By Umaru Fofana
I first met Usman Boie Kamara in 2009, or so. I had gone to interview the then Minister of Mineral Resources, Abubakarr Jalloh, about a story I was doing on the Peppel Port. As Director of Mines at the time the minister decided to call him in for some clarification, of some sort, before my interview. I suppose. He looked affable even if lacking in presence. Shy-looking too. He gave me his business card and I gave him mine. Quick off the mark he called me after close of business on that day. Quite impressive, I thought to myself once I realised he was on the other end of the phone.
Usu, as he is fondly called, was quite clear on what he wanted. Friendship. Or so I thought. I accepted it. He came across as a man who was setting a stage in politics for himself. Otherwise why would a senior civil servant be this interested in a journalist in a country where they are almost barred from talking to us, I wondered.
As the discourse furthered he felt more comfortable. Convenient too. And confident. We discussed a wide range of issues including how he had been sent packing out of the ministry after the elections of 2007 that brought into office President Ernest Bai Koroma and the All People’s Congress party. That much had escaped me or I did not even noticed it had happened. Why not! After all we kind of lost count of how many civil servants were in trouble after those elections either because they had meddled too much into partisan politics under the previous government or the new administration wanted to get their own supporters in strategic places, or may be a bit of both.
I was to later learn, just a few months ago actually, that we both hail from the same chiefdom – Biriwa in the northern Bombali district. While my parents migrated to the eastern Kono district where I was born, his migrated to Freetown where he was born.
Depending on how you pronounce it, his name “Usu” in our native Mandingo means “heat” or “heat up”. And his surname “Boie”, if pronounced bi-syllabically means “leave” or “quit”. And if pronounced commandingly, with an exclamation, it means “go away!” or “vamoose!” Depending on which side of the political divide you are on, take your pick on the significance of his name to the current unfolding political theatrics.
Anyway…back to the telephone call…the truth is Usu never called me again. Probably I did not warm up to him. I often do not warm up to public officials whom, my instinct tells me, are interested in taking my sympathy away from the ordinary people to them. Or may be because I did not call him back he struck me off his calling list. But I always thought back on him as an excellent mining engineer. Top notch!
I was later shocked, even if not surprised, when I learned years later that he was running to lead the opposition Sierra Leone People’s Party as its presidential candidate. Then some sections of the media who are decrying him now, started singing his praise and making us believe he, not Ernest Koroma, should be at State House, while those that are hailing him today started calling him a diamond thief.
Whatever the truth, I recall a foreign diplomat, quoting his sources, telling me that Usu Boie was rich even if he poured cold water on that by questioning how he got his wealth and even suggesting malfeasance. He did not provide me with any evidence but was quite certain. If he was that rich why would he return to the ministry apparently following a humiliating sending off on leave, I thought to myself. Then one of my dad’s piece of advice sprang to my dead: Do not believe or dismiss, wholesale, anything you hear.
At the SLPP national delegates’ conference in Kenema in 2009, it seemed orchestrated to suit Maada Bio, who would later become Usu’s main challenger. Even though it was far away from the party’s primaries which were to hold two years later, pretty much like it is happening in national politics at present, there were support groups for Bio with some of them clad in t-shirts bearing his photograph even though that should not have been allowed. Pretty much an unfair orchestration. But Usu Boie seemed to enjoy the support of some of the top echelons of the party including former president Ahmad Tejan Kabbah and his close aides a lot of whom commanded huge influence within the party and seemed to dislike Bio. The reasons are for another article. It will be interesting to know where their support lies now with Boie out of their party.
At the end of that convention Usu Boie’s name started taking centre-stage. His name sounded more like the next presidential candidate of the SLPP than he actually looked and sounded. Where is charisma and what about the issues he brings forth, a party member obviously supporting another candidate asked of him? But that did not matter to those who supported Usu. And they were quite a number. A good number of those supporters were his personal loyalists. These are bound to follow him wherever he asks them to, whenever. But it is also safe to say that many others followed him because of the party and they are diehard members or supporters of the SLPP who cannot be swayed from it. But the SLPP must realise that even if it is five people who follow Usu – and they are definitely in the hundreds at the very least, it is five people too many and too costly.
