For the past three days the rains in Freetown have been unforgiving.......Some people carelessly use the phrase "its raining cats and dogs"...but you really have to be here to have an appreciation for that saying. I've been here for about six weeks and everything is moving very very slowly....slower than usual. Ah really don tire wit di 'ol election bizness.
I want the elections to hurry up and come and I want them to be peaceful. And thats all I have to say about the Elections.
As for the social scene Paddies, Old School and Lagoonda are as they always are...though Old School may have dropped a little. They no longer seem to open the lower floor and the second is never as packed as it used to be. The music is good sometimes but most times I'm dissappointed. Paddies on the other hand is as entertaining as ever.....with the Kolonko's holding down the turf. That place would be nothing without the Kolonkos....I really appreciate them. A not so new trend that's become quite popular with our Kolonkos is the wearing of pants really low on the bottucks so that much of the upper part of the butt cheeks are exposed.
A friend of mine indicated to me that it was their form of advertising...You want to know what you're getting before u sign the deal for the night......moving on..............
Now I want to talk about something thats really really bothering me....Its nothing new but my tolerance level has reduced due to the over prevalence of this disease in town. Some people say its a sign of opulence or prosperity but this is nothing short of madness.
I will start with the historiography (not a real word) of the problem...A long long time ago when we lived in agraraian societies and food was hard to come by, it was very difficult for the African to gain weight....the African worked on his farm, went hunting, went to war, and had many wives and children. This combination of factors therefore made it difficult for even the African with a lot of wealth to gain weight.....when an African did gain weight.... especially around his belly...it was seen as a sign of great wealth.
Now let us fast forward into present day Africa....more specifically...SIERRA LEONE....Capital City: Freetown...A country where it is said that the ratio of women to men is 16:1.
Since I've been in Freetown these past six weeks I've noticed that the number of BorbohBellehs have increased exponentially. If the size of the bellies of the men in town is an indication of our current economic status then I must say....Business is Booming. Man dem belleh dem just day big lek fo say na competition. Really though people who I would have never in my life imagined would grow a belly, young guys in their early thirties...dem all day pull belleh. And what's more interesting about the whole thing is that big belleh is something to aspire to because you cannot get a shred of respect in this city if you na man way no get big belleh. Another interesting thing to note is that even the Lebanese men rock the big belleh hard core.
Dare I throw out the statistic that Nine out of Ten of every successful business man or medium to high level civil servant or Ngoer in this City get belleh. You can even use the size of the bellies to tell how prosperous these men actually are. I really wish I could name some names but the decency in me and the fact that I live here now will not allow me to do so......damnnnn it
Na so i go na di American Embassy for dem July 4th Independence....di place bin full up wit all kin minista dem....Ah sweh to God u go fil to say na belleh competition....all man day pass with im yone....And the worst of it all, dem kin lek for wer dem tight tight suit way day wrap around the belleh......na so di bottun dem kin look so miserable...as if to say....do ya pa sorry fo wi...release wi now
Lek ow di belleh kin big na so dem kin get mind. Can you imagine man way belleh big like he's carrying twins coming up to you really serious about taking u out to lunch or dinner....the nerve!!! "IFEOMA....ABOMINATION..."
I cant decide if its the food, alcohol, or inactivity thats causing the bellies to swell so badly. Either way, I think that these men should really be careful with their bellies cause only God knows whats really going on in there. I'm not a health professional but i'm certain growing bellies like that is not only unnatural but it could maybe lead to some gastrointestinal complications.
I'm not the fittest person in the world neither am I a health nut.....and this is not about being mean or spiteful....the bottom line is.....Some man dem belleh na dis tong too big fo dem yone good.
28 July 2007
Nataša's Sierra Leone Adventure - Part 14 - Kabala Rocks
After a couple of days I set off to Kabala. I called my motorbike driver to take me to the station in the morning. Before he left me there, he said, he was there for me, any time. I just had to call. Hmm. I told him to stay cool nevertheless. I got a shared taxi to Makeni there. We had to wait for some more passengers. I sat down on the bench at the nearby gas station, and had a close look at the non-modern manual device they hade for measuring gallons and pumping gas into cars or canisters. No numbers of gallons, or price. Just a glass bottle the size of a gallon being filled with the brownish petrol before poured through the hose into the vehicle.
It was early morning and street vendor women came to the car park with the food they prepared in the even earlier morning to sell as breakfast for hungry passengers. The food was in plastic buckets, and they had some plastic cups or plates to serve it. Their children were running around, some holding cups of their own pap, hot porridge. Some had soup, others porridge. They poured it into little plastic cups, and offered you a spoon. Everything got washed in a small basin of water, and was reused by the next customer. I had some fresh bread I bought at the nearby stall, with butter, which came in a small chunk in a small plastic bag and had it spread on the bread, and also bought a couple of biscuits to eat on the way later.
A couple of young ladies, a petit shy one and a bigger bolder one, both from Makeni, who came to an Amnesty International seminar in Port Loko, and myself waited for more passengers to fill up the shared taxi. In the end there were four of us seated in the front, I shared my seat with the petit Amnesty atendee, who didn't take up much space, and the driver shared his with another boy passenger, who had to lift his leg, when the driver wanted to use the shifting stick. At the back there were four more people. We changed the car once, it was a kind of a deal between different drivers, although we paid only to the first one. I was wondering if they had a trade union, even if an informal one. The journey was smooth. Once in Makeni, we were stopped by the police. They didn't seem to mind the number of passengers in the car, but they were carefully checking the license sticker. They were right, it did expire last year. They tore it off, much to the objection of the driver. There were some hard and loud words, as the driver was obviously distressed, but in the end they let him take us to the car park. The driver told me obtaining the license was quite expensive, and so most of them cheated. Here we departed, and me and another young man with a business suitcase were heading further on to Kabala.
The first vehicle to leave Makeni was a poda poda, so we got on that one. In the meantime I had a quick look of Makeni. It seemed quite devastated by the war. Many buildings were ruined, burnt and run down. But there was definitely a big market activity going on. Even when sitted on the bus, you could buy literally anything, from underwear, watches, sunglasses, cosmetics, cloth, not to mention food. A lot of trading was going on, and people bought provisions, presents or just something they needed. I asked my fellow passenger if he knew of a nice guesthouse in Kabala. The lady sitting in front told me, she will help me once we get there. The road to Kabala was one of the best in the country. Newly paved and straight with a nice view of the sorroundings, slightly curving and climbing up, as we were approaching hilly region. All the way and everywhere along the road there were signposts with the names of NGO organisations, their branches and projects, you name it, it was there, UN, UNHCR, UNAMSIL, UNICEF, CARE, CAUSE CARITAS.
