The failure of the ECSL to produce the disaggregated voting records per polling station and the chief electoral commissioner failed to appear before the Tripartite Committee to answer to questions from the tri-group members of the Committee to give answers to questions regarding the conduct of the 24 June 2023 poll smirks of impunity and a mockery of the rule of law.
It goes without reasoning that obviously the reason for the brokered dialogue between the ruling party government and the main opposition that birthed the Tripartite Committee made up of the SLPP government of Sierra Leone, the APC and international community was to investigate the elections.
The Committee started its work albeit with a few hiccups based on an implicit understanding that the reason for the political drama of the past year that led to the dialogue was to get to the bottom of the elections results that led Mohamed K. Konneh to declare President Bio of the SLPP winner of the June 24 presidential election.
Logically the ECSL was expected to have appeared before the Tripartite Committee, since the investigation is wholly tied to this key election management body. The pronouncement by no less than the SLPPP member of the Committee that Chief Electoral Commissioner Konneh would not be expected to appear before the committee to produce the demanded disaggregated electoral data per polling station should have been resisted as it went beyond logic and against the overwhelming expectation of the people that they would get to see tangible proof of how they had voted across the country.
Just as any other body or individual working in the public sector, the Committee is here to serve the people and country.
Despite the statutory limitations placed on the Committee it must be noted that governance is not static but fluid and dynamic; hence it is a constantly evolving entity that should be oiled and greased every now and then to keep it in tune with the times.
If the whole issue of the Tripartite Committee revolves around the elections results, from whom should the committee be expected to get such data? They cannot get such data from Statistics Sierra Leone, the Central Bank, and definitely not the Chief of Police or Head of the Army. It would be ridiculous to expect for the Tripartite Committee to seek production and clarification of the elections result from the Office of the President.
There is only one place in this country that deals with elections data, even producing what they had gathered; and that is, the Electoral Commission for Sierra Leone, ECSL for short.
The issue of accountability has been the bane of Sierra Leone’s governance crises as duty bearers routinely flout legally binding protocols and procedures all in the interest of averting discovery by the opposition. Such blatant disregard for the rule of law forms the basis for why the nation is at a point where we are seemingly doing things against logic or common sense when there are already procedures that deal with the resolution of an impasse or stalemate.
Why must we be prodded and made to act in line with the rules and procedures that govern how our governors behave, while still claiming to be a sovereign nation?
It must be wholly unheard of for an institution to be receiving praises and all kinds of accolades and we don’t get to hear from that institution’s head to narrate to us how they got to be so successful. If the ECSL was to be presently receiving all kinds of praises for how they executed the past general elections, it must be expected that the head or chief of such an institution be invited to speak so the nation can get it straight from the horse’s mouth.
This is the case with Liberia’s past electoral commissioner who is receiving all kinds of praises from within and without Liberia for how they conducted the past elections that saw the incumbent losing to the challenger.
Public duty comes with public responsibility. If one can give an account for how well he has done something then that individual must also be ready to give an account for why they failed to perform as expected. We must all be made to give an account of our stewardship of public trust. No man wanting to be a public figure would do things in the dark; he or she must come and do things in the light so that all will agree that it was done the right way.
That Chief Electoral Commissioner Mohamed K. Konneh neither appeared nor produced the demanded electoral data per polling station on the inconclusive 24 June, 2023 presidential election should not have been entertained.
Konneh, and the ECSL should have appeared and produce the data as the whole investigation points to the credibility and integrity of their office, the ECSL. The whole reason the APC boycotted parliament and the city or local councils was because the party and all those who observed the election process on the day were not and still not convinced that Konneh announced the data as tallied on the day by all the other observers that witnessed the elections across the country.
The work of the Tripartite Committee is clear cut: to get to the bottom of which data was declared and compare notes or data with the day’s other observers.
If we are to do a systems review of all government ministries, departments and agencies then it must be expected that the heads of such institutions be made to give reason why things should either be changed or left as is. The Committee is bounded by moral and ethical obligations to get to the bottom of this impasse with the expectation that once we get to the bottom of it a decision then will or should be made going forward that will be “actionable” and “implementable”.
There is need for the Committee to have access to the demanded data Konneh and company had refused to deliver to their bosses, the voting public of Sierra Leone.
Therefore, if they were delivered and upon review we found out that no one clearly won the presidential elections, then the legal and logical thing to do as per our elections law would be to call for a runoff. It should be absurd for anyone not to expect the country’s legal luminaries to rise up and demand for a runoff should a review of the real data had proven that no one received the 55 per cent threshold to be declared winner of the June 24, 2023 presidential elections.
We must all bow to the rule of law; it’s either that or impunity will set in, as is the case with civil servants failing to do as expected by the rule of law. If we cannot review how Bio had won the election then we cannot make recommendation on elections before 2028. Konneh and the ECSL’s impunity have made a mockery of the rule of law as they have gotten away with denying the public access to public data.
With Bio and his SLPP now saying that they expect 2028 to be the year for another general and presidential election, then the only recommendation one would think of to assuage the people’s expectations would be a power sharing deal as it happened in Kenya where we would expect Dr Samura Kamara be made vice president, several ambassadorship positions and cabinet positions be offered the APC including a House of Parliament whose seats are equally divided between the contending parties. No one in their right mind should expect for Maada Bio to accept either stepping down from power or submitting to another election cycle before the end of the five year cycle ending 2028.
Meanwhile, Konneh had been given the shameful privilege of scorning the rule of law as per his duty to produce the demanded polling data and by refusing to appear before the Tripartite Committee, which action we should expect again during any other election cycle he and his team heads. With Bio and Chairman Prince Harding publically saying they will not hand power over to the APC, it should be expected that Bio only plans to hand over power to another SLPP partisan, and no one else. Konneh’s impunity has encouraged and seemingly approved this SLPP oft repeated warning to the APC.
