SIERRA LEONE PEOPLE'S DEMOCRATIC LEAGUE

PDL
==============================================
Open letter to our African brothers and sisters in
neighbouring Guinea

Date: 4th. May 2007.

Compatriot African brothers and sisters in Guinea,

Peace!

I am honoured by the National Executive Committee of
the Sierra Leone People's Democratic League (PDL), to
address you this open letter, which in actual fact is
a clarion call to all our African compatriots in
neighbouring Guinea, to exert pressure on the Guinean
military to end its aggression and illegal occupation
of our country, and to respect the dignity and
integrity of Africans living in Sierra Leone. It is
not an accident that the PDL takes this bold step to
contact our brothers and sisters in Guinea, owing to
the long-time peaceful and harmonious relationship we
have been living together as Africans with common
history and struggle, and as neighbours, supposed to
live in atmosphere of stability, understanding and
happiness.

One thing about this letter, which cannot be disputed
is that its reinforced our unflinched solidarity and
support for the democratic movement in Guinea, and
especially the rights of the Guinean people to
political and economic freedom that were absent under
the rogue leadership of the dictator Lansana Conte. It
is our fervent hope that the government of Prime
Minister Lansana Kouyateh is a corrective dispensation
that will make the difference. We pray that God
Almighty may Guide and Protect Prime Minister Kouyateh
as he strives to restore the lost dignity and
integrity of the Guinean people.

Since 2001, our Organisation, the Sierra Leone
People's Democratic League (PDL) has been making
admonition call on the authorities in Conakry to
follow their conscience as Africans and withdraw their
troops out of our country, Sierra Leone. Alas, as we
all know, the Town of Yenga and surrounding towns and
villages were invaded and occupied illegally by
Guinean troops, commanded by the dictator Lansana
Conte. For many years now, our people in these areas
of the country are subjected to all kinds of sub-human
treatment as they continue to live in misery,
sufferings, tribulations, traumas and fear.

The reasons for the dictator Lansana Conte's arrogant
refusal to end his aggression and illegal occupation
of our country are not discussed here. Suffice it to
say that the lust by foreign power to use African
territories as bases for religious purification, a
monster in the form of Tejan Kabbah and his SLPP
(better known as the Sierra Leone People's Poison)
were created to lay the foundation for such heinous
crimes against humanity to be committed on the
continent with impunity.

We have many times also called upon the international
community, particularly member-states of the European
Union to exert pressure on dictator Lansana Conte to
see reason and withdraw his forces out of Sierra
Leone, and never to do anything that will create havoc
on the peaceful and harmonious relations that exist
between the people of the two countries. Despite our
frantic efforts to prick the conscience of the
European Union about the danger and threat which the
dictator Lansana Conte's aggression and illegal
occupation of our country posed to security and
stability in the region, the August body has instead
deliberately show no interest to the unending human
rights abuses and dehumanization of our people in the
Guinean occupied towns and villages.

We understand the position of the European Union, as
long as the heinous crime committed against our people
do not threatened the interests of member-states, let
all Sierra Leoneans perish under the aggression. To
them democracy and human rights are only value when
their agendas are challenged. We have expected that
any step taken by the European Union to help resolved
the matter peacefully would mean an end to the
nightmares suffered by our people in the Guinean
occupied towns and villages inside Sierra Leone. It
would mean not only a condemnation of mafia rule in
the two Mano River Union sister countries, i.e. Sierra
Leone and Guinea, but also an international outcry
against the use of these occupied areas as training
grounds for terrorist activities in the region, and
one notorious venue for United States secret prisons
around the world.

We all know as sovereign independent nation, Sierra
Leoneans are now paying a terrible price, and doubly
so, first, for the brigandage that threw up the
monstrous Tejan Kabbah dictatorship and its
Constitution-prostituting impunity and, secondly, for
the African Union's insensitivity to the peace,
security and progress of Africa and black people
everywhere. We do not ask the European Union or its
allies to compound the tragedy that is taken place in
the east of our country, because any equal action to
repel the heinous attacks by the dictator Lansana
Conte's forces of aggression inside Sierra Leone will
only bring more sufferings and misery to our people.
The best response to those who prostitute with
national Constitutions, threatened peace and security,
have little or no respect for democracy, or the rule
of law or for rights of people is to reaffirm those
very values and institutions. As Martin Luther King
Junior once said: "the response of tit for tat, and
eye for an eye only leaves everybody cripple and makes
us blind".