In Kabala the lady, who promised to help me find a guesthouse, got us a motorbike each and we drove down the road to one of the streets under the big rocky Kabala mountain. The guesthouse was owned by the Canadian NGO Cause. It was locked and noone was around, so we called the cell phone number that was posted on the door, sat down in the shade of the front porch verandah and waited. In the meanwhile I went across the street to check another guest house. All guests have just left there the previous day, and they were in the middle of major cleaning. It looked OK, just a bit empty with no chairs or anything in. The caretaker of the Cause guesthouse was Rebecca, who was also the NGO's secretary, a competent and reliable young lady, as I soon found out. Eseta, by then we got introduced, also worked for Cause in Makeni and occasionally in Kabala. She worked with the handicapped, people who were physically or mentally traumatised, invalids, orphans and such. Many of them were war victims. Eseta said she loved her job, she must had been good at it. She was very straightforward, and energetic. When she talked of her work I started to respect her. She was also a good friend of Rebecca. I appreciated their company and I loved the house right away. Again I was the only one to stay there. The Canadian lady Barbara McKintosh who was in charge of the Cause project in the region left a week ago for her summer holidays back to Canada, so I got her room. Barbara, thank you! It was like having a home. I had a mirror, and little things that made it cosy. I also had a big bathroom with four buckets of water, which was plenty, coming from Freetown, where I got just one small one.
There was Sarah as well, the cleaning lady, but she was just overcoming a bout of malaria, and was resting. My nightguard was a Guinean man, he never failed to tell me, when we met in the evening. His family was not around. He came in the evening to start the generator, and also turn it off later in the evening, and then to stay on his night duty in front of the house. It was great to feel safe once and again.
Rebecca and others told me that the Canadian lady and myself looked somewhat similar, that we were built the same way, were of the same age and the colour and style of hair, and I still wondered if they thought so, because we were both white, People immediately thought I was there replacing her. I could had easily pretended I was an NGO worker. Not that it was very foreign to me, had done a bit of that work before. The guesthouse was full of books, and Canadian magazines, and almost for a whole day I just sat around and read. I found a travel book Harmattan by a Canadian writer Marcello de Cintio, who recounted his travelling in West Africa, and chose that one. In front of the house there was a hamaka. If the rains were not too heavy, I could sit or lie outside and read. When the downpour started, the children living across the street ran over in their underwear, and took a dancing shower under the water pouring down from our roof. All this was done with a lot of laughter and happiness. It was fun to even watch them.
They told me white people like to climb the Kabala mountain, while the local people don't do it. I intended to go up there, but then thought I will go against the usual and just walked around Kabala and out of Kabala as well. Rebecca was busy during the day, but she always came to check me in the morning or the afternoon after her work. One evening she came over with her colleague, and we talked about Cause and their projects. They established a network of individual sponsors among Canadians, and case files of individual children and families to the sponsors to choose a child they want to support. The sponsors could follow their lives through case files, and also establish personal contacts. Sometimes the money was used for larger projects, that contributed to the whole community, such as building a well. If there is no water in the village it is hard to expect children to learn well. Striving for children's education, but it is so interconnected with their living conditions. The illiteracy is extremely high, especially in this region and strongly connected to poverty. Even if schooling is free, the parents still need the money for school uniforms, books or notebooks, which they do not have, plus they cannot count on the children's help in the fields. Rebecca and her colleague were both from Freetown, and got their job here now.
One of the mornings I took the long road north, that went further on to Guinean border, which was around 70 miles away. I walked several miles, and took more pictures. Gradually I was leaving town and getting into the rural area. There was a lot of cattle with their herders on the road, also some goats. There were fields around, and some people just went about their daily chores. Somewhere half on my way, I saw another motorbike approaching from the other directions with two people. It suddenly stopped and someone waved to me. It was Eseta, she was sitting at the back with a black scarf on her head to protect her from wind. We greeted, she was just returning back from one of her work missions in one of the villages, but busy going to another one.
Finally I got to one of the checkpoints. I was tired, it was quite hot in spite of the milder climate in this hilly area, and I forgot my water bottle. I was invited to sit down on the bench by a beautiful police officer woman with lovely braided hair, who was then on duty. She offered me some guavas, and later packed some more to take with me. In the meanwhile she was opening and closing the ramp. I sat there, and watched. A woman was next to me was selling curdled milk. She put it in a narrow plastic bag, added a lot of sugar and shook well. It made a nice refreshing and filling drink. The house on the other side of the road was painted with interesting drawings, children were playing in front of it. The traffic on this road was heavy, cattle, motorbikes, ocassional cars, some NGO 4WD vehicles, and a lot of trucks. I decided to go back, and asked the police officer, if I could find some means of transportation from there. She offered her help, if I could wait. After a while there was a young motorbike driver, who was willing to take me to the centre of Kabala. He was fast and reckless, I was happy I managed to stay on the honda. There were many holes and some rocks on the road, and we were jumping and swerving on the seats, hitting some, or trying to avoid them. I thought I was all ready and set for the Paris Dakar rally after this ride.
11 July 2007
Rallies, Manifesto, Elections....Let the Good Times Roll
I never knew the preamble to the elections would be so fun and exciting in Freetown. Its like everyday is a big party...full of motorcades, speeches, and aschobis. All the party offices remain constantly packed with supporters in full party colors. This past weekend the SLPP had a rally that lasted well into the night. SOLO B DI BOMBA!!!! Can now be heard in the mouths of all SLPP suppoters. Its really amusing....the whole Bomba thing came from a Celtel Marketing Campaign....and now we've gone from Bra to Bomba. All man na Bomba, but not all bomba are made equal....You get Bomba en den u get Bomba way get nomba....
As u probably now know, the SLPP selected the current minister of foreign affairs MOMODU KOROMA as Berewa's running mate. At the end it came down to him and KANJA SESAY, the commissioner of NACSA (National Commission for Social Action). Word on the street is that Berewa would have liked to select Kanja but that Pa Kabbah had promised Momodu the vice presidency three years ago. Supposedly Mr. Sesay is more well liked than Mr. Koroma who is generally viewed as "conservative, im no get time for pipul dem". Yesterday, the SLPP published their party Manifesto, a 60 plus page booklet about their policies and what they will do when they get to office. I'm not sure how many of the 39% of Sierra Leoneans who can read will actually read this manifesto...but I dont think they care who reads it. The purpose of the manifesto is for the parties to refer you to it if u happen to ask them a question. Any tin now way u say dem to tell fo go read di manifesto....knowing damn well no bodi no get fo read am
Today is the APC party rally....Ohsai OhWai (rising sun in temne). Its turned into a call and response thing among supporters....you say Ohsai, I say Ohwai. The rally will start from Earnest Bai Koroma's home in Goderich and all supporters will meet at the National Stadium at 2pm. Bus loads of APC supporters and does on foot are already enjoying the festivities.....the City is red. Supposedly APC is the party of the grass roots from market women to taxi drivers....One SLPP supporter lamented yesterday that the APC party had joined with rebels...Me noh no if na tru.
