A press statement from the Office of the Government Spokesman issued yesterday has described the press release signed by the Presidential Flag bearer of the Sierra Leone Peoples Party (SLPP) Maada Bio as a satanic document aimed at creating a state of instability and uncertainty in the country.
Addressing the press at the weekly briefing at the Ministry of Information conference hall, Deputy Minister Sheka Tarawallie explained that the release contains grave allegations close to suggesting that the Ministers of Defence and Internal Affairs are on the verge of staging a coup by arming ex-combatants and other civilians.
He added that government has already verbally denounced the contents and vicious agenda for the SLPP’s release and at the same time continues to remind members of the public that Bio’s release seeks to scare people of goodwill out of Sierra Leone.
The Deputy Information Minister reiterated that by circulating such a sadistic press release which dishonestly claims that ex-combatants are being re-armed and that citizens from neighboring countries are being smuggled in to the country for the purposes of registering them for voting, some foreigners, he said have already started to dispatch their wives and children out of the country for fear that the November elections would be a bloodbath.
Mr. Tarawallie noted that one of the mobile companies rolling out has already shut down its offices waiting for further instructions from their proprietors.
He maintained that many credible observers have drawn the conclusion that a poorly-organized and poverty-stricken SLPP cannot win the presidency in November.
“it is exactly because President Koroma has worked so assiduously to earn himself a second victory on the first ballot that has made the SLPP jittery to the extent that they are bent on infusing a state of instability by provoking violence to cause the international community to suggest power-sharing” he stated.
The Deputy Minister further stated that President Koroma has exhibited a sense of fair play and has allowed his political party to compete in free and fair elections to the extent that the APC has actually lost political contests in bye-elections without any political reprisals or mayhem.
“The attempt by the SLPP to send the wrong signals to the International community with the wailing of their members, pretending that they are the whipping boys, can at best be described as childish tantrums”, he said.
He emphasized that neither the government nor the APC as a party is engaged in arming ex-combatants and or other civilians, just as it is totally untrue that the government is encouraging non -Sierra Leoneans to be registered for the forth coming elections.
Mr Tarawallie reiterates government commitment to ensuring free, fair and transparent elections through adequate capacitating and equipping of all relevant stakeholders.
He concluded that government is viewing the option of taking appropriate legal measures to address the issue.
The Ministry of Defence Spokesman and also Acting Chief of Defence Staff Brigadier Samuel Williams said they have not received any information of such thing. He explained that they conduct parallel border patrols with their counterparts in Liberia and Guinea. For the past three months, he said there situation report has not recorded any threat to the security. “We at MOD have no evidence to support the release of the SLPP”, he said.
The Sierra Leone Police (SLP) Inspector General Francis Munu, in a release said there is no cause for alarm as every effort is being made to maintain the security of the country at maximum level.
He also said that the SLP is investigating the matter.
By Abibatu Kamara
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