Abubakar Hashim
President Julius Maada Bio has visited wounded soldiers at the 34 Military Hospital at Wilberforce, a stone’s throw from where the military armoury was attacked. He commiserated also with the families of the dead.
President Bio had earlier, in a closed door meeting with ECOWAS delegation at State House, revealed that the opposition APC was behind last Sunday’s sad episode, which bears similar hallmarks like last year’s August 10 violent protest. The prime difference is, in the latter, only police officers were killed, while in last Sunday’s attack, it targeted the military and went further to state subversion and possible overthrow of the government.
The President of ECOWAS, Dr Omar Toure, in response, assured President Bio of the Chairman of ECOWAS, Nigerian President Bola Tinubu’s support to secure Sierra Leone, if need be, to deploy a standby military force, to quell any further attack.
ECOWAS membership is deeply worried of the threat to democracy in the regions, with Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso under military rule, despite an admirable democratic transition recently in neighbouring Liberia.
For a high-powered ECOWAS team to visit Sierra Leone on a solidarity and fact finding mission, just a day after the Sunday coup attempt, speak volumes of the regional organisation’s worries of growing instability in West Africa.
The composition of the delegation, including the National Security Adviser in Nigeria, Nuhu Ribadu, the Chief of Defence Staff, Gen Christopher Musa, the Chief of zmilitary Intelligence, Gen Emmanuel Udiandeye, further confirm that insecurity is top on ECOWAS agenda.
Meanwhile, massive arrests and manhunt of 1,890 escaped prisoners are ongoing. Only 29 escaped prisoners have surrendered to the authorities, out of 1,919 inmates, accounting for about 98% of escaped prisoners on the run.