Julius Maada Bio: Victim of Virulent Tar and Smear

I write today as a Sierra Leonean, a proud and very senior and influential member of the Sierra Leone People’s Party in North America, and a person who is concerned about and tired of the campaign of baseless smear, vile nastiness, and skullduggery directed at one of the SLPP’s presidential aspirants, Rtd Brigadier Julius Maada Bio (in photo).

Awareness Times especially has been waging a shamelessly open campaign of hate by conjuring up and threading sensational narratives meant to malign and muddy the reputation of one of Sierra Leone’s outstanding citizens who has an impressive legacy of confronting the brutal tyranny of repressive old APC politics, battling a raging insurgency in spite of deep personal losses, making peace and returning our beloved nation to the path of democratic governance, investing in his nation and its people after an outstanding academic record in the United States of America, and now presenting himself to serve his people and his country. The records show that he is principled, law-abiding, and he has always been perpetually focused on the best interests of Sierra Leoneans and Sierra Leone.

The February 14 edition of Awareness Times claims the following: “Our sources furthered that the APC is also in possession of Texas Immigration Trial records of one of the former NPRC top guns. The said records have detailed testimonies of witnesses who were present when Bambay Kamara was killed and had testified in Texas on the gruesome manner in which Bambay Kamara was killed.”

This claim is totally baseless and untrue.

1.   I was present at the said trial and the records do show that I testified in the said court during those trials on May 30, 2007 as an expert witness.

2.   I am privy to every detail (judicial or personal narrative) of the said case.

3.   The case was ruled in favor of the former NPRC official and Awareness Times carried that story in its July 4, 2007 edition of the newspaper.

4.   The NPRC official was not found NOT GUILTY OF ALL CHARGES, and to my recollection, Brigadier Julius Maada Bio was NOT/NEVER mentioned adversely in THAT court during the entirety of the PROCEEDINGS.

5.   Brigadier Bio’s name WAS NOT MENTIONED BY THE PROSECUTION’S STAR WITNESS (a former military officer and bodyguard close to officials of the NPRC) as being complicit in the executions.

So to make the insinuation, somewhat, that Brigadier Julius Maada Bio is associated with those trials or associated with the execution of the late Police IG, Bamabay Kamara, IS PATENTLY FALSE. I hope that Awareness Times will do the decent thing and withdraw the insinuation as baseless as well as publish an apology to its readership for insinuating such blatant falsehoods.

The unbridled frenzy of falsehoods, hate, and smear directed at Brigadier (Rtd) Julius Maada Bio, one of the SLPP’s presidential aspirants, can only be fueled by any or all of the following: a) a well-funded smear campaign where persons have compromised the ethical responsibilities associated with their profession to accept promise of or real financial incentives to muddy the reputation of a pre-eminent citizen of this country; b) a virulent and deep-seated dislike for a person with whom that person wishes to settle personal scores; and c) skullduggery and chicanery of the nastiest sort abetted by persons who believe that they can pre-determine and control the outcome of the flag-bearer elections.

If it is a campaign to seek justice for a number of journalists who believe that they were assaulted by persons whom, it is alleged/suspected, are loyal to Brigadier Bio, then due process through the courts should be allowed to look at the evidence and determine Maada Bio’s complicity. Publishing a series of outlandish falsehoods conjured from minds seething with rage and well illustrated with doctored and mislabeled images is certainly not justice as we know it in civilized and democratic domains.

If it is a campaign to assess the records of Brigadier Julius Maada Bio, then his excellent record of leadership under fire in valiantly battling a raging insurgency must be foreground. If his bravery in confronting the malevolent, repressive, and brutally corrupt APC oligarchy of nearly 26 years makes him a violent insurrectionary, then may the good Lord endow this nation with such “violent men” who risk their lives so that their fellow men can live in freedom and peace and be able to determine their own future.  If his selfless act of patriotism in making peace with the Revolutionary United Front and returning our country to democratic governance is part of his legacy, then I will always proudly blazon forth that legacy as that of a pre-eminent citizen who loved his country and who truly evinces the best in us.

What is being done in Awareness Times is virulent public lynching by the press. It makes one wonder about the motives of the writers. If, as they have said, theirs is patriotism, then the parting words of the great George Washington will continue to ring, trenchant – “Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism.” WE KNOW THE REAL PATRIOTS WHO HAVE DEMONSTRATED PATRIOTISM IN BLOOD AND SWEAT. WE KNOW THE BRIGADIER JULIUS MAADA BIOS. We will recognize the selflessness, commitment to duty and service, and loyalty to Sierra Leone evident in Brigadier Julius Maada Bio’s oath of commission into the Republic of Sierra Leone Military Forces and in the immortal words of our sacred national anthem:

We pledge our devotion, our strength and our might,
Thy cause to defend and to stand for thy right;
All that we have be ever thine own,
Land that we love our Sierra Leone

Patrick K. Muana, PhD, Houston, Texas

Stay with Sierra Express Media, for your trusted place in news!

---

© 2011, https:. All rights reserved.