When at the primaries last year some key Usu Boie supporters running for other positions in the party won, I could see discomfort on the faces of Maada Bio and his supporters. And the more the elections went on the more Bio’s cookie seemed to crumble. But some of his supporters stood their ground maintaining that only a runoff could cost their man the position of flag-bearer; something not prescribed in the party’s constitution. Eventually Bio won by a simple majority.
That victory and the way it was handled both by the winners and the losers may just have caused the SLPP a huge disfavour and could cost them the presidency. Usu and his followers started acting up, sometimes like babies. While all thought the party’s flag-bearer would be the last to address supporters after the election, Usu decided for some strange reason to hold his own “rally” after his leader had already done so. He oscillated and vacillated. He held a series of meetings and left his supporters in uncertainty as to where his loyalty lay. In one meeting I was inadvertently at, in Karina in our common ancestral home chiefdom of Biriwa, he told the people to give him more time to think it through when he was asked where they should throw their support. In that meeting were former president Kabbah and his wife who is the national Chairlady of the party. Interesting. But once he declined to tell the people where they should throw their weight, it became apparent he was leaving the SLPP party. Clearly the people looked unhappy that he had lost the contest but whether that meant they would follow him to another party was not so clear-cut.
Around the same time he had accompanied president Koroma to Kabala at a public function where he was introduced as the president’s brother. What more proof he was gone? Then the SLPP officially expelled him from their ranks. I say OFFICIALLY because it was obvious he was gone. But would he have gone had he not ben expelled? I bet my life YES! His men who’d won positions in the SLPP among them Lansana Fadika had all gone, never mind the reasons they gave for moving. Lansana infamously said that God does not reward anyone for being a politician and that politics was all about the 3 Rs: Risk, Recognition and Reward. I was particularly shocked at his interpretation of Reward in politics in a radio interview on 98.1 FM. Anyway Usu was gone anyway…
Bio’s camp on the other hand pontificated and prevaricated so much on the Usu Boie issue that it scuppered any chance of reconciliation within the party. Then crept in the sense of triumphalism in their camp and making it a we-versus-them thing.
To be continued next week
Think Tank
Usu Boi, a hit or a heat
By Umaru Fofana
I first met Usman Boie Kamara in 2009, or so. I had gone to interview the then Minister of Mineral Resources, Abubakarr Jalloh, about a story I was doing on the Peppel Port. As Director of Mines at the time the minister decided to call him in for some clarification, of some sort, before my interview. I suppose. He looked affable even if lacking in presence. Shy-looking too. He gave me his business card and I gave him mine. Quick off the mark he called me after close of business on that day. Quite impressive, I thought to myself once I realised he was on the other end of the phone.
Usu, as he is fondly called, was quite clear on what he wanted. Friendship. Or so I thought. I accepted it. He came across as a man who was setting a stage in politics for himself. Otherwise why would a senior civil servant be this interested in a journalist in a country where they are almost barred from talking to us, I wondered.
As the discourse furthered he felt more comfortable. Convenient too. And confident. We discussed a wide range of issues including how he had been sent packing out of the ministry after the elections of 2007 that brought into office President Ernest Bai Koroma and the All People’s Congress party. That much had escaped me or I did not even noticed it had happened. Why not! After all we kind of lost count of how many civil servants were in trouble after those elections either because they had meddled too much into partisan politics under the previous government or the new administration wanted to get their own supporters in strategic places, or may be a bit of both.
I was to later learn, just a few months ago actually, that we both hail from the same chiefdom – Biriwa in the northern Bombali district. While my parents migrated to the eastern Kono district where I was born, his migrated to Freetown where he was born.
Depending on how you pronounce it, his name “Usu” in our native Mandingo means “heat” or “heat up”. And his surname “Boie”, if pronounced bi-syllabically means “leave” or “quit”. And if pronounced commandingly, with an exclamation, it means “go away!” or “vamoose!” Depending on which side of the political divide you are on, take your pick on the significance of his name to the current unfolding political theatrics. And if you are an APC supporter, this guy is definitely a hit as big to you as Thriller was to Michael Jackson fans.
Anyway…back to the telephone call…the truth is Usu never called me again. Probably I did not warm up to him. I often do not warm up to public officials whom, my instinct tells me, are interested in taking my sympathy away from the ordinary people to them. Or may be because I did not call him back he struck me off his calling list. But I always thought back on him as an excellent mining engineer. Top notch!
