Samuel Kallon 
Even the greatest warriors of all times were defeated in battlefields.
European French emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte, who used to have the largest and strongest army in Europe, was finally defeated in the battle of Waterloo, in Belgium in 1815.
Sierra Leone’s greatest hero, Bai Bureh, was conquered by the British soldiers at the Hut Tax War, when his people sold him off to the whites during the colonial era.
Thus, history teaches us that heroes and heroines, like Madam Yoko of Sierra Leone of blessed memories, had had enemies around who ruined their leadership at the time.
So, President Julius Maada Bio is not an exception and that he has been nurturing enemies around him by giving them position of trust.
President Julius Maada Bio could well be Julius Caesar of Rome who was betrayed by his friend, Brutus. And he is sure to have many Brutus in State House and those outside he had appointed to serve the people of Sierra Leone.
According to reliable sources, many of President Bio’s ministers and appointees do not like him to be running for a second time in office. Most of them are being persuaded by some big figures in the party to sway their support for them. It is believed that certain groups of these people are undermining the president’s agenda. Some of them had started to play their game sooner President Bio came to power. Haters of the president would advise the president wrongly to take wrong decisions that have affected Sierra Leoneans and his chances of victory.
A few of President Maada Bio’s appointees have long expressed interest to contest against President Bio at their party’s lower level elections. But they feared they would lose their position since the president still has popularity in the party.
If President Julius Maada Bio is to fail and lose the upcoming elections in June, most of his close allies are to be blamed.
The likes of Professor David John Francis, Lahai Lawrence Leema, Jacob Jusu Saffa and First lady, Fatima Bio may have partly played a part that now leads to President Bio’s obvious failings in governance.
Professor Francis’ 2018 Governance Transition Team (GTT) report badly exposed the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) government as a government of revenge and hatred on the outgone government, All People’s Congress Party (APC).
The First Lady is accused of corruption and immaturity in most of her comments to Sierra Leoneans.
Many political observers had doubted Professor Francis’ profession in Peace and Conflict Studies for having made egregious mistakes in the GTT report. Professor Francis and his team failed to acknowledge the fact that Sierra Leone needed a peaceful transition than one that is inflicted with injuries of hate, conflict and political division that had caused Sierra Leone’s Civil War.
The wording of the document, they say, had helped to inflame the anger and hatred in President Julius Maada Bio to ever more think of APC, the main opposition, as terrorist organization.
President Bio has labeled APC party as a terrorist group and his tone may have affected his credibility and integrity in the world over. Having handed over power as a junta to a civilian government, President Julius Maada Bio is expected to be always seen as a liberal and a democrat.
But he is ill-advised by his party men as he continues to make mistakes in governance. One of his biggest mistakes as president was to describe the country’s economy as the most ‘broken economy’ he had inherited in 2018. And the fact that he has lately referred to the main opposition as a terrorist group means his country is not open up for business.
Reacting to President Bio’s responses to some media interviews, a seasoned economist, Abubakrr Kanu explained: “If a president himself tells the world that he inherited a ‘broken economy’ ever in the history of Sierra Leone. By principle, it means the country has not any reserve and that may send away potential investors from Sierra Leone….”
It is believed that President Bio’s advisers, in spite of them acquired education in Europe and the West, they thoroughly lack understanding of diplomacy and international relations.
Most critics say speech writers of President Bio and framers of GTT report have contributed to President Bio’s several weaknesses and failures in his reign.
His Chief Minister who was finance minister, Jacob Jusu Saffa, together with Professor Kelfala Muana Kallon, Bank governor of Sierra Leone, has wrecked the nation’s economy.
The economy is declining day by day. Sierra Leone’s currency is now free floating as the Leones keeps depreciating against the US dollar every single day. The ex-finance minister’s abrupt advice to remove subsidy on fuel and the bank governor’s policy to re-denominate the Leones have led to hyper-inflation on commodities, goods and services, leading to rising cost of living.
SLPP’s ill-maturity in governance and President Bio’s bad track-record in human rights also account for his biggest leadership failures. Whenever human rights abuse and killings of innocent people occurred, President Bio would never say a word.
President Julius Maada Bio, in several of the killings across the country by police and state security personnel, has never said a word of sympathy to victims or denounces himself from those atrocities to have been motivated by him.
This of course, tells a leader who is not a respecter of human rights as some of his ministers too are accused of masterminding riots and conflicts. Lahai Lawrence Leema has been allegdly accused by some people of having slain many innocent people’s lives during a latest protest of last year’s August 10.
Whenever such tragedies occur, other leaders around the world could be seen condemning the acts to clean up their image to their people and the world over.
It can be safely stated that President Bio’s opponents would capitalize on his weaknesses and failures if only campaigns and rallies are allowed to happen in this year’s elections. The president is not popular among Sierra Leoneans.
His unpopularity is as a result of his lack of knowledge in resolving internal matters as he keeps a tight-lip on human rights abuses and persistent hardship in the country.
He has also made several blunders since he became president in handling diplomatic and international affairs which in itself may have partly affected the country’s foreign direct investment.
Therefore, critics of President Bio say if he allows the elections to go free and fair, he is going to be ignominiously defeated by the opposition, APC.
