APCs Neo-Liberal agenda cannot end poverty

Unlike what the rulers want us to accept, PACM believes that there is no Golden Jubilee to celebrate. True independence means the political, economic and social control of our society and for the wealth of society to be equally distributed among all the citizens and not just among the elites as is the case now. All is there to celebrate is poverty, backwardness, inequality, injustice, poor housing and education among others.

The reality is that the current ruling elites (represented by the two main political parties – APC and SLPP), has callously betrayed the aspirations of the people for freedom, equality and economic justice.

Colonialism and Resistance.

Unlike what the current ruling class want us to believe, colonialism was a brutal system of exploitation and degradation of humanity. It was a backward, oppressive, undemocratic, racist and corrupt system. Our great Afrikan ancestors were brutalised and murdered during their struggles for freedom. The War of Resistance Against Colonialism in 1898 (or Hut Tax War), led by Bai Bureh and Bai Sherbro Kpana Lewis, was a case in point.

Colonialism imposed a brutal system of exploitation of our economic resources like forced labour, massive looting of our natural resources for the benefit of Europeans. Colonialism made us mere producers of cash crops for the industrialisation of Europe, while leaving the Afrikan masses in starvation, disease and poverty.

ITA Wallace-Johnson.

Sierra Leone’s rulers deliberately orchestrated an attempt to minimise the role of ITA Wallace-Johnson and the West African Youth League (WAYL) in the anti-colonial struggle in Sierra Leone.  This is evident during the president’s 50 year anniversary speech to the nation. Ernest Koroma did not even mention ITA his entire speech. This is an attempt to falsify history so that Milton Margai and Siaka Stevens, British puppets and neo-colonial agent will be seen as our true independence fathers.

ITA Wallace-Johnsons’ contributions to Sierra Leone and Afrika, cannot be effaced by APC-SLPP rulers. He was the first African leader to call for an end to colonial rule and “self government now” even before Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana, he established trade unions in Ghana and Nigeria in the 1930s  and 40s, built the most effective anti-colonial organisation in Sierra Leone – The West African Youth League to struggle for the dignity and rights of ordinary people and for social justice, and introduced issue-based politics in Sierra Leone, leading to the first Black woman mayor in Afrika – Constance Cummings-John.

APCs Neo-Liberal agenda cannot end poverty

The current poverty and general hardship that poor people are enduring is not new. Under previous governments, the hardship and misery were very much the same. This is a clear manifestation that there is a structural problem with the system which cannot be addressed by merely changing one government (either through the ballot or bullet). Part of the reason for our poverty, suffering, disease, high food and fuel prices etc., is the near fundamentalist implementation of neo-liberal economic model.

Neo-liberalism, the current form of capitalism is an economic model prescribed by IMF, World Bank, European nations and the US and accepted by our various governments in power. So that it does not matter who among these parties are in power the poor continue to suffer, prices go up and unemployment skyrockets, while the rulers and their cronies live in richness, building mansions and driving big jeeps and Hummers.

Ernest Koroma’s three years of “Agenda for Change” has only deepened the poverty and hopelessness left behind by the SLPP under Kabbah. In reality these two dominant political parties have no ideological differences, they are one and the same whose only objective is to serve western financial capital.

Under pressure from youths and students, Ernest Koroma reduced the 30% increase in fuel to 20% as a “temporary measure.” He also lifted the 10% import duty on importation of rice, also as a “temporary measure”. We believe that these reductions are only meant to buy time and that the prices will inevitably go up in the near future leading to more poverty.

In Commemorating this year’s Afrika Liberation Day (May 25^th), the 50^th Independence Anniversary, the 113^th year since the 1898 War Against Colonialism and the 35^th Anniversary of the Soweto Uprising (June 16^th) or Day of the African Child, PACM, the veritable voice of the poor and oppressed in Salone, wishes to state the following:

1. We call on youths, students, workers and the unemployed represented by various student unions, community associations, youth clubs, wash car associations, rank and file members of trade unions to struggle for Afrka’s final liberation and its full economic and political emancipation and social justice for all.
2. PACM, maintains that Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs), Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs), Agenda for Change PRSP II have failed in the past and will not lift our people out of poverty and backwardness.
3. We condemn the privatisation agenda of the current government and the implementation of neo-liberalism disguised as PRSP I and II.  We also demand that the importation of fuel, rice and other basic commodities be put under public control /nationalisation to reduce hardship, starvation and poverty.
4. We demand free, decent, hot school meals for all primary and secondary schools pupils to reduce the malnutrition, poverty and disease on poor families.
5. We call of free pass (free transportation) for all school pupils (and university students) in all Government buses across the country. Free transportation should also be extended to the aged and the disabled.
6. Employment is a human right. Every man and woman is entitled to a decent job with decent living wage.  Decent job and pay is the only way to end poverty in Sierra Leone.

We condemn the selling of millions of acres of land to foreign interests to grow bio-fuels for cars while our people go hungry. This will only fuel poverty, hunger, loss of livelihoods and food insecurity. We support the Dakar Appeal against land grab.

Pan-Afrikan CommUnity Movement

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