By Richmond Brima Tholley
Residents of Kholifa Mabang Chiefdom, in the Tonkolili district Northern Sierra Leone has for some months now witnessed mayhem, defiance, lawlessness and unprecedented incidences and violence leading to the burning down of two of the local authority’s court Barries in the Chiefdom headquarter of Mabang town and several others sustaining wounds and injuries, as a result of serious political wrangling and altercations between members and supporters of the country’s two main political parties, the ruling SLPP and the main opposition APC.
The whole incident, according to reliable sources, started three months back when the Chairman of the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party in Constituency 49, Tonkolili District, Idrissa Maxwell Turay, who doubles as the SLPP candidate for Ward 167 in the 2018 General Elections, the Regent Chief and the other Chiefdom authorities in Kholifa Mabang Chiefdom, who were alleged and believed to be surrogates and sympathizers of the ruling party, attempted to hand over the Chiefdom’s only guest house to be used as office by the National Commission for Social Action (NaCSA), that is currently in the Chiefdom on a 53 million dollar project in Education, Agriculture and Health.
The NaCSA project which started during the era of the APC under former President Koroma is geared towards improving the lives of the people of Kholifa Mabang Chiefdom and make it a Class A Chiefdom in terms of development and the said project is to be completed within five years. Though it was agreed upon before the start of the project that a piece of land is to be given to NaCSA by the Chiefdom for an office space the later were using the residence of one Madam Susan, a native of the Chiefdom who resides in Freetown on rentage whiles they go about their work.
NaCSA has been using the said residence for the past two years until the coming of the SLPP to governance. Recently, according to residents, it was widely rumoured that they (NaCSA) decided to quit the house they have been using as an office and take over the Chiefdom’s only Guest house and that agreement and negotiations has already completed with the Chiefdom Authorities who are tagged by many as sympathizers of the ruling party. However, investigation conducted revealed that the Chiefdom Authorities and the SLPP Constituency 49 Chairman have conspired and the latter received over thirty million Leones from NacSA for the said Guest house.
This created tension across the eight sections of the Chiefdom and residents, mostly youths insisted that the Guest house, that was built from the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) by the former Honourable Member of Parliament, Hon Mohamed Raka Kamara of the APC during the last five years of the Ernest Bai Koroma regime, and officially handed over to the people of the Chiefdom with documents, would not be given to the NaCSA to be used as an office space without involving and consulting the people of the Chiefdom.
This led to serious disagreement and uproar, as Youths in the Chiefdom, who are mostly believed to be APC supporters rebelled against the Chiefdom Authorities and insisted that the Guest house should not be handed over to NacSA on free basis and until the people of the Chiefdom are consulted and reached on a final conclusion, they would resist NaCSA entering the Guest house. The SLPP chairman and Chiefdom Authorities on the other hand, insisted that the Guest House since it is a property of the Chiefdom, and NaCSA again is in the Chiefdom for development should be allowed to use the Guest house.
