By Kemo Cham
The main opposition All People’s Congress (APC) has vowed to help its members challenge any move by the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP)-led administration to implement the recommendations of the Commissions of Inquiry (COI).
The opposition party was responding to the publication of the much anticipated Government White paper on the COI.
President Julius Maada Bio unveiled the White paper on Thursday, September 24, at the presidency in Freetown. It endorsed much of the recommendations that included confiscation of the assets of all former officials who were found wanting by the COI.
APC in a statement slammed both the COI findings and the White paper as based on an “unconstitutional” and “unaccountable process.”
It said they were “a product of process marred by unconstitutionality, illegality, procedural corruption, political vindictiveness and malice,” vowing to help its members named in its fight against the government’s enforcement.
“Let it be noted that the APC rejects and shall support Persons of Interest to challenge findings and recommendations of the Government White Paper and COI reports politically, diplomatically and legally at both local and international levels,” it said in the statement signed by its National Secretary General, Osman, Foday Yansaneh.
The COI was established by President Bio shortly after coming to power in the 2018 general elections. It followed the setting up of the Government Transition Team (GTT), whose findings informed the formation of the COI.
Like the GTT, the COI’s findings revealed massive corruption in hundreds of millions of US Dollars. APC officials, from former President Ernest Bai Koroma to former Vice President Victor Bockarie Foh, among many former ministers and other top former officials of the Koroma administration, were found guilty of offences ranging from misappropriation of public funds to abuse of office.
The commissions recommended that those found wanting repay all monies misappropriated. They also recommended banning from holding political office.
But in its White paper, the government said it only wants officials to repay monies to the government. It gave those found wanting 90 days from the day of publication to meet the demands.
The APC had been opposed to the COI from the onset, and its position, it said, was informed by its opposition to the way the Bio administration handled the GTT investigations which it believes was the beginning of the plot to victimize its members.
The opposition party in its statement outlined several issues it said pointed to its position on the matter, including the violations of the legal and procedural approach leading to the creation of the COIs.
“It is therefore discernible that the Commissions of Inquiry are the interpretations of the overt intentions of the GTT report: Members of the SLPP who served on the GTT assumed the roles of investigators, persecutors, interpreters and enforcers of the law. From the outset, the sole aim of the SLPP government was and has always been to unfairly malign and victimize APC stalwarts for political gains,” the party said.
President Bio himself had presided over the launching of the White paper on Thursday. In his statement, he vowed that his government will ensure that the recommendations were fully implemented.
“Unlike other Commissions, citizens are assured that this Government will fully implement all recommendations,” he said.
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