Dear family and friends, today, Friday 11th December 2015, marks ten years after a life-changing accident that I was involved in in the Mathoi-Magbosie area of northern Sierra Leone. Please read through. 11th December 2005 was a Sunday. I was Freetown-bound, looking forward to receiving assignments I had given to my students at the University […]
Reminiscent of the past?
Anything new, have we been down this road before? Parliament: 2 new APC MPs take oath as SLPP MPs walk out All but one Member of Parliament of the opposition Sierra Leone Peoples Party Monday staged a walk out in parliament during the swearing-in-ceremony of two MPs of the ruling All People’s Congress. http://slconcordtimes.com/parliament-2-new-apc-mps-take-oath-as-slpp-mps-walk-out/
GAC Summit (World Economic Forum)
“One of the underlying threads running through the recent GAC Summit (World Economic Forum) was the Fourth Industrial Revolution. This paradigm shift of connected industry and Artificial Intelligence is advancing exponentially faster than previous revolutions, with deep consequences for economy, society and politics.” Culled from the WEF’s weekly bulletin <GAC@e.weforum.org> . This happened last week and […]
The Looting Machine
Have just completed The Looting Machine – Warlords, Oligarchs, Corporations, Smugglers, and the Theft of Africa’s Wealth by Tom Burgis. This is a must read for all who love Africa. It provides dates, names, amounts and reveals the extent of looting going on in mineral-rich African countries.. If you have high blood pressure, keep water […]
Ebola’s Lessons
This Foreign Affairs article from Laurie Garrett on how Ebola journeyed through West Africa focuses on Liberia and is a good read. Striking though, is the revelation that the epidemic was on the decline by the time the American troops arrived. This is hardly publicized by the media, depriving the Liberians and their partners of […]
Rethink the five year mandate
Constitutional Review. Time to rethink the five year mandate. It forces our leaders to look for quick wins, and this is often at the expense of longer term and more sustainable results. Short five year terms may be OK for “matured” economies, their railways are already built, road infrastructure in place, cities more or less […]