By Africa 24 correspondent

“We don’t have jobs; they think we are happy about that,” says a man to his fellow man in a street in Waterloo on Saturday September 9 2023.

He looks pretty grumpy and famished as he stepped his left foot above a basement of a house on the wayside on Furtune Lane in Waterloo.

Waterloo is about 23 miles off the capital Freetown.

As two of these men walked farther the street, the same man told his colleague of a Whatsapp video that had gone viral which is linked to the planned civilian protests in the country.

“I don’t think it is [ the viral video] about him because yesterday, I think, he didn’t send out an audio,” he explained.

He seemed not clear about whom he was referring to about that video. Because, the men were moving toward central Waterloo, while I was going toward the direction they were coming from.

But what I grasped from their short-heard conversation was that it had to do with the popular social media commentator, Adebayor who is said to live in Netherlands.

He is followed by thousands of Sierra Leoneans as people listened to his audio messages to understand the happenings about their country.

The Sierra Leonean born who fled to Netherlands years back was said to have inflamed many of the strikes that had happened lately in Sierra Leone such as the August 8th ,9th , 10th 2022 protests and the other sit-down strikes on June 12th, 13th  2023.

The latest peaceful demonstrations happened on the eve of Sierra Leone’s general elections.

Many civilians were tortured by the police and many others were arrested in those sit-down strikes which later turned to be peaceful demonstrations.

In June on the eve of elections in Sierra Leone, at an opposition’s party headquarters in Brookfields, Freetown, an innocent, an elderly woman was killed in a broad daylight by a government security officer and in June 21, 2023 All People’s Congress party headquarters was also placed under siege by some government security officers.

The ruling government, Sierra Leone People’s Party has been heavily criticized by most Sierra Leoneans for the current economic uncertainty in the country.

The domestic currency is depreciating while inflation continues to spike, causing prices on goods and services to further shoot up.

While a number of civilians, roughly above twenty, were killed by police shootings in the August 10th 2022 protests alone.

And about ten police officers lost their lives on that day.

The latest protests have seen children and innocent civilians sometimes being targeted by police armed men on the streets of the capital, Freetown and on the streets of Makeni in the north of Sierra Leone.

Children must always be protected. So, in a country where police can be very ruthless, it is advised that children should not be involved in protest actions.

The coming protests are fared by parents as rumours have it that the protests could disrupt businesses, office work and normal life.

In most cases, when striking actions are undertaken by civilians, most protesters would tend to be rowdy thereby threatening the peace and security of the country.

These rowdy men, who’re illiterate and wayward, or disillusioned youth who are half-literate, could set government vehicles ablaze during protesting events.

They could also go on a rampage sometimes, thereby confiscating people’s money and steal away traders’ goods while protesting in disguise.

There are lots of criminals who whisked along with some very decent civilians during pasts protests in the country.

The proposed protests have been widely rumoured by people that one major ‘demo’ could start on Septemeber 11, 2023.

The peaceful demonstration ( domo) is believed to be taken against the rising cost of fuel in Sierra Leone after it has jumped from Le 21 per a litre to a Le 30 on the 29th July 2023.

It’s expected that government, unlike in the past protests undertaken by civilians, sits with leaders of civilian demonstrations to control their followers. The protesters should not resort to burning down state’s assets such as buildings, vehicles, and attempting to kill security men.

Army officers who are often deployed on the streets and armed police men should work hand-in-hand with heads of protests movement to be able to peaceably control chanting crowds.

This way, many incidents like killings, and destruction of state and citizens’ valuable properties could be minimized or avoided.