June 6, 1944 will always remain etched in the minds of all freedom-loving peoples of the world as this was the day seventy years ago today when Allied Forces launched a massive assault on the forces of Nazism and Adolf Hitler in a heroic move aimed at freeing Europe and indeed the rest of the world from the clutches of Nazi tyranny, evil and violations of human rights. The liberation of Europe and the discovery of concentrations camps brought to the eyes and eyes of an unbelieving and quite startled world just how determined the Nazis were to debase and relegate fellow human beings to a fate worse than you would wish for your worst enemy. And these atrocities against Jews, gypsies and others caught in the evil web of the Nazis were justified by the evil Nazis as part of their cleansing of Europe of human beings they regarded as not worthy of the label "human being".

This bit from the Holocaust Encyclopaedia will help give a picture of what it was like - Between 1933 and 1945, Nazi Germany established about 20,000 camps to imprison its many millions of victims. These camps were used for a range of purposes including forced-labor camps, transit camps which served as temporary way stations, and killing centers built primarily or exclusively for mass murder.

Doug Linder recalls what it was all about - about the men who took part in such mass cruelty and murder - men you would never, on first glance associate with such evil as we find in present day Sierra -

"No trial provides a better basis for understanding the nature and causes of evil than do the Nuremberg trials from 1945 to 1949. Those who come to the trials expecting to find sadistic monsters are generally disappointed. What is shocking about Nuremberg is the ordinariness of the defendants: men who may be good fathers, kind to animals, even unassuming--yet who committed unspeakable crimes. Years later, reporting on the trial of Adolf Eichmann, Hannah Arendt wrote of "the banality of evil." Like Eichmann, most Nuremberg defendants never aspired to be villains. Rather, they over-identified with an ideological cause and suffered from a lack of imagination or empathy: they couldn't fully appreciate the human consequences of their career-motivated decisions."

And it is worth noting that these atrocities against human beings in occupied Europe was not only maintained by evil men, but were propped up by women who carried out massive human rights violations against people they had put in concentration camps as the Nazi war machine set up extermination camps to kill people - men, women and children. Some of the women who were captured, tried and found guilty were hanged and there were quite a few among their number who showed no remorse during their trial - like their male counterparts and overlords in Hitler's bunker, they believed they were cleansing the world of undesirable human beings, human beings created in the image of God.

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Thursday May 22, 2014 - 21st century slave trade - 24 Sierra Leoneans freed from Chinese fishing vessels in Uruguay - signs of beatings and general ill-treatment as travelling documents seized.

We have been getting reports from international media outlets that 28 Africans have been freed, yes freed from their masters on whose fishing vessel they had been working. An AFP report quoted by many media outlets tells the story with this from Yahoo headlined - Africans held 'captive' on China-flagged vessel in Uruguay.

The AFP report says - A group of 28 African immigrants were held in slavery on a fishing vessel off the coast of Uruguay, beaten and forced to work without pay, attorneys said Wednesday. The migrants, 24 of whom were from Sierra Leone and the rest from Ghana, said they had not been paid "a penny" since boarding the China-flagged vessel seven months ago. They were initially divided up between three fishing boats but, upon reaching Uruguay's territorial waters, they were transferred to a single vessel docked in Montevideo on Sunday and were taken to a hotel. Local news reports said that the men had signed on as contract labor to work on the ship, but that the ship's captain confiscated their passports and the crew held them captive. Most had embarked in Sierra Leone. The men have been examined by doctors who said they appeared to have the early symptoms of malaria and possibly tuberculosis. They have been referred to two Uruguayan hospitals for treatment.

Now the question we want answered is - why have the fate of the men not being made public in Sierra Leone? What agency recruited the men who were clearly desperate to get a job at sea given the labour market in the country with jobs so hard to come by? What action has the Labour ministry taken to return these men home as well as carrying an investigation into how these men were recruited and allowed to leave the shores of their country.

Getting work on board ships was quite an opportunity when law, order and less political interference and was seen as an opportunity for men, yes all were men to earn something for the family as well as giving the lucky ones the opportunity to visit other lands. Residents of the Cline Town, yes Kanikay area in the east of Freetown know only too well the benefits to be derived when the sea men arrived back home at the Deep Water Quay - oops the Queen Elizabeth II Quay. The sounds of music from repaired and reactivated speakers were there to announce their arrivals and those who had visited the famous Matadi port in Congo woulf come back with 45 rpm records of music from the present DRC giving all those within earshot more than an earful of good and exciting music from the land of the sapeur.

