By Joseph A. Kamanda

The people of Sierra Leone have suffered a lot in the hands of the current corrupt administration of President Julius Maada Bio of the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP).

Well-meaning Sierra Leoneans sometimes wonder if the government of President Bio is religiously reading their 2018 campaign manifesto. Sierra Leoneans at home and abroad are hoping for the APC to provide a candidate who the vast majority of Sierra Leoneans will accept. A candidate who is unblemished and has the knack to put Sierra Leone among the list of elite nations in the subregion and that can unify the people for the development of all.

The APC is blessed with a patriotic citizen in Dr Momoh Vandi who has the experience and wherewithal to unify Sierra Leone and put it in its rightful position on the African continent. It is not a secret that the current administration of President Julius Maada Bio has succeeded in reviving the tribal choruses that the previous administration of his predecessor, President Ernest Bai Koroma, succeeded in silencing during his ten-year reign. Sierra Leoneans at home and abroad witnessed when Professor David Francis, head of the Government Transition Team, outlined the ethnicity, regions of origin and perceived political affiliations of both public and civil servants in the GTT Report and that subsequently led to the dismissal of people they believed to be APC and Northerners. That single action of a man claimed to be a professor in Conflict Resolution at Bradford University in the United Kingdom muddied the national cohesiveness Sierra Leoneans used to enjoying under former President Koroma.

Moving forward, the APC is the only potent alternative to unify and liberate Sierra Leone from the current abysmal state of corruption and backwardness the SLPP has plunged it into. That will be made possible only with a Southeasterner, and Dr Momoh Vandi is the ideal person when looking at his commitment, likeability, composure, charisma, astuteness, posture and loyalty to the party.

Dr Momoh Vandi was born in Bo to parents from Giema-Dama Village, behind the Moa River in Kenema district. His father, Mr George Lamin Vandi, was a school administrator in both Bo and Kenema and was a known APC advocate in that part of the country. Dr Momoh Vandi was one of the financiers of the reelection of former President Koroma in 2012 which guarantees President Koroma’s second and final term in office.

Dr Momoh Vandi was later convinced by former President Koroma to return home and serve his people. With the long nurtured ambition of becoming President of Sierra Leone under the ticket of his beloved APC party, he returned from the United States of America and served as Deputy Minister of Finance and later Minister of State in the same ministry from April 2016 to April 2018.  Besides his unique character and finesses he served with in those two positions, Dr Momoh Vandi has demonstrated patriotism and love for his people and country during the 2018 elections in Kenema and beyond. His development strides in trying to change the physical looks of Kenema are everywhere. His developmental works are all over Kenema to see irrespective of him not vying for an elective position in 2018.

If the APC want to win the 2023 election which is nonnegotiable, they should take the fight to the perceived strongholds of the ruling SLPP which has unprecedentedly plunged this nation into the doldrums of abysmal economic decadence. The APC 2023 Presidential candidate should come from Kenema, the district that many political commentators think will never sway from the SLPP. Many Sierra Leoneans are of the conviction that Kenema district will welcome and embrace any Presidential candidate from the APC who is their own and they will do more if that candidate will be Dr Momoh Vandi because of what he had done for them over the years.

The APC was founded on a platform of national cohesion, unity and inclusiveness, so it is high time those traits be reflected to the way the party elects leaders for top positions, and the position of Presidential candidate should be considered for the Southeast. The party should diversify the leadership mantle if it wants to be seen as a party of national inclusion and that besides, the political reality in the country warrant for a Southeasterner and a “Kenema”, to be precise, to lead the party come 2023.

The APC should realize that it is the only political party that has a national agenda when in governance and the people of Sierra Leone have endured too much under the current clueless administration of President Maada Bio when taking the prices of basic commodities into consideration. To salvage same, the party should explore all available avenues to win the 2023 election to free the people of Sierra Leone from the current deceitfulness of the Bio misrule, corrupt, tribal, nepotistic and fake administration.

Dr Momoh Vandi is the ideal and strategic candidate the APC should use to taken the fight to the enemy’s trench if they truly want to redeem the people of Sierra Leone from the tentacles of corruption and bad governance.

With Dr Momoh Vandi Sierra Leoneans are set to experience the Rwandan development trajectory.