By Ilyasa Baa
Progressive minds of Sierra Leoneans at home and abroad have come together forming the Institute for Community Progress (ICP) to hold the Bio led administration accountable to the people of Sierra Leone calling for electoral, commercial and other justices Sierra Leoneans have been deprived of in these seven apoplectic years of the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP).
The Institute’s first Press Conference which was held on 26th March, 2025 via zoom, simulcasted by Wi Yard Tv and other channels was graced by like minded patriots who expressed the need to save the country from corruption, nepotism and unfold sufferings the masses in Sierra Leone are going through.
In his submission, Chairman of the Institute for ICP, Wadi Williams said the Institute is concerned that the country is faced with issues around legitimacy because of the refusal of the Electoral Commission by extension, the Bio led administration, to release the much needed and talked about disaggregated data of the 2023 Presidential election, noting that they would continue to call for the result until it is released so the people of Sierra Leone would once again be ruled by legitimacy.
“We will congratulate whoever is pronounced to have won that election with the 55% threshold which the Constitution of Sierra Leone dictates”, he lamented, adding that their coming together is timely to serve as an objective pressure group for the good of the country.
Moderated by Winston Ojukutu Macauley based in the UK, he descibed the setting up of such progressive presure group of Sierra Leoneans as a big blessing for the people of Sierra Leone especially the masses whose rights, norms have been trangressived upon by the current administration with impunity.
Meaningful contributions were made by the members present in the meeting including names like Ambassador John Leigh, James Sesay (Esq). Mr. Jalloh Jamborie (Historian) Imran Turay in the UK among other well meaning Sierra Leoneans at home and abroad. Ambassador John Leigh as one of the elders of the ICP, said the ICP is seeking a foundamental solution to correct the anormalies the countrymen and women are going through due to bad governance,citing that the “one manic” way of doing things by those in authority is a cause for concern for all well-meaning Sierra Leoneans.
He said Liberia and Sierra Leone are closely connected and the Americans are aware of this connection, origin and they are supporting the two nations. He pointed out that What happened in Sierra Leone should not have been encouraged by the Moral Guarantors. “Sierra Leone has no independent institution to take the lead for the people, they have compromised it all”, he narrated.
Amb. Leigh called for a new compact to be negitiated among various nationalities in Sierra Leone”, labelling Bio as an illegitimate President not running a legitimate government. Before the legal luminary could voice his contribution during the successful discussion, the Moderator permitted a victim of the December 10 Protest for the 2023 Election Result to say a few words. Aruna in Freetown said them as concerned citizens saw the need to go out and protest that fateful day leaving his seven children at home as a responsible citizen.
He said any one who believed in democracy would not stand by and watch everything going down the drain without taking such legitimate action that they took that day.James Sesay Esq came up with a legal view of the current situation in Sierra Leone. He said what he experienced in trying for the release of Wadi Williams and Babadi was a derailment of our constitutional value which is the biggest law of the land.
“Our Constitution is being abused with imputy, no freedom of movement or association,” adding that we are in a country where there is no freedom of speech.
Founding Member of ICP, Imran Turay encouraged Sierra Leoneans to grab the ICP as their own baby being a legitimate organization fighting for the stolen mandate of the
