By Mohamed Sankoh (One Drop)
History is Karma-ish in its Karma-ness (another One Dropian coinage), as the anti-corruption czar, Francis Ben Kaifala, has been paid in his own Leone by the man, Umar Paran Tarawally, whose alleged blatant corrupt practices at the House of Parliament whilst he was the Clerk of Parliament, he unashamedly swept under the carpet at the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC)’s headquarters in Freetown.
I won’t conjecture that it is a case of two rogues falling apart. But it seems to me that two old monkeys, who have outlived their hunters with every trick in monkey-dom, are now trying their trickeries at each other with one giggling softly as if figuring out the other’s intending trickery and has already planned on how to counter it! And other monkeys (figuratively), at the Unity House at Wallace-Johnson Street in Freetown, are now taking cover behind reticence—knowing that “the inquisitive monkey gets a bullet in the face” (to quote Chinua Achebe)!
When Paran Tarawally, as the current National Secretary General of the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP), tells Liberty online TV that as far as his database is concerned Francis Ben Kaifala is not a party-card carrying member of the SLPP; those of us who are good at surface-scratching know he is technically throwing spanners into the wheel of Ben Kaifala’s presidential ambition. The dismissive and arrogant manner with which he tells the world that Ben Kaifala is a political driftwood that is gate-crashing at SLPP’s gate shows that he has already done an autopsy even before the cadaver is wheeled into the mortuary!
If Paran Tarawally, who is the would-be custodian of the would-be Delegates’ List for the would-be SLPP National Delegates’ Conference, is insinuating that Ben Kaifala must be regarded as a ghost flagbearer aspirant; then the anti-corruption czar should just kiss his presidential ambition goodbye and concentrate on protecting SLPP stalwarts whose “unexplained wealth” he is still trying to explain unconvincingly to an unconvincing public! As far as Paran Tarawally is concerned, Ben Kaifala could be likened to a butterfly that fancies itself an eagle! The knife has been struck—not from behind but from the front. And the anti-corruption czar is too stunned to say: Et tu, Paran Tarawally?
The National Secretary General knows when and how to land the Brutus’s stab. He knows that if he discloses that Ben Kaifala is not SLPP at this time, the latter will be constrained to publish his party card because as head of the country’s anti-graft agency, he is not supposed to be partisan. He is only expected to shadow-box in the shadows but he is not expected to spar in the full glare of the public while he still heads an institution where no one is expected to wear a party badge. Paran Tarawally appears to be a man of timing as his recent timing seems to be timely timed!
But come to think of it, the now Paran Tarawally-Ben Kaifala imbroglio is just a synopsis of what is currently the vogue within SLPPdom. As things now stand, the SLPP appears to be a theatre of intrigues, intra-party backbiting, unashamed display of honest dishonesty—and a party full of people who could be aptly described as Mouths-for-Hire.
And it is this Mouths-for-Hire issue that has made the current mess in SLPPdom messily messy. When its former National Secretary General, Sulaiman Banja Tejan-Sie, insinuates that First Lady Fatima Bio, Chief Minister Dr David Moinina Sengeh, and even Ben Kaifala could fall off the flagbearer sieve at the first shake because they have not yet been inducted into the category of “Distinguished Grand Chief Patron” of their party; those of us who are not dead to language second-guess whose bidding he might be trying to do. When the SLPP’s former Chairman, John Oponjo Benjamin, says “the SLPP is not for sale”; we all know that that Yoruba-Igbo-ish head tie will fit Fatima Bio’s head. When others note that they will not allow “new comers” to hijack their party; we know that that hat is for Dr Sengeh’s dreadlocks-less head. And when some die-hard SLPPers swear with clinched teeth that they will not allow any “prodigal son” to put up the pretentiousness of being more SLPP than either Mannah-Kpaka or Teacher Lagao; some of us take furtive glances at Dr Kandeh Kolleh Yumkella!
And what is interestingly interesting about the SLPP flagbearer duel is the factual fact that, unlike in the All People’s Congress (APC) where you have some flagbearer aspirants who are little better off than church mice, most of those who have shown interest in the SLPP race appear to have a war chest at their disposal. Despite their seemingly differences, there is one thread that runs through most of them: they blend egocentrism with uncouth arrogance because of new money and the state machineries at their disposal! These are people who appear to have been so power-intoxicated that they seem to be forgetting that political power is temporary!
Despite I’m a sort of an unrepentant gadfly to SLPPdom; there are some SLPP flagbearer aspirants that I like to like with the likeness of liking. These are men who do not show off how “dangerously educated” they are just to intimidate the substandard academic qualifications of their compatriots. They are the ones who do not flaunt their Ivy League-ness or show off how connected they are to the CEOs of multi-billion dollars corporations. They are the ones who do not show off their peacock feathers simply because they got into “the other room” (to borrow ex-Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari’s phrase) at State Lodge by hanging on someone else’s “kontri kloss”. And they are men who do not think they are smarter than smartness because they can churn out mumbo-jumbos about “renewable energy”!
I particularly like to like the Vice President, Dr Juldeh Jalloh, because he is a man who works more than he talks and does not parade his intellectual competency and work ethics in bush-like manners! I like Honourable Mohamed Sidi Tunis because he behaves like a duck: very calm above the water but working frantically underneath. John Oponjo Benjamin, Musa Tarawallie, and Ali Kabba I also like because all of them will serve as red meats for the APC. And I have a strong liking for Dr Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai simply because “Nar me Soja Tong broda”! But what concerns a landlocked country with the purchase of submarines? I know many SLPPers would ask after reading the paragraph, above, in today’s One Dropian dropping.
But icy innuendoes, savage sarcasms, and One Dropian expressions aside; the ruling SLPP might face a very long winter in its flagbearer contest this time. The reason why I write so is because theirs is a clash of egos, arrogance, uncouthness, greed, an inflated sense of self-importance, and the desire to explain their “unexplained wealth” to their impoverished party faithful through insulting egotism.
So, the recent Paran Tarawally-Ben Kaifala imbroglio, the Tejan-Sie hullaballoo, and the John Benjamin hoo-ha are just indicators of what is yet to come as the SLPP National Delegates’ Conference draws nearer. If Paran Tarawally could gleefully throw Ben Kaifala under a speeding “Waka Fine” bus’, after all what the latter did for him when the former Clerk of Parliament was clutching at straws in the ocean of corruption allegations, then we should not be surprised if cupboards are yanked open in the coming weeks to reveal hidden skeletons!
medsankoh@yahoo.com/+232-76-611-986; https://nationalistsl.com