Anyway lets talk about CHOCOLATE CANDY EARNEST B....As I've said before the man is a babe...For his running mate, he has selected MALIGIE SAM SUMANA from diamond rich Kono. Like many Freetonians, I don't know much about SAM D MAN...but na dat make a day na tong...ash sure say befo di week day don, mo news go day. Wetin me yeri yesterday na say di man get beaucoup money en im buy 100 jeep dem for the APC party.
How true that is...me noh know.
I'm at Wilkonson road right now and hundreds of APC supporters looking well organized some walking others jogging and singing....."APC BACK TO POWER"............."NA NOW DI CASE DON WAM"
I'm heading to town to look around.
THE ELECTIONS ARE NOT A FORE GONE CONCLUSION.........THE WHEELS OF DEMOCRACY ARE IS IN FULL EFFECT IN THIS COUNTRY.........STAY TUNED FOR MORE EXCITING ELECTION TALK FROM FREETOWN
As u probably now know, the SLPP selected the current minister of foreign affairs MOMODU KOROMA as Berewa's running mate. At the end it came down to him and KANJA SESAY, the commissioner of NACSA (National Commission for Social Action). Word on the street is that Berewa would have liked to select Kanja but that Pa Kabbah had promised Momodu the vice presidency three years ago. Supposedly Mr. Sesay is more well liked than Mr. Koroma who is generally viewed as "conservative, im no get time for pipul dem". Yesterday, the SLPP published their party Manifesto, a 60 plus page booklet about their policies and what they will do when they get to office. I'm not sure how many of the 39% of Sierra Leoneans who can read will actually read this manifesto...but I dont think they care who reads it. The purpose of the manifesto is for the parties to refer you to it if u happen to ask them a question. Any tin now way u say dem to tell fo go read di manifesto....knowing damn well no bodi no get fo read am
Today is the APC party rally....Ohsai OhWai (rising sun in temne). Its turned into a call and response thing among supporters....you say Ohsai, I say Ohwai. The rally will start from Earnest Bai Koroma's home in Goderich and all supporters will meet at the National Stadium at 2pm. Bus loads of APC supporters and does on foot are already enjoying the festivities.....the City is red. Supposedly APC is the party of the grass roots from market women to taxi drivers....One SLPP supporter lamented yesterday that the APC party had joined with rebels...Me noh no if na tru.
Anyway lets talk about CHOCOLATE CANDY EARNEST B....As I've said before the man is a babe...For his running mate, he has selected MALIGIE SAM SUMANA from diamond rich Kono. Like many Freetonians, I don't know much about SAM D MAN...but na dat make a day na tong...ash sure say befo di week day don, mo news go day. Wetin me yeri yesterday na say di man get beaucoup money en im buy 100 jeep dem for the APC party.
How true that is...me noh know.
I'm at Wilkonson road right now and hundreds of APC supporters looking well organized some walking others jogging and singing....."APC BACK TO POWER"............."NA NOW DI CASE DON WAM"
I'm heading to town to look around.
THE ELECTIONS ARE NOT A FORE GONE CONCLUSION.........THE WHEELS OF DEMOCRACY ARE IS IN FULL EFFECT IN THIS COUNTRY.........STAY TUNED FOR MORE EXCITING ELECTION TALK FROM FREETOWN
9 July 2007
a sunday at lakka and a friday at wilberforce
it is a sleepy sunday evening. the hum of the generator is going. i type from the balcony of the hostel where i’m staying. i feel a relaxed sleepy sort of satisfaction, the sort you get after a day of swimming in the sea and lounging in the sun. myself and six friends went to lakka on the recommendation of an american who has spent a lot of time in freetown (although she did seem most enthralled with the cute puppies at pierre’s beach resort, that you can actually play with).
perhaps it is because of the rain, but the road to lakka was 4WD material. our taxi driver seemed a bit upset at the number of rocks scraping the bottom of his car as we bumped in and over potholes.. he also wasn’t too happy about having a mud sprayed car by the end of the day. today lakka was a quiet pleasant beach. i expected far more people and beach boys. the sea was beautiful and the beach was lined with palm trees. we walked to a small island just off shore when the tide was low, they had a hard rock ‘cafe’. i bought a coconut from a kid who was eating his way through a mountain of coconuts with his friends. i don’t like the water too much, so he artfully demonstrated how to ‘skull’ a coconut in one gulp. i walked along the beach with my head in a coconut, trying to scrape the flesh off with my teeth. as the day wore on, our quiet beach hideaway was infiltrated with SLPP supporters in green, all going to pierre’s beach resort because solomon berewa (presidential candidate) and his running mate were due to arrive. we ate lunch there and watched proceedings, but i never saw solo b. or maybe i did and i just didn’t recognise him. although i would think he’d have a crowd around him. the resort’s sound system played quite a lot of songs critical of sierra leone politicians (a lot of emmerson songs) which i thought was quite funny as emmerson is discreetly criticising the SLPP. i also saw one guy who looked like he was dressed as a tree. he had green fronds all over him. he was dancing around and kids were following him and banging drums. i asked why he was dressed like a tree and dancing around and apparently it had something to do with the SLPP coming. but i think there was something more interesting going on that i didn’t pick up on.
