By Allieu Sahid Tunkara
The main opposition All People’s Congress (APC) party has appealed for the Sierra Leone government to ensure foreign judges preside over its appeals hearing against last month’s ruling that stripped it of its parliamentary majority.
The ruling by two separate High Court judges on May 31 unseated 10 APC MPs, with nine of the seats handed to the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) and one declared vacant for a bye-election. The development gave the SLPP a one-seat majority, with 58, against APC’s 57 seats.
The APC wasted no time to file an appeal at the Court of Appeals, even though the nine new parliamentarians were controversially sworn in.
On Friday the APC leadership condemned the action of the “illegal” swearing-in of the new MPs, describing the new MPs as “Strangers”. The party says it doesn’t trust any hearing presided over by a Sierra Leonean judge.
“We call on the government to bring in foreign judges to sit on the appeal matters. If the judgment does not favour us, we will continue to appeal till we get to the last step,” Chernor Maju Bah, the Parliamentary Leader of the APC, said in a written statement presented to journalists at a press briefing. He noted that the party’s confidence in the judiciary was at an all-time law.
The party also demanded a reversal of the swearing-in of the new MPs.
“We call on the clerk to do what is honorable and protect the sanctity of parliament by rejecting strangers illegally sworn in as members of parliament from occupying parliamentary seats or taking part in parliamentary proceedings,” he said, noting that the seats must remain vacant until the appeals process was determined.
Despite his expression of assurance that the APC was committed to following the due process of the law until justice prevails in all the matters they have appealed against, Mr Bah said that if the court’s decisions were not reversed it would be difficult for his party to comply with Parliament’s proceedings.
He said the people who voted during the elections would not like to see a situation in which the judiciary took a “short-cut” to unseat duly elected members of parliament.
“We believe in the rule of law by respecting and protecting the laws that govern the country, but this generation will not tolerate what happened two weeks back when 10 Members of Parliament were wrongfully evicted from parliament,” he said.
The APC also wants the judiciary to ensure that the hearings are televised and broadcast nationally in line with international best practice since these are matters of public interest.
Cherno Maju Bah, who is currently representing Constituency 126, has been in parliament throughout the ten-year period of the Ernest Bai Koroma reign. In the 2018 general elections he contested both as Vice Presidential candidate and as MP.
Mr Bah was among 16 APC MPs in the Western Area who were petitioned by the SLPP, which led to last month’s ruling. He was one of five MPs who survived the petition.
The APC said it had also filed dozens of petition against elected SLPP MPs and criticized the judiciary for “failing” to entertain its own cases.
Bah cited relevant constitutional provisions which he argued the judiciary must abide by and hear its cases.
The party also kicked against the courts’ orders that the expelled MPs pay back salaries and allowances they received in the last one year in parliament, adding that that aspect of the ruling was a “big error” on the part of the courts. He said the Members had legally earned those salaries as they were performing the required duties including representing parliament outside of the country.
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