Gone are the days when Bo Town (the former southern district headquarter town but now referred to as one of the newly created cities of Sierra Leone—that’s another story because Freetown itself could be called a big village coming out of the Iron Age) was the envy of many Freetown residents because of several uniqueness not found in the capital.
But now this once bastion of cleanliness, frequent power supply and political cohesion when it comes to matters regarding the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) seems to have caught an influenza from Freetown’s sneeze as it is now speedily resembling the capital in many bad things.
Like filthy Freetown, Bo Town’s streets are racing the capital’s as cabbage management seems to be an alien concept there. Electricity supply is not available and most ‘Botownians’ now have to make do with their ‘Kabbah Tigers’, while people are putting up structures everywhere like mad and in the same unplanned Freetown fashion.
Talking about pure drinking water? ‘Botownians’ get their impure drinking water from wells and streams, making them a little bit better than their ‘Freetonians’ counterparts who have to come to terms with Guma Valley Water Company’s frequent unannounced “Pump Lock” or sachet and bottled water
Like Freetown, ninety percent of Bo Town’s streets and roads (delete where applicable) are not tarred, and the roofs of its houses remind us of John Pepper Clark’s poem “Ibadan”. And like the capital’s lawless Poda-Poda and taxi drivers, the southern town (pardon us because that place does not resemble a city) has its lawless ‘Okada’ riders.
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