on friday i went back to my favourite spot to hang out, the slum behind the wilberforce barracks. i saw my friends juliette, mehsa, khady, tala, mahawa and all their children (who came and hung on to me so tightly i struggled to maintain my balance as i was making my way about the sewers and rocky pathways). i talked with four low level soldiers who have a shack next to moses’ sisters’ place. they were drinking palm wine and smoking ganja but keen to speak with me as they’d seen me about the place. samuel wasn’t born in freetown, but became a rebel fighter during the war, which brought him to freetown. after the war, he was integrated into the national military and trained as a driver. he still thinks that change in sierra leone will only come at the end of a gun, which i found a bit scary. he said he’s not going to vote because he is confused about the different parties. daniel said he isn’t going to vote because all the parties are saying the same thing (they will provide electricity, piped water, roads and jobs), and he thinks none will deliver, so there is no point. all the soldiers i talked to said that their monthly income is 64,000 leones, that is approx 11 pounds per month. all said their standard of living had dropped since before the war. they don’t get issued boots anymore. samuel said he often eats just garri (dried ground cassava), sometimes with water and sometimes plain and he drinks palm wine to dull the feeling of hunger. interestingly, mohammed had been to china for military training but said that he would still prefer to live in sierra leone than china. must have been grim in china. we spoke chinese to each other which seemed a bit surreal. an australian and a sierra leonean speaking chinese in a slum in freetown. their views on women was also interesting. daniel said he wouldn’t marry a woman who worked as a radio broadcaster because she must sleep around to get such a position. she would be the lover of a politician while her husband is at home. most were adamant that while it is OK for a woman to earn money, she must submit to her husband in the home. she must be humble. only babakar greatly admired strong women and said he’d marry a strong educated woman in a flash, if only he would be so fortunate to have such a woman attracted to him, a poor uneducated man. when he said he admired ellen sirleaf-johnson (liberian president), the other men laughed and said she’s sleeping with pa kabbah (sierra leone president).
after sitting with the men for about three hours, i caught up with marian, who showed me where she sleeps. we get along well as we are close in age. she has worked hard selling ice lollies and fishballs at the market to put herself through university (in conjunction with a donation from her uncle). she’s hoping to one day travel abroad for postgraduate studies (LSE is her number one wish). go girl. she pulled out some of her good clothes (for church) and i tried them on. she wrapped my head as well. and we ate some rice with groundnut stew and fishballs (home made of course). to be honest, i don’t like the fishballs much because i’ve watched the women making them and they use all the scrap parts of fish, the heads, the tails, the spine. they pound it is the mortar and pestle. so marian ate the fishballs while i had rice and sauce.
i rounded off my day in wilberforce by attending the SLPP youth group meeting at the wilberforce barracks, out of curiosity. i got there a bit late so caused a bit of a stir when i came in. the guy at the front (they were calling him mr chairman) asked me to sit with him, facing all the young people. i was embarrassed and said i’d rather sit at the back. for the first few minutes, a few were twisting in their seats to look at me, but then they forgot about me. i noticed immediately that it was all young men in there. i asked if it was a men’s only youth group but apparently it is open to women as well. i’m not sure why there were no women, but intend to ask around. the meeting was pretty boring, they were talking about mundane things like venue locations, prices, times, and schedules for some upcoming events. many of the young men were keen to speak with me after the meeting. unfortunately, i had to leave so i didn’t get home too late but i promised i would go back and speak with some of them. i’m interested in their views of the upcoming elections and what motivated these young men to be politically active.
we went to paddy’s nightclub on friday night. on friends’ advice, we didn’t bother heading off until 12.30am or so. we got there at 1am and as we were told, no one was dancing. in fact no one really started jiving until 2.30am. i liked people watching though. there was one prostitute in a low slung blue dress (very mini) with gold heels and a blonde wig. the bouncers wouldn’t let her in because ‘your skirt is too short’, but after money changed hands, she was in, along with us. while there were many prostitutes in the place, i kept my eye on her as i was curious to see how quickly she could ply her trade. after getting some drinks from a few foreign men, she headed off with one white guy to the car park at the back. from where i was sitting (in the outdoor area by the water), i could see negotiations going on between some sierra leonean guys, the white guy and the prostitute. it looked like a heated debate was going on and before i knew it, one of the sierra leonean guys punched the prostitute so hard she fell over. she staggered away and i didn’t see her again. the white guy stood there awkwardly and slowly inched himself away from the situation and back into the throbbing heart of paddy’s. hitting the dance floor was fun, apart from a few leery men. my favourite moment was when a song was played on the dance floor which is by two guys from the youth group i go. it is called o’salone, by d’mark and lamza t, two young fellows i like very much. they only recorded it a few weeks ago and mixed it last week at studio j (i was with them). i was sad that they weren’t there to hear their song played in front of a crowd. when i saw them on saturday they were so happy to hear their song had been played and lots of people danced to it. i was also pretty happy to hear ‘di pa dae pack for go’ because that is one of the few salone songs i know all the lyrics to. they also played ‘mama africa’ by akon, which i’ve been hearing everywhere. as well as the ganja farmer/planter song. i wanted to leave by about 4.30 but moses said the cab drivers are dangerous at night and was reluctant to leave until the muezzin sings in the morning (for the muslim prayers). so we hung around till 5. it wasn’t nice feeling trapped at the nightclub. for a second i envied the rich foreigners who have their own cars and drivers. even when we left, we got another sierra leonean friend to ride with us to make us safer.
perhaps it is because of the rain, but the road to lakka was 4WD material. our taxi driver seemed a bit upset at the number of rocks scraping the bottom of his car as we bumped in and over potholes.. he also wasn’t too happy about having a mud sprayed car by the end of the day. today lakka was a quiet pleasant beach. i expected far more people and beach boys. the sea was beautiful and the beach was lined with palm trees. we walked to a small island just off shore when the tide was low, they had a hard rock ‘cafe’. i bought a coconut from a kid who was eating his way through a mountain of coconuts with his friends. i don’t like the water too much, so he artfully demonstrated how to ‘skull’ a coconut in one gulp. i walked along the beach with my head in a coconut, trying to scrape the flesh off with my teeth. as the day wore on, our quiet beach hideaway was infiltrated with SLPP supporters in green, all going to pierre’s beach resort because solomon berewa (presidential candidate) and his running mate were due to arrive. we ate lunch there and watched proceedings, but i never saw solo b. or maybe i did and i just didn’t recognise him. although i would think he’d have a crowd around him. the resort’s sound system played quite a lot of songs critical of sierra leone politicians (a lot of emmerson songs) which i thought was quite funny as emmerson is discreetly criticising the SLPP. i also saw one guy who looked like he was dressed as a tree. he had green fronds all over him. he was dancing around and kids were following him and banging drums. i asked why he was dressed like a tree and dancing around and apparently it had something to do with the SLPP coming. but i think there was something more interesting going on that i didn’t pick up on.