I was later shocked, even if not surprised, when I learned years later that he was running to lead the opposition Sierra Leone People’s Party as its presidential candidate. Then some sections of the media who are decrying him now, started singing his praise and making us believe he, not Ernest Koroma, should be at State House, while those that are hailing him today started calling him a diamond thief.
Whatever the truth, I recall a foreign diplomat, quoting his sources, telling me that Usu Boie was rich even if he poured cold water on that by questioning how he got his wealth and even suggesting malfeasance. He did not provide me with any evidence but was quite certain. If he was that rich why would he return to the ministry apparently following a humiliating sending off on leave, I thought to myself. Then one of my dad’s piece of advice sprang to my dead: Do not believe or dismiss, wholesale, anything you hear.
At the SLPP national delegates’ conference in Kenema in 2009, it seemed orchestrated to suit Maada Bio, who would later become Usu’s main challenger. Even though it was far away from the party’s primaries which were to hold two years later, pretty much like it is happening in national politics at present, there were support groups for Bio with some of them clad in t-shirts bearing his photograph even though that should not have been allowed. Pretty much an unfair orchestration. But Usu Boie seemed to enjoy the support of some of the top echelons of the party including former president Ahmad Tejan Kabbah and his close aides a lot of whom commanded huge influence within the party and seemed to dislike Bio. The reasons are for another article. It will be interesting to know where their support lies now with Boie out of their party.
At the end of that convention Usu Boie’s name started taking centre-stage. His name sounded more like the next presidential candidate of the SLPP than he actually looked and sounded. Where is charisma and what about the issues he brings forth, a party member obviously supporting another candidate asked of him? But that did not matter to those who supported Usu. And they were quite a number. A good number of those supporters were his personal loyalists. These are bound to follow him wherever he asks them to, whenever. But it is also safe to say that many others followed him because of the party and they are diehard members or supporters of the SLPP who cannot be swayed from it. But the SLPP must realise that even if it is five people who follow Usu – and they are definitely in the hundreds at the very least, it is five people too many and too costly.
When at the primaries last year some key Usu Boie supporters running for other positions in the party won, I could see discomfort on the faces of Maada Bio and his supporters. And the more the elections went on the more Bio’s cookie seemed to crumble. But some of his supporters stood their ground maintaining that only a runoff could cost their man the position of flag-bearer; something not prescribed in the party’s constitution. Eventually Bio won by a simple majority.
That victory and the way it was handled both by the winners and the losers may just have caused the SLPP a huge disfavour and could cost them the presidency. Usu and his followers started acting up, sometimes like babies. While all thought the party’s flag-bearer would be the last to address supporters after the election, Usu decided for some strange reason to hold his own “rally” after his leader had already done so. He oscillated and vacillated. He held a series of meetings and left his supporters in uncertainty as to where his loyalty lay. In one meeting I was inadvertently at, in Karina in our common ancestral home chiefdom of Biriwa, he told the people to give him more time to think it through when he was asked where they should throw their support. In that meeting were former president Kabbah and his wife who is the national Chairlady of the party. Interesting. But once he declined to tell the people where they should throw their weight, it became apparent he was leaving the SLPP party. Clearly the people looked unhappy that he had lost the contest but whether that meant they would follow him to another party was not so clear-cut.
Around the same time he had accompanied president Koroma to Kabala at a public function where he was introduced as the president’s brother. What more proof he was gone? Then the SLPP officially expelled him from their ranks. I say OFFICIALLY because it was obvious he was gone. But would he have gone had he not ben expelled? I bet my life YES! His men who’d won positions in the SLPP among them Lansana Fadika had all gone, never mind the reasons they gave for moving. Lansana infamously said that God does not reward anyone for being a politician and that politics was all about the 3 Rs: Risk, Recognition and Reward. I was particularly shocked at his interpretation of Reward in politics in a radio interview on 98.1 FM. Anyway Usu was gone anyway…
Bio’s camp on the other hand pontificated and prevaricated so much on the Usu Boie issue that it scuppered any chance of reconciliation within the party. Then crept in the sense of triumphalism in their camp, making it a we-versus-them thing.
To be continued next week