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Thursday May 22, 2014 - US Congress hears the story of a teenager who survived a Boko Haram attack on her home. Deborah Peter's story rings a bell with those who witnessed the RUF/AFRC invasion of Freetown on January 6, 1999.

There's a story in Newsweek magazine which has the headline - Teenage Survivor of Boko Haram Recounts Ordeal to U.S. Congress.

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Tuesday May 20, 2014 - The legacy of flouting rules and procedures in governance - planting the seeds of chaos in Sierra Leone's fledgling democracy. A look at the civil service again as rules get routinely ignored and bent as the government loses control over its information management systems.

We have in the past warned against the use of party connections and nepotism in the affairs of government highlighting that our troubles could be traced to the subverting of rules and regulations aimed at getting both the government and the governed to appreciate the benefits associated with due diligence to the country's system of governance. We had highlighted the dangers of having press attaches taking upon themselves the role of official government spokesmen/women spewing on the internet whatever fancies the imagination and encouraged by the rat at State House as long as it is full of the usual praise-singing mantra.

Press attaches, as far as Civil Service rules go - are civil servants bound by rules and regulations that govern theirs and other jobs and are not permitted to air their views in public without clearance from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting - the official Public Relations arm of the government. Again we would want to remind those in authority that having press attaches engaged in publishing articles on the internet attacking other political parties is wrong and in violation of their duties as civil servants bearing in mind that there's a big difference between these press attaches who are paid from government coffers and those praise singers who are paid from political party funds. Just as Siaka Stevens found it difficult to cut a clear line between his pocket and that of government coffers, we do hope that at the end of the day when it comes to accounting to the people, the rat and his system would be in a position to clearly tell the people that jaunts by APC functionaries to grace APC party matters abroad are not funded by the tax paper but by the APC party.

Giving his testimony on behalf of the APC, then the main opposition party to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the TRC, one Wusu B. Munu gave an insight into this very strategic arm of public governance when he stated -  At Independence, the departing Colonial Administration left behind a well established and professionally trained Civil Service on the White Hall model in the United Kingdom. The concept and definition of the Sierra Leone Civil Service was the same as that adopted by White Hall based on the popular formulation of the British Royal Commission (The "Tomlison Commission) on the Civil Service in 1929 - 1931 which I reproduce below: The Civil Servant ". . . the Servant of the Crown other than holders of political or judicial offices, who are employed in a civil capacity and whose remuneration is paid wholly and directly out of monies voted by Parliament".

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Wednesday May 14, 2014 - It is a month today since almost three hundred school girls in Chibok, Nigeria were abducted by the Boko Haram terrorists and despite the clarion call from parents and the concerned all over the world, the rat at State House has not uttered a word of condemnation. Why?

It is a month to the day when the nasty terrorist group, Boko Haram violated the privacy and safety of more than two hundred girls (some put the figure at 300), kidnapped them and took them, against their will, to areas the poor and frightened girls could never have visited or wanted to visit under such conditions. As the pressure from Nigerian civil society mounted with worried mothers, relations and Nigerians joining in the call for their release, the international community brought its forces to bear first from celebrities and then leading ladies and politicians like Michelle Obama and her husband joining the call for the release of the abducted girls. A number of Western countries including the United Kingdom, France, the United States and others have now offered experts in intelligence gathering, hostage-taking and hostage negotiations.

In the midst of heightened fears for the safety of the girls and with increasing pressure from Nigerian and other world leaders, the terrorists released a video in which they showed a part of the kidnapped school children with the Boko Haram warlord ranting away and wanting to use the abducted school children as a bargaining chip for the release of suspected Boko Haram sympathisers and activists believed to be in the custody of Nigeria's state security forces. The Nigerian authorities flatly refused to accede to the Boko Haram request.

In Freetown, the rat continues to sit tight. He has not made any public statement condemning Boko Haram for this outrage. It is the same silence that greeted the aftermath of reports he commissioned on the alleged rape of women who were found on the premises of the main opposition Sierra Leone Peoples Party, the SLPP, when their offices were sacked and vehicles set ablaze after what is now known as a State-directed act of violence.

