Solomon Berewa says Kabbah vindictive, questions his anti-corruption credentials

Former Vice President and 2007 defeated presidential candidate of the Sierra Leone People’s Party, Solomon Berewa has seriously questioned the incorruptibility of his former boss and President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah. In an exclusive interview with Politico following the launch of his memoir last week, he said Kabbah was “also infested with viruses of bad governance”, adding “I cannot say that he was as saintly as he posed to be because he gave the impression he was”. He charged that he had “sacred cows” and cherry-picked people to be prosecuted by the Anti Corruption Commission while he protected others. Berewa said the former president had “his own human frailty” including vindictiveness. He however said that together they provided “good leadership” for the country in view of the country they inherited. For the full interview in which he says probably more than he writes in his book, please read on: Politico: Mr Solomon Ekuma Berewa you have just published your memoir, could you tell us why the need to write this book. Solomon Berewa: Well as you can see from the introduction of the book I believe if you’ve held a high public office you come to gain a lot. To see and know quite a lot about people, about even the country in which you are and about governance. I believe you must let people know, or share your experience with people. And that is basically what I tried to do to share my experience with people on the topics I have mentioned: governance, leadership, which are very crucial in a country like ours. That is why I tried to put them on paper Politico: Quite a lot of experience. Which, would you say, stands out the most Solomon Berewa: Governance, I think. Eleven years there you know that. On leadership I don’t know which is more because they were together. But both are equally important in my own view. Both are equally important because if you have good leadership that tends to underpin successes in governance. If you do good governance then of course you must be a good leader. So the two of them are inseparable as it were Politico: And do you see yourself as a good leader or as having been a good leader? Solomon Berewa: I tried to do mine. I tried to do mine, in a sense that I tried to produce results in areas where I was assigned and I think that is one purpose in good leadership; you try to produce results. You tried to see things in a way that will benefit people. To that extent I think I tried in my own little bit Politico: And would you say that with the benefit of hindsight, would you say that you and your boss, your former boss, President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah, would you say that you provided good leadership exemplary leadership for Sierra Leone? Solomon Berewa: I think together we did. We had a lot of problems, challenges were there you know. When we came in the war was raging. It was going on and that went on for the greater part of our first term. And of course there was a coup staged against us. And that lasted for one year. And even when the war ended to put things straight like resettle the population, disarm combatants, and then put together the infrastructure that was destroyed by the rebels. Those were very difficult challenges. But I think the fact that we got the country going, moving, was evidence of our having done something good Politico: Some people say that your boss wasn’t that tough on corruption and it is something you allude to in a way in your book, yourself. Solomon Berewa: Well I won’t say he wasn’t tough. It was his idea to bring the Anti Corruption Commission. It was a good thing. Politico: Some would say imposed on him by Britain particularly Claire Short who was Development Minister at that time? Solomon Berewa: No, it was his initial idea. That I know. He suggested to them the need to bring that because he got these ideas in his days in the UN. The real problem was not that he wasn’t tough on corruption. We had a few sacred cows, if you like. There were some people who he would not wish they faced the Commission. Politico: Even if there was evidence of them being corrupt? Solomon Berewa: Well I tried to show that in my book and I gave a few instances in the book. Others would go all out to see that they were prosecuted to the conclusion. But as a matter of principle he wished we didn’t have corruption on the level that it was in Sierra Leone or the level that it is today in Sierra Leone. Otherwise he wouldn’t have insisted on having the Anti Corruption Commission set up. The British didn’t impose on him. He got them to be interested in it and they supported it. Politico: And the fact that you say that he would pick and choose who to prosecute and who not to prosecute for corruption. Would you say that he was a vindictive man? Solomon Berewa: [Pause] Oh he had his own human frailty. Politico: Including vindictiveness? Solomon Berewa: That could be mentioned. Mhm. That could be mentioned Politico: And you also say in your book that he [Kabbah] kind of tried to impose things on you. One thing that you write so much on in the book is that when you were elected as your party’s flag bearer to run for president in 2007, President Kabbah imposed his own choice of a running mate on you contrary to your party’s constitution which says that that should be done by the flagbearer in consultation with the National Executive Committee of the party. Solomon Berewa: Well that I brought out clearly in the book. I mean there was no secret about that. That if I had my own free will to make a choice about a running mate in that election it could not have coincided with his own choice. And his insistence that it was to have been his own choice hampered my progress somehow. And of course these were things that were done not in the open but he knows and I know and a few other people know that he was very insistent that his choice was the man I was to take. So I think our first problem which started putting us apart started with that. But then it was too late in the day. The elections were then coming. But I had a very good, fruitful, cooperative relationship all throughout our working period. At that point things started going sour. But I could not resist his insistence for many reasons. Politico: Why couldn’t you? Because you had yourself said at the time you were your own man. But you have given one the impression from what you have written in your book and what you are saying now that in fact you were not your own man. You were being manipulated by President Kabbah at that time. Solomon Berewa: Well I was my own man in many ways. But you know we live in a society where people can easily brand you as being ungrateful. People can easily say ‘here is a man this man’ they would think that it was Tejan Kabbah who made me become the party leader, the flag bearer. And here was I trying to disobey, to reject his own interest. They would say so many things and I fear that he would even undermine my campaign to my own disadvantage. So I took all those into account and I said alright let me settle for this one to see what best I can make of it. It’s not a matter of me not being my own man I was my own man for many years and he knows that. Politico: And you say that action by President Kabbah to impose, to use your own word, his own choice of your running mate in a way contributed to the international conspiracy theory to see your party out of power because, you say in our book, the international community had lost confidence in his commitment to fighting corruption. Solomon Berewa: That was one thing. What made them, I believe, lose confidence in him in relation to his fight and commitment to fight corruption was not in the running mate area. We had a matter which was blatantly one that required the intervention of the Anti Corruption Commission that involving Okere Adams Politico: That’s the then Minister of Agriculture. Solomon Berewa: That is it. He tried to block that. He didn’t want that to go to the [Anti Corruption] Commission at all. The British were very angry with that. They thought that there was enough evidence for that man to face the Commission, for him to be investigated. Tejan Kabbah did not encourage that at all. He did not allow that. He got very angry with that. So I think that was one thing that really exposed him as one preparing to compromise when somebody of his own interest was involved. Politico: Would you say that was because President Kabbah himself was corrupt or was he just protecting his interest for some other reason? Solomon Berewa: Well let me not go too much into that. You have seen the book, you have read it. As I said in the book he was also infested with viruses of bad governance, I put it in that language. Politico: Meaning? Solomon Berewa: I cannot say that he was as saintly as he posed to be because he gave the impression he was. The details of which I tried to put in my book To be continued on Thursday. Among other things Solomon Berewa talks about why he thinks the SLPP leader of the mid 1960s, Albert Margai, was the man who sowed the seeds of tribalism in Sierra Leonean politics. Does he say so because he wants to get at his son, Charles Margai who caused his defeat in 2007? Why does he not say anything about the AFRC junta treason trials whose prosecution he led? Does he regret those trials and executions? Does he regret Hinga Norman’s indictment by the Special Court for Sierra Leone. This and lots more on Thursday.