President Julius Maada Bio’s nominee for Chairman of the National Electoral Commission (NEC) will face Parliament today after a select committee hearing yesterday.
Mohamed Kenewui Konneh, who until his appointment was head of the Financial Intelligence Unit, told the committee that if approved for the job the nation should rest assured that he would make sure the outcomes of all elections were accepted by Sierra Leoneans and the international community.
Responding to suggestions that he was appointed by the president to favour “a certain political party”, he said: “that is false and my record in public life speaks for itself.” He described himself as a man of “uncompromising self-discipline and I will interpret the will of the people of Sierra Leone when it’s time to do so.”
Konneh said that on assuming office as Chairman of the National Electoral Commission, he would reform the commission with emphasis on its human resource capacity, finances and general operations. He said he would “rally the nation to implement much of the recommendations made by international and local observers towards the improvement of the electoral system in this country.”
On the question of whether Sierra Leoneans abroad would be able to vote, the commissioner-designate said he would look into that. He said that while working abroad he had had to pay a reasonable amount of money to travel back home to register and vote in the last election. “That is a burden we need to consider”, he said.
Konneh said his guiding principles throughout his 20 years in public life had always been accountability, integrity, independence and professionalism and that having those principles in mind in the discharge of his duties, he would always “stay calm, follow the rules, consider all views and weigh the impact of his decisions on the entire country.”
Mohamed Kenewui Konneh had also previously worked at the Anti-Corruption Commission, the African Development Bank in Tunisia and in Ivory Coast.
