PONDER MY THOUGHTS BY Andrew Keili TAM BARYOH SAGA: NINE LESSONS BUT NO CAROLS The Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols is a service of Christian worship celebrating the birth of Jesus that is traditionally followed at Christmas. The Christmas story is told in nine short Bible readings, interspersed with the singing of Christmas carols, hymns and choir music. The Government’s rationale for Tam Baryoh’s detention is clearly spelt out in the Attorney General’s press release. According to this, his statements have the likelihood to incite public hatred, disaffection and instability by inferring that the government may want to perpetuate itself in governance, was carrying out quarantining in a discriminatory fashion and his reference to the possible replication of the Burkina Faso situation in Sierra Leone. One thing is for certain though, Tam Baryoh has knocked Ebola out of the news headlines. There are several lessons to be learnt from his plight which in many ways depicts long standing problems in our country and I will attempt to outline these in these nine lessons but with no carols. First Lesson: The VP and Kono problem continues to evoke heightened controversy The Kono District Development Association (KDDA), United Kingdom and Kono Union, USA have put out a caustic press release leaving no one in doubt as to where they stand on the Kono issue: “The arrest of Dr. David Tam Baryoh....... was preceded by a series of arbitrary arrests in Kono District.” It goes on to cite several illegal arrests and detentions. The Press release concludes: ”This apparent sanctioning of violence after the fact, and arbitrary arrests, by officials of the State, constitutes an unacceptable and disturbing trend in Sierra Leone over the last ten years.” It ends by accusing the government of using the state of emergency to settle scores: “We are urging the Government to ensure that officials of State are not using the current State of Emergency in Sierra Leone due to the Ebola crisis to illegally harass, attack, detain, and persecute innocent civilians in Kono District specifically and throughout the country in general in pursuit of other hidden political agendas.” Dr. Sylvia Blyden, no friend of Tam Baryoh’s, lays the blame squarely on Konos indulging in “filthy Kono Politics” and saying the President is a victim of this syndrome: “I believe that the reason why the President is using his extra-ordinary powers to lock up Tam Baryoh, is not over criticisms of Government’s handling of the Ebola crisis but because of a more sinister plot by Tam Baryoh and few others. These persons have craftily worked to consistently present Honourable Vice-President and Konos, as victims of alleged evil intent of President Koroma towards Konos..........President Koroma is a victim of filthy Kono politics. The persistent reports of feuding between the President and his VP are done by unscrupulous allies of the VP who see that as a way of garnering sympathy for the VP in his political pursuits.” The Kono problem is never ending-what the Mende man would call a “Musa wlo” story. Ah, well, Aluta continua! Second Lesson: SLPP calls for blood but........... SLPP has not had an official comment on the arrest of Tam Baryoh, but its many scribes on social media have gone on overdrive. They have not held back in their criticism of Tam Baryoh, who they see as one of the media architects of the last APC electoral victory. The only reason he is disaffected with APC is because he does not like the way his relative, the VP is being treated. If everything was fine with his kinsman he would not have said anything critical of APC.” Another says, “He dressed up the masked devil, let him dance with it!! “ A caustic critic says: “Tam Baryoh is a rogue journalist with very little integrity ...........Most other hired journalists and musicians who hounded SLPP out of power have learned this obvious fact and have shut the f-up. This guy wants to arrogantly and dishonestly insist he is for real....Sierra Leone crawls with phonies as celebrities for virtues they are the very anti-thesis of day in, day out. Once in a while one daft one meets his comeuppance and you want to ruin our well deserved joyous celebration of the spectacle.” Despite this some who see this as the government merely taking advantage of the state of emergency to meet its political objectives caution that the party should make a principled stand based on the issue and not on personalities. Third lesson: The International spotlight is off Ebola...for a while The Tam Baryoh saga has evoked an inordinate amount of international media coverage, taking the spotlight off the very Ebola issue for which he has been considered a detractor. The press coverage has not been exactly favourable to the government. A typical one in the New York Times by Robert Mackey states thus: “According to Umaru Fofana, who reports for the BBC and the Freetown news site Politico, a senior police official said that Mr. Tam-Baryoh