Sierra Leoneans have for far too long been craving for a good leader who can deliver better than his/her predecessors. A leader who can transform Sierra Leone from its current status to once an admirable nation, one who work for the general wellbeing of the people, a self-sacrificing person in charge, not a greed but one who can be satisfied with whatever is on his/her table and who can work in national interest.
Considering the challenges faced by succeeding leaders in recent times, it is also expected from Sierra Leone political parties to provide the nation a leadership who is fully endow with mentorship. As its being widely observed many political and social scientists that until a predecessor’s successor succeeds, he/she is not successful which means that present and immediate past leaders are failed. Then the looming concerns for a good leadership to take over through the ballot box.
The answers to these concerns and questions are with the main opposition All People’s Congress (APC). In as much as a trustworthy leadership for Sierra Leone is concerned, the APC already has a dignified leader who is ready for the job shortly after the February 2026 NDC.
Therefore, being one of the giant political actors and a government in waiting in the country’s democratic dispensation, the APC regardless the governance challenges it is faced with under the hegemonic Julius Maada Bio-led Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) rule, is alive and well, with tangible proves that the party is not short of good leaders. The APC has leaders with appreciable qualities that Sierra Leoneans need now. Leaders with what it takes to fight corruption, mitigate and bridge ethnic and regional polarities, protect the people and their national mineral wealth from foreign exploitations and restore the lost democratic, social and economic glories of Sierra Leone through prudent resource governance.
It is only the APC that has in recent past provided the people with tar-marked, sustainable health care delivery services though its one way or another been killed. The party also offered good road infrastructure across the country, built and developed democratic institutions, revamped the national economy from its 2007 challenges to one of the fastest growing economies in the world before the Ebola outbreak in 2014 and the fall in the price of iron ore in the world market. Yet the APC delivered remarkably well. The APC party also opened Sierra Leone to foreign direct investment among other gains during the party’s last ten years in office. All of those gains and progress made were recorded because of the high level of experience public service expertise of ex-president Dr Ernest Bai Koroma.
Taking up office in September 2007, ex-president Koroma was never a blank character. He had already served in the House of Parliament and had represented Sierra Leone Parliament at the Economic Community of West African States – ECOWAS Parliament. He also served as Leader of the Opposition and a Minority Leader in the House. These, backed by his years in the insurance industry, enabled his excellent performance in governance. This wealth of experience actually helped Koroma exceptionally delivered pledges made on the APC 2007 campaign manifesto; ‘Come With us to a Brighter Future’, which was later transformed to the Agenda for Change as well as the Agenda for Prosperity. That clearly tells that the APC has never produced a starter politician but a well-groomed one that has always led the party to victory; a strategy that has never failed the APC party.
For Koroma’s tenure, it was never a magic but mere implementation of the ‘Agenda for Change’ and later the ‘Agenda for Prosperity’. Those national development blueprints provided Sierra Leoneans with enduring legacies from all sectors of state governance. Legacies, which the incumbent SLPP and Bio are proudly enjoying now, though they can be barely, sustained neither maintenance them.
Similarly, though not a groomed politician, the 2023 and in 2018 flag bearer elections, Dr Samura Mathew Wilson Kamara is also certified public sector expert with long standing experience even though he didn’t win both elections.
Against the sound background of constructive national development records, backed by good governance, the APC can reassure Sierra Leoneans and friends of the country that the party has the best leadership that can transform Sierra Leone from its current democratic, governance, economic challenges and restore the past glories of the nation come 2028.
Notwithstanding the state-sponsored crucibles being inflicted on its members by Bio and his SLPP regime, in furtherance to extinguish them and their party, the APC is still not short of public service professionals and good politicians. APC professionals and good leaders are well alive. They did it during the last ten years and are fully prepared and ready to take the mantle of state power again through the ballot box with the full mandates of the electorate. This takes a good leadership, which the APC has already from the list of flag bearer that have so far come forward.
To tell the world and the party’s rivals about APC’s level of preparedness, the party has the required leadership with a high level of public sector management and state governance experience.
So irrespective of those facts that everybody is stepping forward for the flag bearer, it can be categorically made clear that APC leadership is not for a beginner with a scanty experience in governance, but a trained and qualified APC politician.
In view of that, contenders have thrown their hats in the ring for the party’s flag bearer seat. All of them are vying for only one position, the party’s leadership which will be won by a single candidate at the end of the February 2026 NDC. Their respective professional backgrounds speak volume, though of vary in diverse ways, which does not determine who will win the leadership the February 2026 conference.
Among them are some of the most competent contenders – former vice president, Alhaji Chief Samuel Sam Sumana, Hon Chrenor Ramadan Maju Bah-Chericoco, Joseph Fitzgerald Kamara, Dr Richard Konteh, Dr Kaifala Marah, Ady Macauley, Bai Mamoud Bangura, Dr Ibrahim Bangura, Sheik Mohamed Ormordu Kamara to name just the few. All of them are well-known APC politicians in their respective rights, though there are few political beginners among them who may not be qualified to run for the APC flag bearer. The reason is that the APC cannot afford to invest their resources and energies in inexperienced candidates and political beginners who may want to use party’s resources to learn on the job. Theirs are certainly dead on arrival because the APC leadership is not for beginners not to talk of the February 2026 NDC on the 2028 transition.
The party’s leadership must stand taller than ever, restructure systems and position the APC very well before the much anticipated February 2026 NDC. The leadership also needs engage flag bearer aspirants and tell them about their respective competences before even thinking individual chances of winning delegates’ mandates. Some of them can be respectfully encouraged to join the line of nurturing the APC young leaders and get themselves better prepared for the future, considering that not all manners of undignified characters can be elected to lead the party.
So by ways of taming some of these desperate political armatures vying for the APC flag bearer, the party should inform spirants that all past APC leaders were elected based on their competences, loyalty, popularity within the party and at national level and beyond as in sync with the legal framework of the laws of the land and that of the party.
APC, being a strong political entity with records for training solid, battle tested, loyalist, popular, and grassroots-oriented politicians. The party is never known for desperate inexperienced armature politicians. People with no competence who are busy pushing hard for the flag bearer position with lies, misleading delegates will end up deceiving themselves and their followers even before the 2026 NDC. Such desperate novices should be urgently tamed and kept at bay before delegates fall for their deceits.
Observing the trend of the internal dynamic of campaigns, consultations, canvassing and consultations within the APC, most of the contenders lack electability. They don’t even have message to put across to delegates, but are banking on the legacies of past leader and chairmen. Others who are gallivanting all over the place have never hold any public office before, but are yearning to become the APC flag bearer come 2026, with the notion that it is because they are spending money and materials wealth to delegates so that can be elected to lead the APC. That is not the point. People are getting it all wrong. Aspirants need to self-retrospect themselves before the race to February 2026 gets to the screening stage, wherein candidates shall be questioned about what each and every one of them has done for the APC and the country.
What is widely known is that the APC is not short of public sector professionals. As records could have it from the ten years of committed and dedicated stewardship, the party delivered a transformative national development, with enduring legacies across the board. Most of which the incumbent Bio can hardly sustain nor protect. Anyway that must be deferred for another debate.
No matter the mad rush for the party’s leadership, the reschedules of electoral processes by the ruling SLPP, the APC leadership is not for armatures, but for well-groomed experienced public sector professional who need tuitions of the job.
