Here we are not naming names, but are critically calling on the political organization to look back and give the country one of its best leaders. Sierra Leoneans would no longer want to see the existing situation within the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party wherein they have a divided house of ‘paopa’ and that of the SLPP, who are hardly cared for by the President Julius Maada Bio-led paopa government. The likes of John Benjamin, John Karimu, Madam Isata Jabbie Kabbah – wife of former President the late Alhaji Ahmed Tejan Kabbah – and a host of others are not in any way regarded as important members of the SLPP anymore except the paopa clan members hence their curtailed roles in the SLPP. That is not good for the progress and unity of a ruling party. And President Bio must review the mode of operations once more to get the old guards included in the fold.
Similarly so for the embattled APC, there is so much internal clamour, especially for the party’s flag bearer ticket towards the 2023 presidential elections. There is no gainsaying that such a clamour is not good for a party, which intends to defeat the incumbent President and the SLPP in the next polls to take the APC back to State House.
Such a victory is only achievable with a non-vengeful and antagonistic candidacy, not a divisive one. So the APC must pay attention henceforth on the way forward as they make a choice of leadership for the next presidential race so as not to deceive the people and the country called Sierra Leone.
Consequently it is in this vein that the APC must also be careful about the manner and character of leadership the party will elect come the next APC national delegates’ convention. To all delegates therefore, they must ensure to put their country first by first of all electing a candidate with a potential to secure victory for the party, and by extension return the country to its onward path of progress.
Nevertheless, it is indeed good that everybody is jumping here and there for the APC flag bearer position for 2023 elections, which clearly speaks to the facts that the APC is a political party of action, progress and commitment, with the landmark of the lasting legacies of its immediate past leaders. Nobody is against the ambitions of any of the aspirants, for all members of the party have their individual rights to vie for the candidacy of the party’s front runner, but there must be a very competent candidate to carry the day among the lots.
It is believed that is why the party has continued to drive cautiously to produce a clean slate and a unifying candidate that is ready and willing to return the party to power. But all must be very much aware of a vengeful and antagonistic leadership considering the trend of events unfolding within and around the party and its aspiring leaders. Down memory lane, certain members or would be members of the APC were for certain reasons asked out of the party for what the political organization described as an ‘anti-party’ activity. And the individual went out seeking justice elsewhere around the sub-region, during which the APC and its leadership were critically subjected to all sorts of derogatory misrepresentation ranging from description of display of undemocratic tendencies, to allegations of extension of term of office by the then political leadership of the country, the Ebola virus outbreak conspiracy against the people of Sierra Leone, the negative international media campaign against the last political administration of the APC and so many other allegations that were pushed by some of these very aspiring leaders against the last government, the APC and its leadership. Thus the APC must be mindful of a vengeful leadership.
