By: Win Stanley. R. Bankole. Johnson
Unrepentant spinners across the divide – and a few “Fence Sitters” – have attached varying names to the formal departure of both Hon. Victor Foh and Hon. Alpha Kanu inter-alia to the Sierra Leone Peoples’ Party (SLPP): such as Spectacular; Phenomenal; Major. I say “formal” because since after our 2017 Makeni National Delegates’ Conference at which Dr. Samura was finally selected as our Y2018 APC Flag bearer, the both have been functionally irrelevant within the APC Party. Their angst – like some fifteen (15) others – was not against the APC Party directly, but against the then Chairman and Leader Dr. Ernest Bai Koroma for allegedly promising each of them the same Flag bearer position, but only to have jettisoned all of them at the very last minute in preference for Dr. Samura Kamara. For that he was labelled as: “a Bad Man that should never be forgiven”.
Reasons
To serious and equally unrepentant All Peoples’ Congress (APC) supporters however, none of those adjectives would apply mainly for the following reasons:
- Given the winds of change (Perestroika) that recently swept across both the APC and SLPP and ushered into the respective executives of both parties more youthful, more exuberant leaderships, neither politician has any residual political shelf-life (of value) to impact an equally more youthful and more exuberant electorate – anymore.
- Both Foh and Kanu are moving from the APC, the same political party that the SLPP family has always haboured an innate loathing for, and which reason prompted such acronyms as for the APC membership as : “Ayampis”; “Unfit for purpose and not even for themselves”; “Terrorists”.
- Between them Foh and Kanu have at various times and in their respective political careers carved out niches of notoriety for themselves among the SLPP family. Both are on record either for alleged malfeasances or for allegedly hoaxing intending Pilgrims to the Holy Land (which was how Alpha Kanu bagged the a.k.a of “Alhaji Abuja”), or in the specific case of Alpha Kanu, to have been associated with the procurement of the seized aircraft that Police concluded brought Cocaine into this country.
- No matter the level of amity displayed or the platitudes lavished on both by the SLPP leadership for their formal detours, and no matter for how long it lasts it will always be temporary. Temporary because they will never be[a1] come fully assimilated within the SLPP; they will always remain as “Strange Bed Fellows”, and the very last thing the SLPP will ever allow them proximity to is their Bank Accounts. Here the adage holds so true that: “Indeed, a Lion can tame a Leopard, yea…..but it cannot change its spots”.
So I insist that that their detours to the SLPP is temporary (and will be short-lived), because it was engendered more by mercenary motives to safeguard materialism allegedly illegally acquired under the APC, and further heightened by the palpable fear and fallacious beliefs that the APC will not reclaim governance come June 24th, than by any innate love and respect for the SLPP as a robust political machine. As a matter of fact you can tell from their frequent verbal gaffes that faking loyalty to the SLPP has on occasions been very painful for them to wit: “No More Green!!” (Victor Foh) or “The entire Kaffu Bullom has over two hundred and fifty Million Voters for the SLPP” (Alpha Kanu).
Be that as it may, both Victor Foh and Alpha Kanu have since 2018 felt more comfortable within SLPP ranks. So it is on all the above accounts that when their formal/official declaration for the SLPP was announced it was greeted with same kind of dour reaction as would arise in any neighbourhood where a village Priest would excitably announce that a couple that had been co-habiting for thirty years and were recently wedded actually consummated their marriage on their wedding day.
Pappy show
As I listened to both Foh and Kanu spewing tirades so blithely on the APC Party I couldn’t help but also ruefully reflect on the two other major causes for our eleven years of carnage to wit: Selfishness and Avarice. I am of the view that for the years both men had spent in and with the APC, and the various positions of eminence that the APC Party allowed them to serve both God and country, simple but courteous letters of resignation would have sufficed – yea more respectable in fact – than all the pappy show they displayed through public lambasting of the very Party that made them the politicians they are today. So beyond the short public applauses received during their respective public declarations for the SLPP, I am not sure many citizens (and of course the International community) ever took them as serious. Only in Sierra Leone would politicians so brazenly (and shamelessly) prioritize personal interests over and above national interests, which explains our dearth of political leadership in the country. Still courtesy demands that we wish them well in their new endeavours, and so be it.