From the above, it is clear that only we as African
people can best resolved those issues that threatened
the peace, security and safety of black people
everywhere. We therefore, take the opportunity to
condemn dictator Lansana Conte's policy towards Sierra
Leone as criminal, evil and anti African. Not even the
United Nations is interested to help Africa grow.

As a Pan Africanist Organisation, the Sierra Leone
People's Democratic League wish to assure the Guinean
people that it would not advocate for the Sierra Leone
Army and former combatants to confront the Guinean
forces in an attempt to defend the sovereignty,
national independence and territorial integrity of
Sierra Leone along the provisions of international
principles and justice. Because we know the government
of Prime Minister Lansana Kouyateh is conscious of its
responsibility to make friendship and not enmity with
other countries, particularly its neighbours.

Unfortunately, the tenure of the stooge, mafia,
reactionary and retrogressive regime in Freetown has
ended, and what we have in the country is an illegal
and unjust government that operates against the
spirits and articles of the Constitution, and against
the wish and aspirations of the Sierra Leonean people.
The corrupt, deceitful, tribalistic, criminal and
mafia SLPP (Sierra Leone People's Poison) is no longer
a legitimate government and we want our friends in the
European Union and its allies to understand that they
are dealing with rogues and political prostitutes, and
not a government of Sierra Leone. In short, Sierra
Leone transition would be peaceful, credible and
democratic only with the formation of Transitional
Government of Inclusion now.

This is why, we, in the Sierra Leone People's
Democratic League (PDL) take the opportunity to write
this open letter and addressed to all Guineans at home
and the Diaspora to reason with our cry for
understanding of the situation in the east of Sierra
Leone, with the aim to guarantee and foster our common
bond as black people belonging to the same species of
race family and who can dwell together in peace and
harmony. It is time we start a process of abandoning
backward mentality and move forward as unified
socialist continent to bequeath a good future for the
coming generations of Africans.

What is happening in eastern Sierra Leone today with
the unending Guinean aggression and illegal occupation
depicts an atmosphere of hate towards our people and
the entire African race. Whether the action of the
Guinean military is proxy we live it for the Guinean
people to make conclusion. In our opinion as
representing the interests of our people, it is
unthinkable that today, Guinea under the dictator
Lansana Conte will serve as an axis of external evil
against our people and our country.

We therefore ask our compatriots in Guinea to exercise
their own moral conviction and prevail to their
Government in Conakry, under Prime Minister Dr.
Lansana Kouyateh not to give in to the forces of hate,
division, exploitation and prejudice. We are concern
at the possibility of violent confrontation between
our people and their counterparts in Guinea. We urge
the Guinean people to exert pressure on Prime Minister
Lansana Kouyateh to do everything in his power to end
the Guinean forces occupation of Sierra Leone in order
to prevent any further senseless violence in the
sub-region. We urge the competent authorities in
Conakry to exploit all available peaceful avenues to
end these unnecessary nightmares created for our
people in the region, by immediately and
unconditionally withdraw the Guinean troops out of
Sierra Leone. Once this is done now, Sierra Leoneans
are not interested to go anywhere to seek compensation
for the wounds and scars inflicted on their territory
by years of Guinean aggression and occupation.

With this, we, of the Sierra Leone People's Democratic
League (PDL) standby ready to meet political Parties'
leaders, trade unions, civil society groups and other
stakeholders in Guinea, to discuss ways of easing the
current tension between our two countries. This is
necessary as a step towards confidence building and
laying the grounds for the immediate and unconditional
withdrawal of the occupying Guinean forces out of
Sierra Leone.

We thank all Guineans for their understanding of our
concerned about the tense relationship, which the
unwanted and unmandated presence of Guinean troops in
Sierra Leone, has caused. We want to live in peace and
harmony as we were before the current troubles in
2000.

May God Almighty bless us all as we strive to restore
peace and harmony amongst Africans in the region.

Sincerely Yours,

Alimamy Bakarr Sankoh

Chairman and Leader of the Sierra Leone People's
Democratic League (PDL);
Presidential Aspirant for the Presidency of the
Republic of Sierra Leone; and National Committee
member of the African Unification Front (AUF), Canada.


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