Sierra Leone has started feeling the pinch of the main opposition All People’s Congress (APC) party stance of not accepting the June 24 presidential elections results that was worriedly announced by the Chief Electoral Commissioner, the Electoral Commission for Sierra Leone (EC-SL), Mohamed Kenewui Konneh.
An outcome which has been widely referred to by domestic and foreign observers as a process that fraudulently declared Julius Maada Bio as winner and president, a declaration the APC says stole the majority victory of the people, for which the opposition has resolved to boycotting governance with the ruling Bio-led SLPP government.
Sources closed to the Vice President Office in Freetown, last evening reliably informed FORUM News SL that the United States’ Government’s Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) has in a meeting held with Vice President, Dr Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh, revealed that the MCC has resolved to withhold fundings to Sierra Leone.
An insider in the Office of the Office Vice President told this medium that the Tuesday 11 July 2023 decision reached at by the MMC, announced moves to scale down operations in Sierra Leone until the Government handle all elections related challenges and reach resolutions to the satisfaction of all parties.
The move seems speaks volumes to the fact that development cannot strive amid disagreements, especially among government and its alternative partner the main opposition APC party.
In demonstration of the MCC’s serious about the issues, the Corporation has cancelled and withdrawn an invite addressed to Sierra Leone for a propose traveling to Washington come August 2023.
It could be recalled that the main opposition APC party had raised serious concerns about electoral irregularities in the areas of the tabulation and tallying processes of results of the just concluded multitier election.
National Election Watch (NEW) alongside Regional and International Election Observers Mission (EOMs) also highlighted similar concerns about transparency in their reports.
Election Observers Mission (EU/EOMs) in their reports encouraged aggrieved party to rely on the justice sector for redress.
The reports called on Government to extend olive branches to the aggrieved party. The reports pointed out gains made in the country’s democratic history and national developing, stressing the need to maintain those gains especially so, when the country is still a developing nation.
