AS EBOLA STRIKES, PRES. KOROMAS INCOMPETENCE COSTS THE LIVES OF CITIZENS By Josephine Koroma (Iron Lady) For how long more do we as ordinary citizens have to be victims of Pres. Koromas gross incompetence. Back in 2012 when we had the cholera outbreak according to figures from WHO as of the 19 September that year we had about 19,000 people affected and about 274 deaths recorded. It was the worst cholera outbreak in 15 years and the gross incompetence of Pres. Koroma could not make it any better. And now there is ebola and according to WHO, the international health organisation has confirmed that five people have died as of Monday. And below is the picture of one of the reported ebola victims, Mammy Yawa Korfeh. Her family like that those of the other deceased must have felt neglected and abandoned by this incompetent President and his grossly incompetent Minister of Health, Miatta Kargbo. And if you want to know why, Pres. Koroma would not sack Miatta Kargbo just ask Sylvia Blyden, the Special Executive Assistant to Pres. Koroma she would tell you the answer. Here is a grossly incompetent President that for the past two months the ebola outbreak has been ravaging the lives of citizens of neighboring countries in Guinea and Liberia. Any proactive government would have had a sustained sensitization especially in the border towns with affected countries. With all the cash they took from donor agencies to sensitize there was poor leadership from the ministry of health and lack of direct supervision by incompetent President on an issue as serious as the deadly ebola. If a very senior government official like the Special Executive Assistant to the President can admit that the Rapid Diagnostic Kits for the Kailahun people had EXPIRED since March 2014 then you have to wonder whether if Pres. Koroma was born in Kailahun whether he would have allowed such neglect to his own people. Even when Makeni is not the capital city, dont his people enjoy 24 hours electricity and all basic social amenities? It has now also been confirmed that Pres. Koroma knew about the incidence of ebola on Saturday, a claim which has also been supported by the Special Executive Assistant. You would have expected any competent President to have immediately called a meeting for an emergency response showing leadership because of the deadly nature of ebola. But the President had to put the interest of APC above the lives of ordinary people whom he had taken an oath to protect. Rather cutting short his visit and wasting of our money in Mambolo on his friends and family members so that he can take control of the situation knowing fully well that he has an incompetent health minister the President failed spectacularly. Even when there were still evidence of EBOLA, the incompetent Health Minister and her officials thought the best they could do was just DENIAL, DENIAL and DENIAL. And now families of the victims of Ebola have lacked so much faith in the health officials and medical teams, as poorly prepared as they are to put the situation under control, that they have taken away from the Ebola clinic their relatives who have been infected. As bad as this is because such a decision will put not only the lives of those family members at risk but also communities will be at risk as well, however, if there was a sustained and effective sensitization of the people in those communities then these devastated families would not have attempted to do such thing. How can a government be so heartless that even the Special Executive Assistant to the incompetent Pres. Koroma could make such a shocking revelation on May 27th “One of the Ebola patients who had to flee the Koindu Kissi Teng Community Health Center when Police last evening went to rescue and escort the besieged Medical team sent to FORCIBLY take Ebola patients to Kenema yesterday, has just died at her residence where she had fled with her relatives after everyone, including the Community Health Officer, simply abandoned the Health center leaving the patients to their own devices. Madam KUMBA SATTA was her name. Her corpse has been taken to her village named Korosur, located three miles from Koindu for burial.... And if the incompetent Health Minister, Miatta Kargbo, was accused of being GUILTY of ordering the kidnap and possible secret killing of dying ebola virus patients then you can tell the extent of the heartless incompetence. So, if you have a President who cannot control his own immediate staff at State House from abusing each other on social media and newspapers and a President who cannot reprimand her Heath Minister for such incompetence or better still takes responsibility for such failure of leadership then our suffering people can only brace up. But if you think Ebola or cholera are the only issues that have exposed the incompetence of Pres. Koroma then think again. Just last month commemorating world malaria day, Sierra Leone was also ranked as one of the top five countries in the world mostly affected by Malaria. Deaths from malaria in the country account for about 50% of outpatient visits and 38% of admissions.Worst, Malaria-related illnesses contribute to 38% and 25% of child and all-ages mortality rates, respectively. The question that is on the lips of majority of Sierra Leoneans now is: how many more of our poor and suffering citizens are we going to be VICTIMS as a result of an incompetent president leading a bunch of incompetent ministers and government officials? I guess we can only pray that the souls of our departed compatriots rest in peace.
Posted on: Thu, 29 May 2014 09:17:18 +0000