By Jarrah Kawusu-Konte
In politics, speeches often echo. But some moments, quiet and unassuming, linger long after the microphones are turned off.
At the recent Fourah Bay event, one such moment came neither with chants nor with drums, but in a tender, personal aside. Dr. Ibrahim Bangura, standing beneath the weight of traditional honor and political expectation, let his guard down and spoke not so much as a candidate, but more so as a father.
He spoke of his daughter, Petra Bangura, young, brilliant, curious. A child with eyes full of wonder and a mind already reaching beyond the present.
“She asked me recently,” Dr. Bangura said, “Daddy, what kind of country are you building for me? And that question sits on my chest every single day.”
His voice caught for a moment, both with emotion and with a sense of sacred responsibility.
Petra represents more than family. She represents every girl in Sierra Leone, every daughter of this nation who dares to dream beyond tribal walls, political borders, or ceilings of circumstance.
He painted a vision of a country where no child is judged by her surname, her region, or her parents’ voting history, but by her potential. A Sierra Leone where opportunity is not reserved for the connected, but accessible to the competent. A land where girls grow up to be doctors, presidents, entrepreneurs and whatever else they aspire to.
But the dream is haunted by a brutal truth. There are young girls with Petra’s brilliance, he inferred who are today walking dusty roads instead of attending university. Some are pulled out of school to help repay microloans, harassed by debt collectors for sums they borrowed only to survive.
He recounted stories of girls who fell pregnant before completing school because education was simply out of reach. Girls who never reached a classroom because there was no bus, no road, no chance.
He doesn’t want Petra or any Sierra Leonean child to inherit a nation where tribe is a burden, or party is a prison; he wants her to grow up knowing that fairness is the first right of every Sierra Leonean.
And his most gut-wrenching concern: he doesn’t want her to live in a country where, God forbid, if she ever faces childbirth, she must ride a motorbike to reach help. Our women deserve ambulances, not agony.
It was a poignant reminder that this movement is not just about votes, it’s about the lives behind them. It’s about playgrounds and schoolbooks, clean water and safe hospitals. It’s about daughters who deserve to run free without fear, and sons who must be taught to see them as equals.
In Petra, we see our future. And through Dr. Bangura’s eyes, we are challenged to heal, unite and build a Sierra Leone worthy of her smile.
