By Amin Kef (Ranger)
The average Sierra Leonean is apt to believe that it is impossible for Freetown to become better, cleaner; less chaotic and properly managed than it is currently. This is, not believing in what others believe is possible.
But then, those people who have lived in Freetown for decades have their genuine reasons not to believe that Freetown can be made cleaner more orderly and better managed than it currently is.
This is because they have lived most of their lives enduring systemic and endemic corruption, decadence, retrogression, mismanagement, recklessness and other negative attitudes unleashed on Freetown by hopeless and visionless administrators at the Freetown City Council (FCC).
Apart from the fact that past FCC administrators lacked, whether by commission or omission, the ideas, plans and aspirations to improve the face of Freetown and manage its affairs well, our case over the last decades was unreadable; or so it seemed.
Fast forward to the year 2023, it is not unreasonable to suggest that Freetown is not a lost case. Freetown which is the face of Sierra Leone can be salvaged, resurrected and transformed from its near hopeless, dormant, unprogressive and decadent state to become a shining example of what a capital city should be and look like.
As stated earlier, most residents of Freetown prefer to believe that the transformation of Freetown is a pipe dream. But thankfully, at least there is one gentleman who believes that Freetown can be salvaged and transformed to become and look like what a capital city should look like.
This ambitious but unassuming and humble man is the Freetown Mayoral Candidate Mohamed Gento Kamara running under the SLPP ticket. Gento believes that Freetown is not a lost case. He believes that Freetown can be rescued from the doldrums of backwardness, chaos, disorder it finds itself today.
Gento Kamara believes that with the correct mindset, vision and planning, he can turnaround the face of Freetown to make it a proper capital city we all can be proud of. He believes that something cannot be done only when you believe it is impossible to do it.
It is against that background that Gento Kamara is coming to this political race as someone who has spent the last two decades getting things done. He carries a badge of honor and believes that he was placed on earth to get things done, for Freetown, and for Sierra Leone.
In his own words, Gento says: “It is only impossible if you think it is. I always look at life as a marathon, not a sprint. After building successful mobile phone and real estate businesses in the UK, I returned to Sierra Leone at the request of Pa Ahmad Tejan Kabbah, our former President. I did not need to return. I was living a life of comfort and safety, but I came back because I knew I had a duty to leverage the skills I had fine-tuned in the West for my country of birth. Still trembling from the ravages of the Civil War, there was so very much to be done. An impossible amount … but I looked and thought and planned and I knew there were issues I could tackle and I could contribute to restoring the hope of a generation of young people.
It is no secret that through Gento Group, Gento Kamara has become the face of local content in Sierra Leone. In fact, he is the first Sierra Leonean to manage large Government contracts and for over a decade he has been building numerous roads, including the Waterloo Township Roads, Ring Road, Kerry Town Road, Juba Estate Road, Congo Cross Stone Pitch, and King Jimmy Bridge, as well as the Hill Cot Road, which many people thought was impossible.
Gento adds: “I have built bridges, culverts and road drainages, as well as other urban infrastructure. Many of these projects were said to be impossible. Until they saw what was possible. This lends credence to what I have said many times: It is only impossible if you think it is.”
Therefore, if anyone can change the impossible state Freetown finds itself today, that person is Mohamed Gento Kamara.
Need we say more?