on friday i went back to my favourite spot to hang out, the slum behind the wilberforce barracks. i saw my friends juliette, mehsa, khady, tala, mahawa and all their children (who came and hung on to me so tightly i struggled to maintain my balance as i was making my way about the sewers and rocky pathways). i talked with four low level soldiers who have a shack next to moses’ sisters’ place. they were drinking palm wine and smoking ganja but keen to speak with me as they’d seen me about the place. samuel wasn’t born in freetown, but became a rebel fighter during the war, which brought him to freetown. after the war, he was integrated into the national military and trained as a driver. he still thinks that change in sierra leone will only come at the end of a gun, which i found a bit scary. he said he’s not going to vote because he is confused about the different parties. daniel said he isn’t going to vote because all the parties are saying the same thing (they will provide electricity, piped water, roads and jobs), and he thinks none will deliver, so there is no point. all the soldiers i talked to said that their monthly income is 64,000 leones, that is approx 11 pounds per month. all said their standard of living had dropped since before the war. they don’t get issued boots anymore. samuel said he often eats just garri (dried ground cassava), sometimes with water and sometimes plain and he drinks palm wine to dull the feeling of hunger. interestingly, mohammed had been to china for military training but said that he would still prefer to live in sierra leone than china. must have been grim in china. we spoke chinese to each other which seemed a bit surreal. an australian and a sierra leonean speaking chinese in a slum in freetown. their views on women was also interesting. daniel said he wouldn’t marry a woman who worked as a radio broadcaster because she must sleep around to get such a position. she would be the lover of a politician while her husband is at home. most were adamant that while it is OK for a woman to earn money, she must submit to her husband in the home. she must be humble. only babakar greatly admired strong women and said he’d marry a strong educated woman in a flash, if only he would be so fortunate to have such a woman attracted to him, a poor uneducated man. when he said he admired ellen sirleaf-johnson (liberian president), the other men laughed and said she’s sleeping with pa kabbah (sierra leone president).
after sitting with the men for about three hours, i caught up with marian, who showed me where she sleeps. we get along well as we are close in age. she has worked hard selling ice lollies and fishballs at the market to put herself through university (in conjunction with a donation from her uncle). she’s hoping to one day travel abroad for postgraduate studies (LSE is her number one wish). go girl. she pulled out some of her good clothes (for church) and i tried them on. she wrapped my head as well. and we ate some rice with groundnut stew and fishballs (home made of course). to be honest, i don’t like the fishballs much because i’ve watched the women making them and they use all the scrap parts of fish, the heads, the tails, the spine. they pound it is the mortar and pestle. so marian ate the fishballs while i had rice and sauce.
i rounded off my day in wilberforce by attending the SLPP youth group meeting at the wilberforce barracks, out of curiosity. i got there a bit late so caused a bit of a stir when i came in. the guy at the front (they were calling him mr chairman) asked me to sit with him, facing all the young people. i was embarrassed and said i’d rather sit at the back. for the first few minutes, a few were twisting in their seats to look at me, but then they forgot about me. i noticed immediately that it was all young men in there. i asked if it was a men’s only youth group but apparently it is open to women as well. i’m not sure why there were no women, but intend to ask around. the meeting was pretty boring, they were talking about mundane things like venue locations, prices, times, and schedules for some upcoming events. many of the young men were keen to speak with me after the meeting. unfortunately, i had to leave so i didn’t get home too late but i promised i would go back and speak with some of them. i’m interested in their views of the upcoming elections and what motivated these young men to be politically active.
we went to paddy’s nightclub on friday night. on friends’ advice, we didn’t bother heading off until 12.30am or so. we got there at 1am and as we were told, no one was dancing. in fact no one really started jiving until 2.30am. i liked people watching though. there was one prostitute in a low slung blue dress (very mini) with gold heels and a blonde wig. the bouncers wouldn’t let her in because ‘your skirt is too short’, but after money changed hands, she was in, along with us. while there were many prostitutes in the place, i kept my eye on her as i was curious to see how quickly she could ply her trade. after getting some drinks from a few foreign men, she headed off with one white guy to the car park at the back. from where i was sitting (in the outdoor area by the water), i could see negotiations going on between some sierra leonean guys, the white guy and the prostitute. it looked like a heated debate was going on and before i knew it, one of the sierra leonean guys punched the prostitute so hard she fell over. she staggered away and i didn’t see her again. the white guy stood there awkwardly and slowly inched himself away from the situation and back into the throbbing heart of paddy’s. hitting the dance floor was fun, apart from a few leery men. my favourite moment was when a song was played on the dance floor which is by two guys from the youth group i go. it is called o’salone, by d’mark and lamza t, two young fellows i like very much. they only recorded it a few weeks ago and mixed it last week at studio j (i was with them). i was sad that they weren’t there to hear their song played in front of a crowd. when i saw them on saturday they were so happy to hear their song had been played and lots of people danced to it. i was also pretty happy to hear ‘di pa dae pack for go’ because that is one of the few salone songs i know all the lyrics to. they also played ‘mama africa’ by akon, which i’ve been hearing everywhere. as well as the ganja farmer/planter song. i wanted to leave by about 4.30 but moses said the cab drivers are dangerous at night and was reluctant to leave until the muezzin sings in the morning (for the muslim prayers). so we hung around till 5. it wasn’t nice feeling trapped at the nightclub. for a second i envied the rich foreigners who have their own cars and drivers. even when we left, we got another sierra leonean friend to ride with us to make us safer.
4 July 2007
7th day in freetown
for most of yesterday and today it has rained and rained and rained. joshua told me the rains have set in early this year and now it will rain solidly until the end of august. i woke this morning to the deafening roar of rain slamming into tin roofs, plastic sheeted huts, palm trees and finally landing onto the muddy road below the hostel, where it made its way into red-brown torrents of water rushing down gutters & roads. while most people i could see were sheltering under road side huts and little homes, some intrepid school kids with great big umbrellas carefully picked their way among various streams running along the road. one woman carrying crates of eggs on her head had no defence against the rain and walked with a look of grim determination on her face. mangy dogs appeared to laugh at her from the comfort of their shelters.
then it was time for me to face the rain. the hardest thing is negotiating ankle deep streams of water rushing across roads while wearing flip flops. i nearly lost them several times. the boys sheltering in the huts kept shouting out ‘white gyal white gyal, how you?’ and i kept answering ‘wet’ and i could smell their ganja in the air.
we had enough money for diesel for the generator at the youth centre today which was exciting, because that equates to internet access. but the most endearing thing was watching the kids sit at the computers before the generator was turned on, practicing typing on the keyboards with all their fingers. typing messages into thin air. some are quite good, others struggle. when they get a chance to type properly, most of them type ‘my name is hawa, i am 17 years old, i live on wilberforce road and i have three sisters’. or something like that. a few actually surf the net and open yahoo accounts and all the spam mails that come with them. the computers are riddled with viruses.
i had an enjoyable conversation with precocious 12 year old jaz who gave me the low down on the differences and similarities between the three main political parties running for the presidential elections in august. according to jaz, they all promise to provide electricity, piped water and roads and so voting comes down to who you think is being the most honest. when i asked him where he learns about politics, he answered that his grandmother teaches him everything about ‘politricks’ and he wants to learn all about politricks so he can be a president one day. it seems a common ambition.
