By Umaru Fofana
The year 2024 and the months leading up to it, witnessed the deepening of the toxicity that has come to characterise – marred, if you prefer – Sierra Leonean politics in recent years. On the back of a disputed election there was a failed attempted coup in the previous November which cast a shadow over the year. As the wheels of next elections cycle keep spinning, and 2028 approaches, things can only hot up several degrees in 2025.
With the ruling SLPP party aiming to succeed itself – for the first time since the restoration of multiparty democracy in 1996 for a ruling party to continue after two terms – it has to choose its flagbearer differently. It should be done more democratically and with level headedness. Otherwise they risk a splinter like it happened in the months leading up to the 2007 polls.
Things have become so frenetic that there has been a warning. At a meeting on Friday 20 December of the party’s National Executive Council – the highest decision-making body after the delegates’ conference – the party’s National Leader, Julius Maada Bio, said that whoever campaigned to become flagbearer at this time would be suspended from the party. How that will be enforced or even adhered to in 2025 will be as hard as desalinating water from the ocean with a mining sieve.
To be able to succeed itself, the SLPP will have to contend with the main opposition APC party who are prepositioning themselves ahead of the next polls. On the back of their claims that they were robbed at the 2023 polls, not backed with evidence, they must be oozing with momentum. 2025 will make many things and candidates much clearer.
Ruling SLPP
In the green corner, Dr Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh is hoping to achieve another first by becoming the first Vice President of Sierra Leone to succeed his boss. He has shown loyalty than any other Vice President that I know of. Astute with attention to detail, his Kono and Port Loko background is seen as an asset both for his aspiration and his ability to reunite the country. Being an ethnic Fullah is seen both as a political strength and weakness, in that the backing of the third largest ethnic group will count for a huge amount of vote, while potential anti-Fullah sentiments for president could mean a downer to be able to win his way to the ticket. The belief among his supporters being that once he secures that ticket, he could be home and dry in a nationwide vote.
To clinch his party’s ticket, the former UN man will have to fend off interests from the former UNIDO boss, Dr Kandeh Yumkella aka KKY. The born-again SLPP member who ran in 2018 as a presidential candidate for the NGC party after defecting from the SLPP, is obviously interested but quite quiet about it. He is a man filled with ideas and knowhows, backed by his gift of the garb. How the party delegates and rank and file members forgive him for breaking away in the first place in a way that could have cost them victory in 2018, will be a matter of time to determine.
In more ways than one, Chief Minister Dr David Moinina Sengeh has probably made his intentions more apparent than anyone else has. Many see him as the president’s preferred choice to succeed him. The MIT-educated technologist showed remarkable diligence and dedication to duty in his previous role as Minister of Basic and Senior Secondary School Education. Many see him as the preferred choice of his boss who has reportedly denied backing him. His critics say he is somewhat puerile in both his utterances and swagger, with the proclivity of a man desperate for power. His first job under the Bio administration was Chief Innovation Officer, a position he has not relinquished.
The former Speaker of the ECOWAS Parliament and current MP, Sidi Tunis, is one not to be written off and is definitely interested. Married to the Minister of Tourism, Nabeela Tunis, hails from the southern Pujehun district, just like Sengeh does, and has tremendous influence and connections among the political elite in Nigeria and elsewhere in the subregion due to his previous work at ECOWAS. And he is believed to have the resources to match.
Another interested person is the former foreign minister and Ambassador to the UN, Allie Kabba, who is a personal friend of the former US president, Barack Obama. He is a campaign maestro who was one of the brains behind the 2018 Bio victory. But the two would apparently fall out and things seem to have gone awry between Kabba and President Bio. Details are sketchy but they seem to be fundamental differences to the point that Kabba refused to take up his ambassadorial appointment in Egypt which was announced shortly after he had been posted to New York. How those differences pan out could manifest itself in 2025.
Main opposition APC
In the red corner, Dr Samura Kamara remains the man to beat – at least on the face of it. Having twice contested and lost against President Julius Maada Bio, his influence within the APC party is still pretty profound, especially at the grassroots level. But he is faced with an internecine civil war against him in the party which seems difficult for him to win. Some of the warriors have even torn his flag into shreds. He may just have the political life of a proverbial cat.
