By Mohamed Issa

Sierra Leoneans, who are conversant with the country’s telecommunication company Sierratel’s problem, will be very blunt to point accusing fingers at the governing Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) as architect, spanning from the warring years in the country. To whet your appetite, during our eleven (11years) of the senseless rebel war, late President Alhaji Ahmad Tejan Kabba’s led SLPP government went into exile in Conakry, the capital city of Guinea following his overthrow in 1997 by late Major General Johnny Paul Koroma’s AFRC junta barely a year in office.

In Conakry, a shadow government was set up waiting for ECOWAS’ intervention to oust the marauding junta government.

Nevertheless, it is pathetic to dig that sad history but truth to say that the likes of the current chairman of the SLPP Dr. Prince Harding who was Secretary General of the party during their challenging moment and at the same time Minister of Mines before he became the Minister of Transport and Communications and now NCP Chairman which invariably labeled him as reservoir of knowledge about Sierratel issues, will surely be the right person to fix it if he is ready.

In fact, his rebranding mechanism by creating competition in the communication arena for Sierra Leoneans to enjoy varieties of mobile companies like other countries in the sub-region and the world at large exacerbated the problem that the company is currently exposed to. And the truth of the matter is, no reasonable citizen would even want to recall that ugly episode which culminated into the age old myriad of problems of that vital government entity. Without going in-depth, those who can conjure history will vividly recall that Sierra Leone was completely donor driven at that time and when the SLPP government was operating in another land means a lot which is now very hard to digest in this perspective.

But the reality is that, it will interest any patriotic citizen to see that SLPP government squarely fix their created Sierratel’s problem as they have done to some other issues that they left undone during their reign at that time.

In fact, many concerned citizens can still recall that when SLPP returned to power they totally neglected the only important national mobile company in the country, instead, Dr. Prince Harding who was the Transport and Communications minister during that time concentrated on empowering the new mobile companies that he created way for their operations in the country.

Yes! Sierra Leoneans will say Kudus to him for that but it would have been nicer for government to empower our nationals other than any other.

Many frustrated Sierratel workers fumed that they have had many stories and promises from many quarters about changing that moribund government entity but all have been interpreted like the coming of the promised Messiah that no one knows, more so when they have gone without salaries for many months less to talk about allowances and other enumerations for past the years. The Minister of Communications Madam Bah should realize that Dr. Prince Alex Harding is the encyclopedia of Sierratel’s problems and now that she has started that good initiative to solve them she needs thorough schooling and consultation. If Dr. Harding says yes, Madam you are okay, but if no, don’t waste your time especially when Sierratel is one of the government’s designated entities for privatization and Bullet as he is popularly called in the political gymnastic in this country. Yet, any reasonable citizen that is au-fait with the Sierratel’s problems will say that it SLPP’s problems that they need to solve now.