when moses turned up, we headed off to meet his friend in the military barracks in wilberforce. i met alvie sitting outside a house with some of his friends. i told him about what i’m interested in and what i’m studying and he offered to help me out by getting a group of people together who i can talk with. once practicalities were out of the way, talk descended into sierra leone politics, as always. we mostly talked about freedom of speech (and lack thereof), journalists, corruption, ‘what is a bribe’, and most of the boys seemed to agree that military dictatorship was preferable to the current system because ‘at least when the NPRC (?) overthrew APC, things got done, electricity came back’. alvie said you need someone strong, even if brutal, to get things in order and that to call the current system a ‘democracy’ is a farce anyway.
when the rain died down enough to leave, moses and i made our way to his aunty’s house in the slum behind the barracks. i love going there because it is so crammed with life. everything is done in the open. cooking, washing, cleaning, talking, arguing, playing, listening to the radio. there are washing lines strung about and clothes also hang from useless electricity wires. chickens dart about the place, hopping across sewers and narrow rocky steps to find little bits of rice. most dogs just lie about looking faintly amused. the kids there are really not shy at all. it seems they all want to hold my hand, i just don’t have enough hands for them all. and i just seemed to collect more of them as i walk along. moses and i talked to a few ladies about joining my group for talks. most of them said no. i’m not sure if they are shy or don’t like me or maybe just suspicious of white girls wanting to talk about politics. but then we talked with aunty who, although shy, agreed to help me get a women’s group together. we start tomorrow morning.
we sat outside moses aunty’s hut and i had kids draped all over me. fatu took special dibs and instructed all the other children not to touch me, i belonged to her. a bossy 6 year old. like 6 year old girls anywhere in the world. i watched moses’ sister cooking plasas. she had two coal fires going outside. one for the rice and one for the plasas. she finely chopped up potato leaves, pounded chillis (peppers) with a large mortar & pestle, added small pieces of dried fish and a she emptied a little knotted plastic bag full of bright orange palm oil into the mix. i think she added an onion and a few other things, but i’m not sure what they were. moses said every meal is plasas. they cook once a day in the afternoon and then have cold leftover rice for breakfast. moses and i shared a plate of very oily plasas. when moses finished he had orange lips. i probably did too. afterwards i gave the kids a lollipop each. they all sucked happily and when i wasn’t looking, fatu stuck her lollipop in my mouth and i briefly wondered how clean her mouth was... and then decided best not to worry.. and handed her lollipop back. it was nice to lean back on the little wooden stools and just watch life go by. moses step sister warmed some water on the coals and went to wash. some military men walked by and looked surprised to see me sitting there. moses and i talked about the relative merits of australia and england and sierra leone. and then his artist friend came by and i pulled out my laptop and showed him some banksy pictures. then they looked at my other pictures and i learned that there are no horses in sierra leone, or so they said. apparently there might be one left at family kingdom restaurant in aberdeen, all the others died. moses seemed outraged that family kingdom charged people 2000 leones (less than 50 pence) to sit on the only horse in sierra leone. i also played them ‘beds are burning’ on my laptop and we talked about aboriginal issues in australia. a few guys found it funny that we don’t have many black people in australia. they think it would be strange to be surrounded by all white people. then jyoti rang and it was late and i had to go home. reluctantly.
then it was time for me to face the rain. the hardest thing is negotiating ankle deep streams of water rushing across roads while wearing flip flops. i nearly lost them several times. the boys sheltering in the huts kept shouting out ‘white gyal white gyal, how you?’ and i kept answering ‘wet’ and i could smell their ganja in the air.
we had enough money for diesel for the generator at the youth centre today which was exciting, because that equates to internet access. but the most endearing thing was watching the kids sit at the computers before the generator was turned on, practicing typing on the keyboards with all their fingers. typing messages into thin air. some are quite good, others struggle. when they get a chance to type properly, most of them type ‘my name is hawa, i am 17 years old, i live on wilberforce road and i have three sisters’. or something like that. a few actually surf the net and open yahoo accounts and all the spam mails that come with them. the computers are riddled with viruses.
i had an enjoyable conversation with precocious 12 year old jaz who gave me the low down on the differences and similarities between the three main political parties running for the presidential elections in august. according to jaz, they all promise to provide electricity, piped water and roads and so voting comes down to who you think is being the most honest. when i asked him where he learns about politics, he answered that his grandmother teaches him everything about ‘politricks’ and he wants to learn all about politricks so he can be a president one day. it seems a common ambition.
when moses turned up, we headed off to meet his friend in the military barracks in wilberforce. i met alvie sitting outside a house with some of his friends. i told him about what i’m interested in and what i’m studying and he offered to help me out by getting a group of people together who i can talk with. once practicalities were out of the way, talk descended into sierra leone politics, as always. we mostly talked about freedom of speech (and lack thereof), journalists, corruption, ‘what is a bribe’, and most of the boys seemed to agree that military dictatorship was preferable to the current system because ‘at least when the NPRC (?) overthrew APC, things got done, electricity came back’. alvie said you need someone strong, even if brutal, to get things in order and that to call the current system a ‘democracy’ is a farce anyway.
when the rain died down enough to leave, moses and i made our way to his aunty’s house in the slum behind the barracks. i love going there because it is so crammed with life. everything is done in the open. cooking, washing, cleaning, talking, arguing, playing, listening to the radio. there are washing lines strung about and clothes also hang from useless electricity wires. chickens dart about the place, hopping across sewers and narrow rocky steps to find little bits of rice. most dogs just lie about looking faintly amused. the kids there are really not shy at all. it seems they all want to hold my hand, i just don’t have enough hands for them all. and i just seemed to collect more of them as i walk along. moses and i talked to a few ladies about joining my group for talks. most of them said no. i’m not sure if they are shy or don’t like me or maybe just suspicious of white girls wanting to talk about politics. but then we talked with aunty who, although shy, agreed to help me get a women’s group together. we start tomorrow morning.
