By: Alusine Rehme Wilson
Public places including market places, night clubs and some strategic meeting points on main streets in the Northeastern regional headquarters Makeni were for the first time all empty on Tuesday between the hours of 4-10pm local time.
The emptiness some residents have told Awoko Newspaper is as a result of the announcement of the final presidential election results on the day that confirmed incumbent Julius Maada Bio, presidential candidate of the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) as the president elect with a record votes total of 1,566,932 equalling 56.17% of the total votes cast.
The result saw Mr. Bio being declared winner of the historic polls by the Returning Officer and Chief Electoral Commissioner of the Electoral Commission for Sierra Leone (ECSL) Mohamed Kenewui Konneh, because of the total number of votes casted across the 11,712 polling stations nationwide on Saturday in his favour had surpassed the 55% constitutionally required percentage required by any presidential candidate to win a presidential election in Sierra Leone.
And behold, the ECSL’s Boss announcement was followed by a loud silence in the northern regional city perceived as the stronghold of the main opposition All People’s Congress Party (APC) where many had expected that the APC presidential candidate Samura Matthew Wilson Kamara would have emerged as the winner of this year’s presidential contest hence resulting to staying calm and quite in their houses when the opposite of their expectations occurred.
The silence in the city was so loud that even when it had rained in the evening hours of the day no child as usual was spotted in the rain bathing cheerfully, except for a handful of supporters of the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) that cheerfully paraded the Campbell street area though the central business area of Makeni and converged at their party’s Bombali district office on Kamal Street.
However, no SLPP or APC top executive members were available for comments on the June 24, 2023 presidential election outcome which according to the ECSL attracted a total voter turnout of 2,800,691 equals 83% of the total number of registered voters for this year’s poll, out of which 2,789,808 valid votes, 10,883 void votes were being recorded.
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