Time to put away the ‘Me-First’ mentality and embrace President Koroma’s urgent message of attitudinal and behavioral change
According to a recent religious magazine, AWAKE, the world around us is surrounded by a self-absorbed culture that has contaminated a lot of people. According to the magazine, “You see evidence of that nearly everywhere–From the shameless way people defraud others to the aggressive way they drive , from their crude language to their explosive tempers. ” The pyramid of THE SELF–I, me, myself–was responsible for the destruction of our nation. We need to deviate from this evil if we must rebuild our nation.
The Publisher of COCORIOKO was in London nearly two years ago when riots by rampaging youths tore that city apart .Gangs of young people went on the rampage destroying cars, public and private property and harming innocent people. The Bishop of Manchester, the Right Rev. Nigel McCulloch later attributed the chaos and bedlam to what he described as the erosion of public morals. The Reverend called for a return to moral values “where respect for others is placed above possessions.” We have to respect authority and those God has placed above us. Promotion comes from the Lord and what he has destined will happen , regardless of what we do.
In Sierra Leone, we need to capture that message because it is the reason for our problems, never mind the rich natural and human resources we are blessed with. We are so self-absorbed that indiscipline and insubordination have become part of our national life. We need to respect each other .We need to respect other people’s value to society. We need to get rid of our selfish mentality and appreciate the hard and difficult sacrifices being made by our public servants in the interest of the nation. Some of our public servants are working sacrificially and very hard to make the government and nation succeed, often going days without sleep. Public service is not a bed of roses. We must recognize the hard work and sacrifice of those God has appointed to lead our nation.
The reason President Koroma set up the Attitudinal and Behavioral Change Secretariat was that he recognized the fact that unless we Sierra Leone revolutionize our thinking, our nation will never progress.
The elections are over . Let us go back to normal and make up our minds to put our nation first and help President Ernest Koroma succeed in transforming our nation to a strong and prosperous one. We must not leave the task of rebuilding our nation solely in the hands of the President and his ministers . He will do his best and score many achievements but we too as a people need to play our own part in national reconstruction. The nation belongs to all of us and if the government succeeds, we all benefit; if the government fails, on the other hand ( The Lord forbid ) , we all suffer .
We cannot afford to be mere fence-sitters and arm-chair critics. We must identify areas where we will be of use to our nation. We all cannot be ministers. We must cultivate the servant mentality.
This is not the time to use our resources, our talents , our newspapers and media outlets and what-have-you to spread false and unsavory rumours about our President and government . It is counter-productive. It is neither democracy nor freedom of speech when we fabricate stories and pass them off as public-interest news and features against our President and public officials. We need to change and work for the good and betterment of our nation. Some of the articles appearing in our print and online media do not enhance the process of national rehabilitation and national reconstruction, especially where deliberate and unnecessary efforts are being made to discredit the government. It is time we pay more attention to serious issues and DEVELOPMENT NEWS.
The opposition political parties must realize that they cannot remain in belligerent and protest mode forever. The opposition in Sierra Leone must become progressive and productive.
The Agenda For Prosperity must succeed. Failure is not an option.
Let us all therefore change our attitudes and think more about how we can contribute to bring prosperity to our nation.
© 2013, COCORIOKO. All rights reserved. – Discuss this and other related articles on the Salone Forum
Attitude is altitude, watch that if you want to grow in what ever you do. Combating corruption is a position we should take ownership of for several reasons: the president can not do it alone, a single body to correct it has proven to be inefficient, we have all aided, involved, condoned, or ignored corrupt practices. We bribed governments officials, judges, police, immigrations,customs, for what suppose to be our own rights. It is us that want corruption and not the government. We will remain corrupt unless we stop asking for favors and start to demand our rights. We need to talk about how we have contributed to destroy the system instead of dreaming that the police will do it while we provide their lively hood by bribing them. Corrupt practices that we so involved in as an easy way to got our way through is the problem and not the government. We need to cover this discussions on radio, tv, and news outlets.
Places to observe daylight corruptions
immigration. I paid more that twice the official cost of a pass port in Freetown after waiting a year without getting it. For others it took a day to get it.
Government buses: While I cued up in the line together with less known and less fortunate people for half a night, people who were never seen in line got their tickets and boarded the bus before us. Most us who suffered waiting in that line had to suffer again another day except for those who could pay twice the government price.
The point I am making is that you will see it as soon as you are at the airport and it is easily observable every where including government buildings and agencies.