we sat outside moses aunty’s hut and i had kids draped all over me. fatu took special dibs and instructed all the other children not to touch me, i belonged to her. a bossy 6 year old. like 6 year old girls anywhere in the world. i watched moses’ sister cooking plasas. she had two coal fires going outside. one for the rice and one for the plasas. she finely chopped up potato leaves, pounded chillis (peppers) with a large mortar & pestle, added small pieces of dried fish and a she emptied a little knotted plastic bag full of bright orange palm oil into the mix. i think she added an onion and a few other things, but i’m not sure what they were. moses said every meal is plasas. they cook once a day in the afternoon and then have cold leftover rice for breakfast. moses and i shared a plate of very oily plasas. when moses finished he had orange lips. i probably did too. afterwards i gave the kids a lollipop each. they all sucked happily and when i wasn’t looking, fatu stuck her lollipop in my mouth and i briefly wondered how clean her mouth was... and then decided best not to worry.. and handed her lollipop back. it was nice to lean back on the little wooden stools and just watch life go by. moses step sister warmed some water on the coals and went to wash. some military men walked by and looked surprised to see me sitting there. moses and i talked about the relative merits of australia and england and sierra leone. and then his artist friend came by and i pulled out my laptop and showed him some banksy pictures. then they looked at my other pictures and i learned that there are no horses in sierra leone, or so they said. apparently there might be one left at family kingdom restaurant in aberdeen, all the others died. moses seemed outraged that family kingdom charged people 2000 leones (less than 50 pence) to sit on the only horse in sierra leone. i also played them ‘beds are burning’ on my laptop and we talked about aboriginal issues in australia. a few guys found it funny that we don’t have many black people in australia. they think it would be strange to be surrounded by all white people. then jyoti rang and it was late and i had to go home. reluctantly.
2 July 2007
THE TRUTH ABOUT THE RICE THAT MAY HAVE COST THE SLPP GOVT. THE ELECTORAL CAMPAIGN
(Starring Muamar Gaddafi, Phillip Neville, and President Kabbah)
The past week in Sierra Leone has been incredibly interesting and somewhat chaotic. As you probably now know, Libya’s Gaddafi rode into town via Conakry in a fleet of SUVs and hundred people plus entourage. Banners and signs were hung all over Freetown welcoming Gaddafi to Sierra Leone. I must confess that I did not realize the depth of our relationship with Gaddafi and by “our” I mean president Kabbah.
Gaddafi arrived into F/town late into the night and the radio station voice of Islam was proudly broadcasting every bit of his procession. Calls came in from listeners in areas like Wellington, Grafton, and Kissy to indicate that he was in their area. According to one caller, Gaddafi got out of his car and started walking on foot shaking hands of locals. Ah propaganda!!!! Its amazing how easily we believe. Of course now, knowing some Salone Man Dem they will say “Gaddafi da man wondaful, im even comot na im motoca fo cam shake pipul dem an”. If there’s one reason why I respect Gaddafi, it’s that he knows how to present himself as the people’s man. He can appeal to the masses.
Anyway back to his visit. Besides causing a 3 day traffic jam in F/town, Gaddafi held a huge rally at the National Stadium with President Kabbah. I didn’t listen to the radio broadcast neither did I attend but the following day a rumor began circulating about an incident that supposedly occurred during the rally and cause president Kabbah some embarrassment.
The story I heard went something like this: “Gaddafi announced at the stadium that he had given 2 ships of rice to Kabbah for the people and asked him what he did with the rice. Kabbah then for the first time had to come to the mic and explain that he had indeed used the rice aid to invest in a social security safety scheme under NASSIT”.
As the rumor circulated, many SLPP supporters and skeptics alike were disappointed. Even I used this story to discredit Kabbah’s regime in an argument with friends that evening.
The following day on a personal visit to the Presidential Lodge to visit an uncle who works at the presidential lodge, I realized the rumor had shaken the government to the core. The president was furious at the story. I turned to my uncle and asked “so this rumor with the rice is it true”? My uncle’s response “No, its not…”
It was at the Lodge that I found out the source of the rumor was actually a newspaper article written by Phillip Neville in the Standard Times Paper. It was Neville who claimed that Gaddafi had asked about the rice at the stadium and that Kabbah had never informed the public of the rice. The article hinted at corruption and lack of transparency.
Refusing to just take “no” for an answer I asked for any documents that could be produced that indicated that the president had indeed informed the public of the rice aid and its use.
In a document titled: “Statement by his Excellency the President, Alhaji Dr. Ahmad Tejan-Kabbah on the occasion of the launching of the social safety net (social assistance) scheme”, dated June 29th 2006 the president did indeed state and I quote:
“When we were setting up NASSIT, we realized that it needed to be complemented by a social safety net scheme. However, we encountered severe resource constraints to finance this scheme…when we received ship loads of rice from Chinese, French, Libyan, and Italian governments as commodity aid in 2001 and 2002, we sold it at concessionary rates to our people, with the following amounts realized:
Libyan Food Aid---Le. 2,027,684,370 Italian Food Aid---Le. 579,260,100 French Food Aid---Le. 558,364,154 Chinese Food Aid---Le. 961,599,184. The funds were invested, yielding an interest of Le. 345,487,497.24…part of the funds from these sources was later utilized as seed money to set up NASSIT…today NASSIT being in good financial standing, had been able to pay back over Le 5.3 billions towards the establishment of the Social Safety Net Scheme”
This document shows that contrary to the allegations of Phillip Neville in the article “BOMBSHELL-Colonel Gaddaffi exposes government—June 27’ 07 that the president did in fact inform the public of the utilization of the ship loads of rice from Libya and elsewhere.
The president’s office had a press conference on Thursday and released a document and one Sorie Fofanah written a special commentary with title “Kabbah-A victim of Transparency”.
I hate to admit it but I was eager to believe the rumor as I was suffering from a quick bout of a contagious disease commonly known in Sierra Leone as P.H.D- Pull Him Down Syndrome. This is a condition that causes one to believe and say negative things about other Sierra Leoneans. Not being a supporter of the SLPP regime, it was incredibly easy for me to believe the rumor was true.
In actuality selling food aid at reduced prices to the people and investing the profits in a long term scheme is amazing. I am happy to give kudos where it is due. If the rice had been given to people for free the whole story would have ended there. Plus I’m from the school of Sembene Ousmane’s Guelwaar, I don’t believe in giving a nation of people free food….commodity aid turns the people into beggars. That is dependency of the worst kind.
Back to Phillip Neville---As of yesterday, he has been arrested and will most likely spend the next couple months in jail. I doubt he will be out before the elections. The truth is his paper is usually quite good adding necessary critique where it is due. I enjoyed an article he wrote recently linking Gaddafi to the RUF though I would not have reprinted those horrific pictures of amputee victims. Rice is to Sierra Leone as Oil is to America. It is a very serious matter, and you don’t play with a hungry man’s rice. Because of the article (rumor) a lot of people thought that the SLPP govt had misused or confiscated rice that rightly belonged to them it’s sometimes a challenge to get people who need to eat today to invest their food in the bambais of tomorrow.
