When citizens and friends of Sierra Leone piled into a room in south London one evening in 2014, the hope was for situation updates by representatives from agencies fighting the Ebola outbreak. It was August and we had for close to six months been through rumours, denials, more rumours and a belated admission that the epidemic was real. Proof that the problem had no time for international borders widened the panic gripping Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea to the rest of the world.

With the post-briefing questions and discussions suggesting few in the room thought Sierra Leone’s authorities could deal with the fast-evolving crisis, a known party hack stood up to “remind everyone here that there is a government in Sierra Leone and it is ably led by …”. His interjection transformed my till now disciplined irritation into an undiplomatic “you needing to remind us there is a government in Sierra Leone tells me all I need to know”. Unfortunately, this exchange unintentional pointed at the painful and troublesome reality for many Sierra Leoneans. It is of people who know of the government but do not feel the government.

Travelling widely and deeply around Sierra Leone has tossed me between pleasure and dismay with the country’s beauty and her people’s kindness touching the same heart that breaks with realisation of their desperate struggles and sense of hopelessness. I have met communities so removed from the attention and actions of government that I am sure they will not notice an America style shutdown of government any more than they would the shenanigans of an ant on a thatched roof. Fact is the last fifty-seven years have seen cabals willing to enjoy power while giving the communities that help get them there not a lot more than the square root of zero. How do I know this? Where is my proof?

Let’s fast forward from the London seminar to mid-February 2015. I had by now Commanded the Bo District Ebola Response Centre for a couple of months and the virus had just been confirmed as no longer in the district. We started roadshows in the chiefdoms as part of efforts to keep the virus at bay and Gboyama in Wonde Chiefdom was the place to be on 16th February. Not even the tyre blowout we had could take from our determination to finish what we had started.

As we pushed toward the turning that would take us through Wonde chiefdom, I told my passengers – a force protection (British) soldier and two Sierra Leone Ministry of Health employees – how I last travelled the road through Wonde Chiefdom 37 years earlier. I told of coconut tree trunk bridges and of having to guide the driver over the bridges as some of the trunks had rotted away and left gaping holes. Anyway, that was thirty-seven years ago… or so I thought.

After only a few minutes on the Wonde Road we stopped at the first bridge. The young soldier sighed and jumped out of the vehicle to guide me across. I used my camera to record the moment and got his legs in the frame too. Once across the bridge, the soldier jumped back in and spoke my thoughts – “no change there then” he said. There were more bridges like this one through to Gboyama. Travelling through Wonde in 2015 was as precarious as it had been in 1978. All the cabals that have ruled Sierra Leone to date did stints in the intervening years and there was no evidence any of them had touched Wonde’s people.

By this time a week from now, the people of Sierra Leone would have spoken and the wait to hear what has been said will begin. The people whose suffering and isolation I have or have not seen will contribute to that collective noise. I don’t know what they will decide but it remains my deepest hope that will choose to change the narrative and give opportunity for bridges into the 21st century.

#ChangeMustComeToSalone because it really has been #TooLongBo of the nonsense and #rankanomics

©Othame Kabia