Sierra Leonean lives on the cheap - the
land where "investors" are encouraged by an uncaring and corrupt
government to get away with anything including murder as the forces of law and
order become slaves to the whims and caprices of the vultures at State House.
By Tamba Morkway-Sossah
http://tambasosa-troubleshooting zone.blogspot.com
Some time in late December last year,
we started getting reports of a boat incident involving one of our local sea
transportation vessels known as pampa. Initially the death toll from that
incident was reported to be in the region of five, but as the hours progressed,
it became obvious that far more Sierra Leoneans could have lost their lives.
Caring national newspapers wanting to alert the government of the rat
immediately started running stories with the main thread being that the local
sea craft was in collision with a boat controlled by one of the many
"investors" now operating in Sierra Leone and who would want us to
believe that they do care for the people of Sierra Leone.
After what seemed like a hesitation on
what actually happened, one of the investors, named Beltship issued a press
statement under the hand of one John McMillan, Director, Beltship Management
(SL) Ltd. This was the statement -
"At approximately seven pm on the
evening of the 28 December, a Beltship Management (SL) Ltd support craft
returning to port with three crew members on board reported a collision with a
small passenger boat close to Tagrin point. The vessel, a 15 passenger slow
speed crew boat, was in normal operations returning after deploying local
workers. Beltship Management (SL) Ltd immediately mobilised rescue craft to
assist and are fully cooperating with the local authorities. Beltship
Management will release further updates as and when they become
available."
We would urge a closer look at this
statement again - a Beltship Management (SL) Ltd support craft returning to
port with three crew members on board reported a collision with a small
passenger boat close to Tagrin point...Beltship Management (SL) Ltd immediately
mobilised rescue craft to assist and are fully cooperating with the local
authorities. Beltship Management will release further updates as and when they
become available.
As simple laymen, we would applaud the
above statement which admits that indeed there was a collision albeit with
"a small passenger boat close to Tagrin point" and that the collision
involved one of the vessels of Beltship. What is worth mentioning and again to
be applauded is that Beltship was a part of the rescue attempt immediately
after this incident and not only that but stated that it was fully cooperating
with the local authorities.
That would show the hallmarks of a
company that cares. It gets involved in a fatal sea accident, for that's how we
see it, and promises to cooperate fully with the local authorities. "Local
authorities" we would interpret as the traditional rulers of Tagrin, the
naval wing, the police and of course the government of the Republic of Sierra
Leone headquartered at State House.
The next statement from Beltship we got
from a report published by the online Sierra Express Media (SEM) with this
headline - Our Deepest Sympathy to Boat Victims and this statement within 24 hours showed that Beltship was quick to
express regret, if not remorse -
"Beltship
Management (SL) Ltd would like to express their deepest sympathies to the
families of the deceased after the tragic accident at Tagrin Point on the evening
of the 28 December. Beltship Management is cooperating fully with the
authorities in the investigation of the circumstances of the collision and will
provide further updates on that investigation when they become available. We
would like to commend the actions of our Captain and his crew whose prompt
actions saved many lives. The Captain of the Beltship craft, immediately after
the collision, called the Sierra Leone Port Authorities and alerted a response
whilst at the same time initiating a rescue operation. Life vests and life
buoys were thrown into the water to assist those who were thrown from the canoe
and one of the Beltship crew members (there were three on board) jumped into
the water to assist those who could not help themselves. Two other Beltship
craft were immediately summoned to assist and during the rescue operation the
Captain and crew managed to save 49 passengers from the stricken canoe. Our
crews and vessels stayed on station coordinating the rescue operations until
stood down by the port authorities."
Throughout
this whole tragic incident, Beltship's statements have always expressed the
company's willingness to cooperate with the local authorities and to update
Sierra Leoneans on the needed investigations after such an incident that no doubt
claimed at least twenty Sierra Leonean lives and the fact that Beltship had to
deploy life vests and life buoys points the spotlight on what is still going on
that puts lives at risk. It would appear from reports so far that our very own
Sierra Leonean folks using pampa vessels still continue to ply our rivers and
creeks without the benefit of life vests and buoys.
Remember we
reported on the contract for the supply of life vests that we suspected was pretty shady? We wanted to know who won the
contract and how many such life jackets were actually delivered.
Kindly
recall that on Tuesday September 8, 2009 a boat travelling from Shenge to Tombo
was involved in an incident in which more than two hundred lives, including
those of school children coming back from holidays and getting ready for the
reopening of schools, were lost. Up to this time, the exact number of people on
the boat has not been verified nor the exact number of those who perished.