was arrested as a result of “an executive order signed by his excellency the President.” The same officer said that the detention would last “until it pleases his Excellency” to release the reporter......On Thursday, Mr. Fofana reported that Mr. Tam-Baryoh’s wife had been denied access to him, and that the police raided his office and confiscated equipment.” The Guardian and other international papers have also been equally scathing. This is not exactly the type of press coverage we want at this stage in the Ebola fight. Fourth Lesson: There is nothing like a lame duck President President Obama may be termed a lame duck President in his last two terms with the Republicans now in control of both houses. Not so, for African Presidents and President Koroma is not likely to disappoint us in this respect. The President even under normal circumstances wields enormous powers both bestowed by the constitution and ceded by acquiescent politicians and citizens. The state of emergency only enhances this power. Fifth lesson: Law enforcement?.....What law enforcement? Our law enforcement officers in the Police and Prisons have not come out of this smelling good. The Guardian attributes this statement to a close friend of Tam Baryoh :“When the police arrested him in his office, there were six armed ones and a couple of plain clothes. They were really rough with him and threw away his blood pressure tablets,” The Guardian also says “A doctor has said he really needs to be in a hospital but officials made some excuse about no visitors because of Ebola, and shooed [the doctor] away.” There were also reports that Tam-Baryoh’s wife had been denied access to him, and that the police raided his office and confiscated equipment. A report yesterday from the Human Rights Commission gave more upbeat news that these reported problems have now been rectified. Sixth lesson: The tribal and regional political divide is ever present The lamentations of Tam Baryoh’s wife lends credence to the fact that the tribal and regional divide in our politics will be hard to cast aside. In an interview in Radio Democracy, she described the APC party as being ungrateful to her husband who did so much to get the party re-elected and described his close relationship with President Koroma. This was now how Tam Baryoh was being repaid! Her next statement was revealing: “Tam even got me, a Southerner to vote for APC”. What a revelation-APC should be anathema to southerners! The only story that beats this is that of an Uncle of mine, a die-hard SLPP stalwart who in the heydays of the one party state was stopped by the notorious ISU, made to “pump” and asked to repeat the words APC-“say A”. “A”, he repeated and so on. He went home later to his wife and told her-“The worst thing happened to me today-they made me say those words! Ah, well! This is a divided country. Seventh Lesson: civil society and governance institutions are divided Civil society has come out swinging. A press release from a group consisting of Lawyers for Human Rights, Sierra Leone , Society for Democratic Initiatives, Sierra Leone, Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law and others have made their voices heard on this issue, urging government to be more circumspect in addressing the Tam Baryoh issue. The Human Rights Commission has made a statement of sorts-at least they are keeping abreast of the situation. As is usual the National Commission for Democracy and other institutions are Missing in Action, as they normally do on such issues. Eighth Lesson: Thank God for small mercies As with most other sagas involving the arrest of journalists, the perceived solution seems to lie with placating the President and asking for mercy. One senior journalist remarked that his colleagues were ”working assiduously to plead with His Excellency, the President to have mercy on David.” I am also playing my own part”, he affirmed. Ninth Lesson: The media- a house divided against itself will fall The media is as usual divided on this issue. There is little doubt that with a weakened IMC and the SLAJ constantly on the defensive because of schisms in its ranks, the media is unlikely to speak with one voice on this issue. Those who clamour for a weakening of such institutions may one day not be able to garner support from such weakened institutions to act when they need action most. We await the outcome of the Tam Baryoh saga, but I think Peter Nkanga, West Africa representative of the Committee to Protect Journalists put the present situation in the right perspective when he said: “Sierra Leone’s genuine state of emergency means that critical thinking and public debate are more important than ever. Locking away journalists without charge helps nobody.” Time will tell whether he is right. Meanwhile, let us ponder these nine lessons, but remembering there are no carols to be sung. Ponder my thoughts.
Posted on: Tue, 11 Nov 2014 15:12:52 +0000
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