We’ve heard it all before

Truth may be bitter in the ears of arch tribalists and progandists, but boy, it must be told. Makuta and her group under the title of ‘mama Salone en pikin’ in the for-di-people newspaper had been previously inciting their readers against the Mendes until some of us began to answer back and very effectively at that too. And then, but only then did it bother the Independent Media Commission that a dangerous situation was developing which moved it to intervene. Once again the same notorious group minus their leader Paul Kamara has begun the wretched game of whipping up inter-tribal sentiments. This piece will hopefully serve as a warning to them once more and for the last time that “Anything you can do I can do, better!” How a small bunch of people could imagine that their main source of criticism is to encourage ethnic warfare is something only they must appreciate. (Photo: Dr Sama Banya)

There is hardly a day when a pro APC government newspaper or columnist does not go in for me. A few days ago there appeared in one of them, most probably the African champion an attack from a so-called APC youth because I had challenged his claim that he came from my home district of Kailahun. Of course my story was based on the fact that the young man in question was alleged to be a native of Kailahun district. I said then and I say so now that very few if any indigenes of the district could place him in any chiefdom. In his reaction Sahr Mokuwa claims that his mother hailed from the village of Mofindor in Luawa and not perhaps Mofindor in Kono although his father was from Kono. What I found amusing in his supposed outrage was his further claim that he was born in Kailahun town, just like me. But he casts doubt on his story with the additional information that he was brought into this world in Belebu hospital in 1972. He must be quite an old youth who is now approaching the ripe age of 40. To the best of my knowledge there are ONLY TWO hospitals in Kailahun; there is the much older one on Barracks Road and which I understand is now used for Maternal and Under Five services. There is the much newer and larger complex along the Buedu road in the Kissi town section of Kailahun. The Marie Stopes organization runs a multipurpose clinic in the centre of Kailahun town. Dr. Morie Lengor had a private Admissions clinic also along the Buedu. But in all my years I have never heard of a Belebu hospital which claim throws a lot of doubt on the rest of Sahr Mokuwa’s story.

I returned from abroad in 1963 some nine years before Sahr Mokuwa’s birth and I have visited Kailahun at least three times a year recently, although those visits were even more frequent over the period of Mokuwa’s birth date. There is an expression that says “The strength of a chain depends on its weakest point.” Thus the credulity of Sahr Mokuwa’s story is shaken by his claim to have been born in a nonexistent hospital in Kailahun. But he is a Sierra Leonean and that is what should matter to him rather the flamboyant stories of his deeds in Kailahun. Well he did not give money to people but certainly those who answered his call in person went away materially satisfied. Their beneficiary may have been the APC, but did that rich party use Mokuwa as a conduit for its handouts?

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