Voluntary
Ignore Hon. Victor Foh’s bluffs (and “un-wagered” bet) to be voluntarily jailed or even to be killed by the APC should the Party win at the next elections. He full well knows within his inner self that the APC will do neither to him because in true APC tradition, the tongue of good report can only be heard once for its members. True “APCians” value all those who have served the Party and country faithfully, and whether or not they maintain or discard their memberships to the party later is irrelevant. Membership of the APC it should be noted has always been voluntary, never contractual.
Besides if the APC had really wanted to jail Victor Foh they could have easily done that since decades ago when as a young itinerant civil servant he substituted a valuable organ of his body for use as “stationery” to access cheques proceeds. Or again when the physiognomy (face) of someone whose nude clips that aptly answers his own physical descriptions appeared on social media soon after he was appointed to serve as the replacement Vice President. But the APC let that pass too!!
Romance
Still on political mergers, alliances and transfers it is the same kind of befuddled excitement for the Victor Foh/Alpha Kanu migration to SLPP that would appear to have greeted Dr. Kandeh Kolleh Yumkella’s formal “Progressive Alliance Deed” recently signed-off with the SLPP. Dr. Hycy Bull in the United States, once an avowed member of the defunct National Grand Coalition (NGC) Party has described it as a “suicidal” pact. But to the extent that his own “romance” with the SLPP is documented – even though not “registered” in the offices of the Administrator and Registrar General – KKY does appear to have the priority attention over Victor Foh and Alpha Kanu when it comes to attracting the attention of outgoing President Bio. But with less than a month into that relationship, one could clearly discern that the “cogs” in that “Progressive Alliance” do not seem to be aligning well and would need to be frequently greased with the “Oil of Trust” if they are to spin well up to 24th June.
Rewards
The less said about moves of three (3) former Coalition For Change (“C4C”) members spearheaded by their former parliamentary leader Emerson Lamina to the SLPP the better, because it had been long in coming. He qualified himself for a slot in the SLPP Parliamentary Proportional Representation (PR) list for Kono District by consistently reneging on directives from the executives of the Party that voted him into Parliament and by dealing decisively with anyone or group of persons including the EU that attempted to stand in the way of anything that would deny the SLPP a second term of office. But for His Divinity, Emerson Lamina’s next victim would have been God Almighty Himself, which clearly shows that when it comes to chasing the rewards of politics in Sierra Leone, there can be no bounds and even the Supreme Being could be at risk.
Phenomenal
But if there are any mergers or potential transfers that could be aptly described as phenomenal, spectacular and major they would have to be the following two:
- The alliance between and among the remaining five (5) former Coalition For Change (C4C) members of Parliament, the Unity Party of Madam Femi Claudius-Cole and the Peoples’ Movement for Democratic Change Party headed by the political maverick Charles Francis Margai. It is deemed phenomenal, spectacular and major because it does not discountenance the flurry of activity arising out of the Victor Foh/Alpha Kanu/KKY/Emerson Lamina/SLPP mergers or acquisitions.
Mr. Charles Francis Margai (who cannot be easily switched off the polity of Sierra Leone) has publicly debunked any merger with the APC Party as of now, until after consultations with the remaining five (5) members of the “C4C” Party that have to date not towed the line of Emerson Lamina. But he stands out as the likely political nemesis of the SLPP in the Kono District in the event a run-off occours and history is repeated.
- The recent crossing of erstwhile Western Area Chairman of the now defunct NGC Party Comrade Arthur Pearce to the APC Party. As a matter of fact unlike KKY, Victor Foh and Alpha all of whom crossed to the ruling SLPP forlornly (ALONE), what made Comrade Pearce’s cross over to the APC more significant and impactful is that he came aboard with a formidable asset base of over a thousand former NGC members comprising former executives and grassroots supporters countrywide. They were all warmly welcomed and received into the APC family amidst glaring publicity in typical APC tradition, with many of them also promptly deployed into various strategic committees as applicable from their skills-based assessments to compliment APC Party’s moves towards regaining government on 24th June.
If up to this point you have not read about former Vice President the Hon. Samuel Sidikie Samsumana in the country’s polity it is because he is not only home and dry within the APC Party, but also that the sublimity of his membership within the party and the formidable leadership roles he continues to play in the party’s hierarchy – like that of former President Ernest Bai Koroma – transcends ordinary public discourse.
Finally if news making rounds become reality more transfers, cross overs and mergers to, and with the APC can be expected in the coming days, as the coffee smell gets stronger that the only way out of our present socio-political quagmire (or chaos if you please) is to decisively vote the SLPP out of office come 24th June 2023.
And may God Almighty aid our laudable endeavours!!
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