Conakry-Freetown Highway and Joint Border Post Marks Turning Point in Relations Between the Two Countries

Words are not enough to describe the joy and sense of fulfilment I feel today on this auspicious and epoch making occasion of the commissioning of the Conakry-Freetown Highway and the opening of the joint border post. An occasion in which the presence and participation of my elder brother, colleague and friend, Professor Alpha Conde is highly appreciated. Let me therefore, on behalf of the people of the sister Republic of Sierra Leone register my personal and sovereign gratitude to Professor Alpha Conde for actually consenting to grace this historic occasion.

Common History

In days gone by, there were no physical frontiers limiting the movement of our people between and among the countries of the sub-region and especially countries within the envelope of the Mano River Basin evidenced by the fact that even the rivers that water the countries of the sub-region have their source in the Fouta Djallon mountains. This is the reason why Guinea is often referred to as “La Reservoire De l’Afrique”.

The boundaries separating the people’s of Africa, that compartmentalised it’s peoples into different nationalities baptised with alien names such as Guineans, Sierra Leoneans, Ivorians, Gambians, Liberians, Senegalese, Angolans, Nigerians, Ghanaians and so on, we’re drawn in a distant land called Berlin by strange people who had hitherto not set foot on the African soil, and quite oblivious of the tribal, cultural and traditional linkages and sensitivities, in the year 1884/85. That celebrated conference is now commonly referred to as the ‘partitioning of Africa’.

Today’s meeting of the two nations at this new border crossing will herald the corrective measures African Leaders are willing to take and must take in order to restore the dignity and unity of the people’s of Africa, in general and our sub-region, in particular.

Commissioning of the Freetown-Conakry Highway and Joint Border Post

For emphasis, let me recall the words of the late President Ahmed Sekou Toure of the Republic of Guinea to the late President Modibo Keita of the Republic of Mali when the latter threatened to annex parts of north eastern Guinea claiming it to be Malian territory. When President Sekou Toure was informed he said to the emissary, “go and tell my brother Modibo Keita that he is right. The territory is his indeed. Siguri is his and even Conakry is his. He or any of his people can come and settle here anytime for Guinea and Mali are one and the same country.”

Your Excellency, your presence and my presence here today is of great significance demonstrating to the people of our sub-region and the world at large that a journey of a thousand miles starts with one step. Your Excellency, you and I have taken the first concrete step towards the realisation of the Mano River and ECOWAS principles to facilitate the free movement of goods and people and the mutual right of citizens to live and work in any of our countries within the laws of the lands.

Your Excellency, let me thank you for making history.

HE President Ernest Bai Koroma

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