchers on the ground in Sierra Leone to carry out empirical research and prepare reports on the said service delivery areas by the Bio government.

The fact that the MCC are being largely deceived into placing US taxpayers’ moneys in the wrong hands in the name of supporting the government of Sierra Leone that must be corrected, the right thing done for the record. Or else the MCC support will yield no dividend in Sierra Leone under the Bio regime, except if the MCC leadership is in the country to endorse Bio for a second term.

Moreover, Sierra Leoneans have taken note of the Commonwealth and the MCC joint conspiracy being plotted against the masses in endorsing Bio and the SLPP for a second term. That has been exposed and won’t work anymore. As major global institutions with high repute, much is expected of them to play by the rules and do stay away from the internal politics of Sierra Leone. These institutions have resident representatives in the country who are fully abreast of state governance failures under the SLPP and Bio-led administration. The Commonwealth and the MCC givers could work with the government and get the real facts on the ground rather than coming in with personal agenda against the wishes and aspirations of the people of Sierra Leone.

In Sierra Leone today there is so much malaise in governance under the Bio administration. These include endemic public sector corruption, gross human rights violations, arms proliferation across the country, and complete seizure of political and democratic freedoms.

Hence having these international bodies coming to town with peace awards when there is no real peace and funding governance failures amid high insecurity of Sierra Leoneans is baffling and seen as a mere conspiracy against the people to re-impose Julius Maada Bio on the nation for the second time, a game plan the people have denounced outright, saying enough is indeed enough and they want a change now and forever to once again get respite and true peace.

Forum has endeavoured to fix gimlet eyes on the game plan as the devious political plot unfolds.