Anyhow, I think it was a horrid mistake to arrest Phillip Neville. Even if the man may have fabricated the story about the rice the government should not have arrested him. The govt should have sued him in civil court or found some other legitimate way to discredit him as a journalist. Instead what they have done is arrested him and possibly charge with criminal libel. By arresting the man has been martyred. Some in the international community and the Salone Diaspora will eat it all up…outgoing SLPP govt arrests journalist to curb dissent and win elections.
I guess the lesson to all of us if we didn’t already know is don’t believe everything negative you hear or read, or positive for that matter, and resist the PHD—Pull Him Down Syndrome. I will be on a panel for a radio discussion reflecting on Gaddafi’s visit later on today on radio democracy 98.1. I hope I can gain more insight on this rice affair.
Look out for the post on the radio show with me ( as an independent observer), Septimus Kai Kai (minister of information), Alpha Kanu (former MP & Speaker for Earnest Bai Koroma)
Gaddafi arrived into F/town late into the night and the radio station voice of Islam was proudly broadcasting every bit of his procession. Calls came in from listeners in areas like Wellington, Grafton, and Kissy to indicate that he was in their area. According to one caller, Gaddafi got out of his car and started walking on foot shaking hands of locals. Ah propaganda!!!! Its amazing how easily we believe. Of course now, knowing some Salone Man Dem they will say “Gaddafi da man wondaful, im even comot na im motoca fo cam shake pipul dem an”. If there’s one reason why I respect Gaddafi, it’s that he knows how to present himself as the people’s man. He can appeal to the masses.
Anyway back to his visit. Besides causing a 3 day traffic jam in F/town, Gaddafi held a huge rally at the National Stadium with President Kabbah. I didn’t listen to the radio broadcast neither did I attend but the following day a rumor began circulating about an incident that supposedly occurred during the rally and cause president Kabbah some embarrassment.
The story I heard went something like this: “Gaddafi announced at the stadium that he had given 2 ships of rice to Kabbah for the people and asked him what he did with the rice. Kabbah then for the first time had to come to the mic and explain that he had indeed used the rice aid to invest in a social security safety scheme under NASSIT”.
As the rumor circulated, many SLPP supporters and skeptics alike were disappointed. Even I used this story to discredit Kabbah’s regime in an argument with friends that evening.
The following day on a personal visit to the Presidential Lodge to visit an uncle who works at the presidential lodge, I realized the rumor had shaken the government to the core. The president was furious at the story. I turned to my uncle and asked “so this rumor with the rice is it true”? My uncle’s response “No, its not…”
It was at the Lodge that I found out the source of the rumor was actually a newspaper article written by Phillip Neville in the Standard Times Paper. It was Neville who claimed that Gaddafi had asked about the rice at the stadium and that Kabbah had never informed the public of the rice. The article hinted at corruption and lack of transparency.
Refusing to just take “no” for an answer I asked for any documents that could be produced that indicated that the president had indeed informed the public of the rice aid and its use.
In a document titled: “Statement by his Excellency the President, Alhaji Dr. Ahmad Tejan-Kabbah on the occasion of the launching of the social safety net (social assistance) scheme”, dated June 29th 2006 the president did indeed state and I quote:
“When we were setting up NASSIT, we realized that it needed to be complemented by a social safety net scheme. However, we encountered severe resource constraints to finance this scheme…when we received ship loads of rice from Chinese, French, Libyan, and Italian governments as commodity aid in 2001 and 2002, we sold it at concessionary rates to our people, with the following amounts realized:
Libyan Food Aid---Le. 2,027,684,370 Italian Food Aid---Le. 579,260,100 French Food Aid---Le. 558,364,154 Chinese Food Aid---Le. 961,599,184. The funds were invested, yielding an interest of Le. 345,487,497.24…part of the funds from these sources was later utilized as seed money to set up NASSIT…today NASSIT being in good financial standing, had been able to pay back over Le 5.3 billions towards the establishment of the Social Safety Net Scheme”
This document shows that contrary to the allegations of Phillip Neville in the article “BOMBSHELL-Colonel Gaddaffi exposes government—June 27’ 07 that the president did in fact inform the public of the utilization of the ship loads of rice from Libya and elsewhere.
The president’s office had a press conference on Thursday and released a document and one Sorie Fofanah written a special commentary with title “Kabbah-A victim of Transparency”.
I hate to admit it but I was eager to believe the rumor as I was suffering from a quick bout of a contagious disease commonly known in Sierra Leone as P.H.D- Pull Him Down Syndrome. This is a condition that causes one to believe and say negative things about other Sierra Leoneans. Not being a supporter of the SLPP regime, it was incredibly easy for me to believe the rumor was true.
In actuality selling food aid at reduced prices to the people and investing the profits in a long term scheme is amazing. I am happy to give kudos where it is due. If the rice had been given to people for free the whole story would have ended there. Plus I’m from the school of Sembene Ousmane’s Guelwaar, I don’t believe in giving a nation of people free food….commodity aid turns the people into beggars. That is dependency of the worst kind.
Back to Phillip Neville---As of yesterday, he has been arrested and will most likely spend the next couple months in jail. I doubt he will be out before the elections. The truth is his paper is usually quite good adding necessary critique where it is due. I enjoyed an article he wrote recently linking Gaddafi to the RUF though I would not have reprinted those horrific pictures of amputee victims. Rice is to Sierra Leone as Oil is to America. It is a very serious matter, and you don’t play with a hungry man’s rice. Because of the article (rumor) a lot of people thought that the SLPP govt had misused or confiscated rice that rightly belonged to them it’s sometimes a challenge to get people who need to eat today to invest their food in the bambais of tomorrow.
Anyhow, I think it was a horrid mistake to arrest Phillip Neville. Even if the man may have fabricated the story about the rice the government should not have arrested him. The govt should have sued him in civil court or found some other legitimate way to discredit him as a journalist. Instead what they have done is arrested him and possibly charge with criminal libel. By arresting the man has been martyred. Some in the international community and the Salone Diaspora will eat it all up…outgoing SLPP govt arrests journalist to curb dissent and win elections.
I guess the lesson to all of us if we didn’t already know is don’t believe everything negative you hear or read, or positive for that matter, and resist the PHD—Pull Him Down Syndrome. I will be on a panel for a radio discussion reflecting on Gaddafi’s visit later on today on radio democracy 98.1. I hope I can gain more insight on this rice affair.
Look out for the post on the radio show with me ( as an independent observer), Septimus Kai Kai (minister of information), Alpha Kanu (former MP & Speaker for Earnest Bai Koroma)
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