The
government then, under one Ernest Bai Koroma before he became a rat expressed
deep sorrow and promised that as from then on all vessels plying our waters
will see all passengers wearing life vests with names on manifests that will be
overseen by one of Sierra Leone's finest, the navy or rather the naval wing of
the Sierra Leone Military Forces.
At that time
the opposition Sierra Leone Peoples Party under the hand of its National
Secretary-General one Jacob Jusu Saffa issued a press statement which in part
read -
"The Sierra Leone People’s Party
would like to bring to the attention of the general public the efforts made in
the past to promote passenger safety at sea. During the last SLPP
administration, Sierra Leone ratified international safety codes including Safety
of Life at Sea (SOLAS) under the aegis of International Maritime Organisation
(IMO). The regulations provided for capacity limit for passenger and cargo boat
indicated by visible load lines on the outside of all boats. Water level above
the load line shows that the boat is overloaded and should not be allowed to
leave the harbour. Other regulations include use of spare engines, life jackets
for all passengers, adequate fuel at sea and regular inspection of the engines
by Marine Engineers.
The last administration also acquired
huge quantity of life jackets and started nationwide sensitisation on use of
life jackets and other safety rules. Also, Marine Monitors were employed and
trained to ensure compliance to the safety rules. These monitors should ensure
that all passengers have life jackets before departure. Coxswains (Pampa
operators) were trained in navigational skills and safety rules.
It is, however, disheartened to know
that since 2007, these regulations have not been enforced. The Ministry of Transport
and Aviation and the Maritime Administration, the lead government agencies for
sea transportation has failed to enforce the safety regulations. Even in
Freetown, the use of life jackets is not enforced. There are inadequate Marine
Engineers and Monitors to enforce compliance.
The SLPP therefore calls for immediate
investigation into the accident. The investigation should propose
recommendations with clear implementation plans indicating timelines for
action. This Plan should be made public and monitoring mechanisms put in place.
In addition, the SLPP calls on full implementation of all international
regulations and local laws relating to maritime transportation."
We are not so sure if this
strongly-worded statement at the time was one with a political tinge but it was
quite clear that something had gone wrong and that the new government of Ernest
Bai Koroma needed to do something to prevent the loss of a single Sierra
Leonean life - more so when such incidents could have been prevented if the
necessary regulations were enforced. As with all investigations
promised/ordered by the government of the rat, Sierra Leoneans still await the
findings of those investigations.
And now this - why has the government
kept sealed lips on the matter? Surely the rat cannot say he is under pressure
not to investigate the Beltship incident and make such proceedings public given
the initial statements and promise from the Beltship Management that they will
cooperate fully with the authorities and update Sierra Leoneans on the issue.
Or is it that Beltship has been ordered not to make any more public statement?
This we doubt because if those lives
were British, Australian, American or nationals from any democratic and caring
government, they would be requesting a full investigation into the matter. Our
hunch tells us that Beltship is quite willing to make public just what happened
and to institute the much needed compensation procedures for all those affected
by that tragic incident.
That the government has still not come
out with a full statement updating Sierra Leoneans and friends of Sierra Leone
within and outside the borders of Sierra Leone again puts the spotlight on an
uncaring government, the head of which is only interested in what swells his
foreign currency bank accounts and safe deposits at State House and the Lodge.
On the "investors" getting
away with murder remember Bumbuna and how the rat's security forces reacted
after the murder of poor Musu Conteh -According to the final report of the Human Rights
Commission of Sierra Leone that investigated the incident independent of the
government's promise
"The police marched behind the
women and physically and emotionally intimidated them thereby disrespecting the
women’s secret society. According to them, the police were raining the worst
forms of verbal insults saying they will ‘’fire gunshot into the sexual organs
of the women’’ and “vaginate” their new weapons. The women reported that they
were traumatized because the police operation reminded them of the rebel war.
“It was like any rebel attack”, the women repeatedly said. “Due to this
incident, our memories of the nineties were recalled when the rebels attacked
here in 1994. All what we saw on that day [of the police operation in Bumbuna]
can be compared to what we went through during the war. We were worried to
imagine we were going to lose all we have worked for a second time. We even
thought it was another war.”
Or as a quote in the film Cassablanca
states -
"My dear, perhaps you have already
observed that in Casablanca human life is cheap. Good night,
mademoiselle."
We are talking of a Sierra Leone in
2014 and not something fictional depicted in a 1942 film.
We hope the rat would not want us to
believe that only the lives of rats like him are more important and that the
lives of real human beings, Sierra Leoneans to boot, are cheap and can be
sacrificed on the altar of what can be harvested from the vultures in the
extractives industry in Sierra Leone.
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