I want to express my profound gratitude to the organisers of the DIB Iron Ladies programme in the United Kingdom, and to everyone who took the time to attend, participate, listen, ask questions, and share in what was a truly meaningful engagement.
I am particularly grateful to the remarkable women who took the initiative to organise the programme. Your commitment, leadership and belief in this journey mean a great deal to me, and I do not take your support for granted. I also want to thank everyone who attended, including those who already support my aspiration, those who remain undecided, and those who may currently be supporting another candidate.
Your presence mattered.
This is an internal democratic contest, and every member of our great APC family has the right to examine those of us seeking the responsibility of leadership, to question us, challenge our ideas, and ultimately reach their own conclusions. I respect that right.
To those who support me, I am deeply grateful for your confidence. But I do not ask for unquestioning support. Challenge me. Bring your ideas. Please tell me when you believe we can do better. Help us build a movement worthy of the confidence you have placed in us.
To those who remain undecided, I ask only that you judge me fairly. Examine my journey, my record, my experience and my temperament. Ask the difficult questions and listen to what I stand for before reaching your conclusion.
And to those supporting another aspirant, I respect your choice. Political competition should never make us enemies. We may support different candidates today, but we remain members of one political family and citizens of one country.
I want to win this contest. I would not have offered myself for the responsibility of leadership if I did not believe that I was prepared to serve. But I also believe there is something greater than the ambition of any individual candidate: the future and unity of the All Peoples Congress.
There can ultimately be only one flagbearer, but there must remain one APC.
That conviction is at the heart of the leadership I seek to offer.
My relationship with the APC did not begin with this flagbearer contest. I was born into the APC and grew up understanding its history, its traditions, the sacrifices people have made for it, and the responsibility that comes with belonging to it.
Over the years, I have had the privilege of serving our party in different capacities. I have organised, mobilised, listened, advised and helped bring people together, including during difficult moments.
I mention this not because I believe the APC owes me anything.
The APC does not owe me a flag.
Rather, those of us who have benefited from the history, sacrifices, and opportunities created by this great political family owe it our service. It is in that spirit that I have offered myself.
The London event was particularly meaningful to me because of the role women have played throughout my own life.
I lost my mother at a time when I needed her most. Yet God placed strong women around me, women who supported me, guided me, corrected me, encouraged me and helped shape the person I became.
I therefore understand women’s strength and contribution from personal experience. Long before this political journey began, strong women were already part of my life’s foundation.
That is why I will never regard women simply as people to be mobilised during elections.
Women are leaders, organisers, professionals, entrepreneurs, mothers, mentors and pillars of our communities. They must be central not only to political mobilisation but to leadership, decision-making and the future we build together.
My own journey has taken me beyond partisan politics. For more than two decades, I have worked across governance, peacebuilding and development in Sierra Leone, across Africa and internationally. Those experiences have allowed me to work with leaders, institutions and communities confronting some of the most difficult challenges facing our continent.
But experience and titles alone do not make a leader.
Temperament matters. Judgement matters. And the ability to listen matters.
I am naturally calm and consultative. I do not believe leadership requires shouting louder than everybody else or attacking everyone who disagrees with you.
But calmness must never be mistaken for weakness
A leader can be calm and decisive. A leader can listen and still lead. We can disagree without becoming destructive. And we can be ambitious without believing that everyone else must fail for us to succeed.
I also believe I occupy an important generational space within our party. I belong to a generation that understands and respects the APC’s history and traditions while also understanding the aspirations of younger Sierra Leoneans who want opportunities to participate, contribute and lead.
Our elders built and sustained this party through enormous sacrifice. Their wisdom and experience deserve our respect. But every successful political movement must also renew itself.
Young people must see a pathway to leadership. Women must see themselves at the centre of our future. Professionals and members of the diaspora must see meaningful opportunities to contribute. And our grassroots must always know that they remain the foundation of our party.
Renewal does not mean rejecting our past. It means building confidently on it.
That is why the mission I have placed at the centre of this journey remains:
HEAL. UNITE. BUILD.
We must heal, because our party cannot move confidently forward while carrying unnecessary divisions and wounds.
We must unite, because no individual, faction or aspirant is bigger than the APC.
And we must build, because beyond this contest lies the much greater responsibility of building a stronger, broader, disciplined and more confident political movement capable of serving Sierra Leone.
But Heal. Unite. Build. must speak beyond the APC.
Our country cannot achieve lasting peace and sustainable development if political differences continually produce division, mistrust and hostility among our people. Politics must never become a permanent source of bitterness.
We may belong to different political parties, support different candidates and hold different views, but we remain Sierra Leoneans.
We must learn to disagree without becoming enemies, compete without destroying one another and debate politics without losing sight of our shared national interest.
For me, healing means creating space for reconciliation, dialogue and trust. Uniting means recognising that Sierra Leone is bigger than any political party, faction or individual. Building means translating national togetherness into sustainable development: creating opportunities for young people, empowering women, strengthening our institutions, improving livelihoods and ensuring that the country’s resources work for present and future generations.
At a time when political discourse can become increasingly polarised, Sierra Leone needs leadership that lowers the temperature rather than raises it; leadership that builds bridges rather than walls; leadership capable of bringing people together around what unites us.
That is the spirit of Heal. Unite. Build.
This journey cannot therefore be about Ibrahim Bangura alone. No serious political movement should be built around one individual. Everyone has something to contribute: ideas, time, professional expertise, community networks, mobilisation, resources and experience.
But there is one principle on which I will not compromise: we should never build a movement today in a manner that compromises our ability to lead with integrity tomorrow.
The way we pursue leadership matters.
I will not build my aspiration by destroying another person’s aspiration. And should I be entrusted with the responsibility of leading our party, my obligation will be to reach out to those who supported me and those who did not; to our elders and young people; to our women and grassroots; to our professionals and diaspora.
Everyone must have a place in the APC we build together.
The London event reminded me again that politics can be conducted differently: with conviction, not hostility; with ambition, not division; and with confidence, while remaining willing to listen.
So, once again, I thank the organisers of the London event, everyone who worked behind the scenes to make the London programme possible, and every person who attended.
Whether you came as a supporter, as someone still deciding, or as a supporter of another aspirant, thank you for listening and engaging.
I do not claim to be a perfect candidate. I do not claim to know everything. And I will never claim that I am the only person capable of serving our party or our country.
What I can promise is what I will bring to this journey:
Experience without entitlement.
\Confidence without arrogance.
\Calmness without weakness.
\Renewal without disrespect for our history.
And ambition without division.
That is the leadership I offer.
Heal our divisions
Unite our party and our people
Build our future
May God bless everyone who made the London event possible.
May God bless the All Peoples Congress.
And may God bless the Republic of Sierra Leone.
Dr. Ibrahim Bangura
APC Flagbearer Aspirant
13/09/26