Join Michelle Obama, the US First Lady in this campaign.

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A page on the website of Sierra Leone's Anti Corruption Commission headed by one of the hirelings of the rat nestled at State House has a Press Release proclaiming - "High Court hands down custodial sentences on NRA/ECO bank officials for corruption offences." And the press release goes on to state that it was a landmark decision in the case of the State vs Solomon Hindolo Katta and others in that apart from the fines those found guilty in the court presided over by one Justice Paul had to pay, it would seem that for the first time somebody is being sent to jail apart from a fine.

What we are really puzzled about in this matter is why this should be seen as a landmark judgement in a country where the rat proclaims zero tolerance for corruption. Now here's the juicy if not weird aspect of it all - the charges. The Press Release on the Anti Corruption Commission website states - "All five were convicted for offences including Conspiracy to Commit a Corruption Offence, Misappropriation of Public Revenue, Possession of Unexplained Wealth and Failure to Fully Declare Assets to the Commission, all contrary to the Anti Corruption Act 2008."

Imagine this, if you will. The provisions of the stated Act had been there since 2008 and yet when one reads the various government-oiled "news outlets" one may be forgiven for thinking that it is only now that the Anti Corruption Commission boss Kamara has taken time off to carefully peruse the document in full and becoming aware of the provisions therein. We have in the past brought the various offences to the attention of our readers so that they too can see that if the Anti Corruption boss and his paymaster at State House were really interested in clamping down on corruption, then many wrong doers and would be followers and beneficiaries would have been quaking in their boots/half-backs. How about the number of private residences and other buildings attributed to the handiwork of his master at State House? Dare he ask the rat about his unexplained wealth?

And last but not the least - what about all those cases the conclusion of which he stated he would be appealing. What happened to those appeals? Were they submitted to the courts? Has he forgotten this - "The suspended Boss of the National Revenue Authority, Alieu Sesay, Samuel Cole, Franklyn Pratt, Gloria Gabisi and Fatmata Ojubarra Sesay were acquitted and discharged on all fifty seven counts of corruption offences. The Trial Judge held that the Prosecution had failed to establish that the 1st Accused, Alieu Sesay conspired with his Co- Accused. The Judge also believed that the Prosecution had failed to prove that the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th Accused acted in collusion with regards to the award of the various contracts."

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Wednesday February 5, 2014 - Sierra Leonean lives on the cheap - the land where "investors" are encouraged by an uncaring and corrupt government to get away with anything including murder as the forces of law and order become slaves to the whims and caprices of the vultures at State House.

Some time in late December last year, we started getting reports of a boat incident involving one of our local sea transportation vessels known as pampa. Initially the death toll from that incident was reported to be in the region of five, but as the hours progressed, it became obvious that far more Sierra Leoneans could have lost their lives. Caring national newspapers wanting to alert the government of the rat immediately started running stories with the main thread being that the local sea craft was in collision with a boat controlled by one of the many "investors" now operating in Sierra Leone and who would want us to believe that they do care for the people of Sierra Leone. We are quite sure that if those lives were British, Australian, American or nationals from any democratic and caring government, they would be requesting a full investigation into the matter.

Kindly recall that on Tuesday September 8, 2009 a boat travelling from Shenge to Tombo was involved in an incident in which more than two hundred lives, including those of school children coming back from holidays and getting ready for the reopening of schools, were lost. Up to this time, the exact number of people on the boat has not been verified nor the exact number of those who perished.

On the "investors" getting away with murder remember Bumbuna and how the rat's security forces reacted after the murder of poor Musu Conteh -"The police marched behind the women and physically and emotionally intimidated them thereby disrespecting the women’s secret society. According to them, the police were raining the worst forms of verbal insults saying they will ‘’fire gunshot into the sexual organs of the women’’ and “vaginate” their new weapons. The women reported that they were traumatized because the police operation reminded them of the rebel war. “It was like any rebel attack”, the women repeatedly said. “Due to this incident, our memories of the nineties were recalled when the rebels attacked here in 1994. All what we saw on that day [of the police operation in Bumbuna] can be compared to what we went through during the war. We were worried to imagine we were going to lose all we have worked for a second time. We even thought it was another war.”

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