By Kabs Kanu
British High Commissioner Lisa Chesney, when you foreign diplomats on whom so much is expected remain so naive and hypocritical, that is why Africa will never grow tired of producing despicable dictators and tyrants like Maada Bio. How can you get so easily fooled by Maada Bio’s fake promises of electoral reforms?
First, you do not put the cart before the horse. What President Bio ‘s Elections Commission first needs to do is provide what international elections observer groups, the U.S the European Union (EU) and international stakeholders and moral guarantors of peace, security , democracy and good governance are demanding—-Disaggregated results from the polling stations as recorded in Results and Reconciliation Forms ( RRFs ) to show how the final elections results were determined in what is definitely a rigged electoral process. Until Maada Bio can produce such evidence, he cannot talk about electoral reforms.
After thumbing his ugly nose at you and refused to produce the disaggregated results from the polling stations, you had the temerity to blink first and pay a courtesy call on Bio’s new Foreign Minister, Timothy Kabba. To me, this sounded like compromising your principles and integrity. After Maada Bio had stolen our elections and while, with impunity, he is sitting on top of it, it was not the right time for a diplomatic visit short of telling him to do the right thing, if you are serious about seeing democracy prevail in Sierra Leone. The right thing would have been continuing to insist that the ECSL produce the disaggregated results from the polling stations. Without that, Maada Bio ‘s Foreign Minister did not deserve a courtesy call from you, Madam. And did the government media report it right that you were praising him for electoral reforms? How can you be so naive?
What kind of diplomacy is Britain practicing in Sierra Leone? A diplomacy of compromising with electoral fraud, coups through blatant elections thieving and undemocratic change of governments? And you expect Sierra Leone to take a credible place among the community of nations? The idea you have promoted is that you do not care for the working of the constitution and the rule of law in Sierra Leone—-just what the nebulous Maada Bio needs to continue trashing the country.
But why should we be surprised, Lisa? Your country, Britain, imposed Maada Bio on us in 2018, thanks to the surreptitious dealings of the then High Commissioner, Guy Warrington. You could very well be continuing the policies of Guy Warrington. Some of us who know you Western diplomats for your hypocrisy and double standards, l knew it was just a matter of time before you blinked after Bio started pulling wool over your eyes. It is a shame. I am even more ashamed for you, reading that you did stress Britain’s neutrality in Sierra Leone’s politics. What message was that? When did Britain become a neutral partner in Sierra Leone’s chequered politics? That our former colonial masters who still hold a lot of the aces and determine much more the economic direction our nation goes would do nothing to teach President Bio a lesson for criminally stealing the Sierra Leone elections? If that happens, Lisa, you have joined forces with President Bio to destroy Sierra Leone.
Come on, Lisa. You know it is that President Bio floating an idea of electoral reforms after stealing the June 24 elections is a criminal ruse. You are too smart to fall for such gimmicks. By your educational standard and diplomatic training, you have been able to read between the lines that Bio’s promise is just deception to paper over his criminal act.
You did not owe the Bio government a courtesy call. They owed you one. By going to see them while they are unlawfully holding hostage the people’s mandate and you commending Bio for his fake promise of electoral reforms, you have sent the wrong message to this government that all is well, after all, and to the people of Sierra Leone that they cannot depend on your government to help Bio respect democracy, the law and the constitution in their country. Knowing lawless President Bio for his spirit of impunity, you will be encouraging him to wax worse.
Let it not be what some of us are thinking, that the British government would ultimately let Maada Bio get away with criminality and destroying democracy and constitutional civility and resume normal relations with him. I am very confident that you are aware of the dangerous precedent you would set in so doing.
Maada Bio deserves to be isolated by your government for committing a criminal act against the people of Sierra Leone, the constitution and indeed the world political order. We demand no less from you, especially when we know that it is your budgetary support and economic aid that keep our nation’s head above waters.
You cannot botch it this time. If you do, the people of Sierra Leone will hold Britain accountable for the any subsequent chaos and for the evils going on in our country under this fascist government.
WE HOPE AND PRAY YOU ARE NOT GUY WARRINGTON, MARK 2.
We are watching.