Those challenging him within the party say he is yesterday’s man, citing age and his apparent lack of charisma. Some have therefore resorted to searching for younger and more dynamic candidates. The name Dr Ibrahim Bangura has been brought to the fore. In his 40s, the university lecturer has a huge persona but he remains an unknown quantity in the country’s body politic. His father, Mohamed Lankulay Bangura, is one of those who took Ernest Bai Koroma to court in his opposition days to stop him from running in 2007, elections which he eventually won. He would later become the Acting Organising Secretary of the party when, in my opinion, the best ever APC national delegates’ congress since multiparty democracy was restored to the country, was organised in Makeni.
One of the highlights of that convention, besides the rejection of Samuel Sam-Sumana as the party’s Deputy Leader, was the stopping of ML Bangura in the middle of his speech. With President Koroma at the high table, the microphone was seized from him, much to his mortification. Considering how little-known his son is, and how Koroma remains a colossus in the APC, it is a tough ask for Dr Bangura to emerge as the standard-bearer. Unless interests and dynamics have changed – and that happens so often in politics with horse-trading a common feature.
Joseph Kamara, a former Anti-Corruption Commissioner and a one-time Attorney General, is another interested person. The flamboyant lawyer oozes with charisma, has been involved in court for the party’s many cases and is one of the well-known names and faces in the party brought to the limelight by former President Koroma. He is believed to enjoy his support with the two men hailing from Makeni and Kamara being Koroma’s lawyer.
For all his trials and tribulations in the APC, leading to his expulsion from the party and his ignominious removal as Vice President, Samuel Sam-Sumana should not be underestimated. He has since returned to the party and is nursing a comeback to the presidential ticket. He obviously wants to be the flagbearer. Whether he will be amenable to return as a running-mate is unclear. Sources say he will not be. If the APC wants to win the Kono vote, a crucial electoral block, he is their best bet. As a presidential candidate, I believe he will get the majority of votes for the party in Kono. As a running-mate he will have to contend with First Lady Fatima Bio who also hails from the diamondiferous bellwether district and is a colossus there. That, of course, will depend on how much interest she shows in campaigning in 2028 for her party.
Freetown Mayor, Yvonne Aki-Sawyer, is gunning for the flag and can make a fine candidate in some ways. She is articulate and a strong woman. But her apparent reliance on the international community or outsiders could be her undoing. She should focus in-country, pay attention to improving Freetown beyond rhetoric and let go of her obsession with overseas support. She could make a good running-mate and that should be more easily attainable methinks.
Former House Minority Leader, Chernor Maju Bah aka Chericoco, is a witty politician who has learned the art of shrewdness. Even though interested in becoming the APC flagbearer, he is largely reticent about it but believed to be working behind closed doors. Regarded as the political son of former president Koroma, the twice presidential running-mate’s ethnicity could play to his advantage or disadvantage as much as it could into the hands of Vice President Juldeh. He is savvy, cunning and has friends in the media. How a decision to have both men leading both parties will pan out will be a subject of another article if that happens.
The name which appeared from the blue as a potential APC running-mate in the days leading up to the 2023 elections is also being mooted. But the chances of Jagaban, who hails from the southeast with northern parents, are thin and slim. But if he is as wealthy as it is being peddled, he can be a fodder for a northern presidential candidate the APC are more likely to choose, and gun for the running-mate position in 2028.
And this is where SLPP may be able to make all the difference – choosing someone from their weak spot – the north. Sources within the party who should know, say that they are gradually settling for a non-southern candidate. That will narrow the field between VP Juldeh and Yumkella who is the de facto minister of energy. Alpha Timbo may just have passed his political juggernaut era.
But the party may just decide to settle for somebody who has not served in the Bio administration, is well-known, articulate and not from the southeastern political block. In 2025, get ready for a year that will bring it all out in politics – and, possibly, in violence too. Happy New Year and best wishes in 2025!
(c) Copyright (2024) Politico (23/12/24)
