September 25, 2017 By Joseph S. Margai
DSL’s Warrisay
agent of instability? Bishop Cole
head of Multi-Faith Council
The Multi-Religious Council for Peace and Justice has warned that Democracy Sierra Leone (DSL) could be promoting ‘strife, discord and chaos’ as well as jeopardising the peaceful conduct of the 2018 general elections.
The inter-faith group made the call in a press statement following an error-ridden press release by DSL calling on the Chief Electoral Commissioner, Nfa Alie Conteh, to resign.
In response, a release dated 18 September, 2017, signed by Bishop Christian A. Cole, advised government not to pay heed to the DSL press release, which it said could jeopardise the conduct of the 2018 elections.
With multitier elections less than six months away, DSL and a few groups aligned with the ruling All Peoples Congress have called for the resignation of the NEC boss, ostensibly for missing data on the voters register.
NEC met the deadline for the final voters register, which it says has 3,178,663 voters and promised to recapture data of voters whose identity may have been omitted inadvertently. Despite the hue and cry by DSL and co, no persons have come forward to claim their names have been deliberately omitted from the register.
Apparently concerned by rhetoric from a group that claims to promote democracy, the release by the multi-faith council said they were appalled by the DSL release which called for the resignation of the Chief Electoral Commissioner Mr. Mohamed Nfa Alie Conteh, only few months ahead of the general elections slated for March 7, 2018.
“While conceding that freedom of opinion is entrenched in the constitution of Sierra Leone, Council believes that careless statements arrogated by unscrupulous persons under the cover of civil society have the tendency to breed strife, discord and chaos that will not only be inimical to the current electoral process but will also disrupt the fragile democracy which every Sierra Leonean and religious leaders in particular are striving relentlessly to maintain,” the press release stated.
According to the release, “the 29-man national executive committee drawn from every religion in the country firmly believes that there are better options on how to address national challenges than inciting press releases.”
The Multi-Religious Council noted that following the 2007 general elections, a similar outcry for the resignation or removal of the erstwhile Chief Electoral Commissioner, Dr. Christiana Thorpe, for allegedly cancelling votes in the opposition stronghold was simply ignored as being “unconstitutional” and she was further appointed to conduct the 2012 general elections.
The release said DSL’s call for the resignation of the NEC boss was both ill-timed and unacceptable, while commending the latter for his positive achievement of registering more than three million Sierra Leoneans and conducting a credible boundary delimitation process.
“The eye of the international community is now focused on Sierra Leone to see that the entire process is freely, credibly conducted,” the release warned.