FREE FOR ALL PUNCH UP AT YSC
We have seen appalling pictures of a FREE FOR ALL punch up at the Young Sportsmen Club along Wilkinson in Freetown. We still don’t have any coherent explanation addressing how what looked like a night of revelry descended into absolute chaos and bloodshed.
Punch ups happen in such gatherings from time to time but the widespread nature and anger with which people with blood ties attacked each other that day, as could be seen in the video tells us that the underlying cause could be long-standing.
When we called the police a day after the event we were told the issue was still being investigated. This is normally a quick way of telling the media to MIND THEIR BUSINESS. Our police source couldn’t even say if arrests were made and what the line of inquiry is. We are still waiting because the source promised to get back to us. This is how things begin only to end in journalists being described as RECKLESS. The police are opening themselves up once again to speculation and doubt.
1. They cannot deny that big guys, some with fat bank accounts, beat up each other with missiles leaving some with bloodied faces and others lying helplessly on the floor. The pictures are all over the place.
2. What happened is a serious law and order issue and the police have something to say and do about it. We will not allow them to treat it as a mild neighborly dispute. No way!
3. The word on the street is that the social standing of those who behaved so badly that night is a guarantee that the police are going to simply call them into a meeting room for a quick chat and send them away with the words: YOUR SINS ARE FORGIVEN; SIN NO MORE.
4. We serve notice that we will follow this up until people are brought before a judge. That’s our job. The laws of this country should apply fairly to all.
WHEN ORDINARY PEOPLE FIND DRUGS IN A POLICE FACILITY
What is the official explanation from the Sierra Leone Police about what happened at Lower Bambara Chiefdom in Kenema District? The report we’ve seen in the video is one in which ordinary activists in that area raided a police facility and discovered a good quantity of marijuana. They then displayed it for the world to see with running commentary.
Again, it’s been a good few hours since that picture emerged and the police have still not told us what actually happened. What was marijuana doing in a police facility as claimed by the young people in that video? While we wait for the police, let’s share a few thoughts because we’ve also been trying to make sense of the video.
1. It could well be that the video portrays an event purposely staged by some young people with a mobile phone as they attempt to embarrass the police and slow them down in this new drive to fight drug abuse. It’s possible.
2. Maybe a deal between the police and some of those same young people went bad after the declaration of the emergency – the police wanted to pull out of the business because of the emergency declaration but the young guys think after a few weeks the noise will die down so the business should go on. Without the cooperation of the police, the next move is to embarrass them.
3. Maybe rogue elements in the local police were actually caught pants down and exposed. They cannot be arresting people for drug dealing while they are neck-deep in the trade.
Anyway, please don’t believe any of what we have stated here. Wait for the official explanation. See you soon.
CABLE CAR MAYOR IGNORES SANITATION CHALLENGE
Freetown Mayor’s CABLE CAR project is still in the pipeline. Well, it's been a long time now and she hasn’t said anything about that. We asked a senior Tolongbo councilor about the project recently, he waffled his way out of it. We ignored him because he was in a difficult position trying to explain an idea that even the big woman is refusing to talk about these days.
Anyway, she has a few more years at City Hall, who knows? What concerns us immediately is the way she has also abandoned the city in the area of sanitation. Forget those nice pictures of our Mayor on social media; we live in a very dirty city. We share dirty streets and markets with those people with British accents who spend a good portion of their time on social media complaining about the cost of airline tickets. We are here talking about WAKA FINE and the unsanitary condition of our city. We pay our taxes in Freetown but our Mayor appears to have lost the plot so early in round TWO.
Usually reliable sources have told us she is planning a big crackdown on Illegal Street trading in September. Why September? When is she going to crackdown on people throwing rubbish all over Freetown?
It’s one thing to tell gullible people in the West, including respected media institutions about planting ONE MILLION TREES that ordinary folks like us living in this city have not seen, quite another to believe that one day even those gullible Westerners are not going to get tired of being told ALICE IN WONDERLAND STORIES.
WHY ALWAYS EVERTON?
After scoring a goal in the EPL years back for his former club Manchester City, Italian footballer Mario Balotelli lifted his shirt to reveal the following lines on his T-shirt: WHY ALWAYS ME? Apparently, the guy was fed with the British media constantly getting on his case over almost everything – his performance on the field – that is always expected for a player with a big reputation and a large pay deal, his attitude to his team mates and the manager and his comments about the media. In his case, his hairstyle was also a matter of great interest to football writers. Even his own fans created a bit of a hell for him. He left England before he could actually settle in.
Football writers in the Italian media are also known to be critical but Balotelli was not prepared for what he found in England.
Anyway, EVERTON must be asking the same question right now: Why Always Everton? We know that at least four clubs in the EPL were charged for breaching FINANCIAL FAIR PLAY RULES. One of them –that’s money bags Manchester City have more than ONE HUNDRED COUNTS but no action has been taken against them so far. In fact they were the first to be charged for living above their income but EVERTON, with just a few counts has been tried, convicted and punished twice along with lowly Nottingham Forest. Nobody is saying anything about Manchester City. Why Always Everton?
1. Let’s face it Everton is a low hanging fruit that can be dealt with easily. They don’t have a big fan base to cause a lot of trouble for the English Football Association.
2. Everton doesn’t have oil money in the bank. Manchester City hired a lawyer on a pay of hundreds of thousands of pounds an hour. That’s very serious business.
3. The FFP actions initiated by the English FA against these clubs will provide the greatest test for credibility of that organization. The world is watching.
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