By Tabora Bojang
An executive member of The People’s Democratic Organisation For Independence and Socialism PDOIS, Suwaibou Touray, has said misappropriation of public funds, corruption and bad governance will not end in this country until there is a drastic change of the governance system which only PDOIS can provide.
Touray, who is also the National Assembly Member for Wuli East revealed that there are two types of political parties in this country, capitalist and socialist and while the capitalist represent the business and wealthy class, the socialist represent the masses, the poor and the laborers,.
“Out of the more than 20 political parties in this country, PDOIS is the only socialist party. We are here for the poor, all these other parties are here for the interest of businesses and wealthy people. If you vote for them, they are only going to continue the same system of governance,” Touray said at a PDOIS community outreach event in Foni during the weekend.
He assured that a PDOIS government will institute a grassroots centered development where tax will be collected by village development committees and village heads (alkalolu), instead of local councils and the people will decide for themselves the development they want backed by government support and additional funding.
According to Touray, the resources available in the country, if well managed, can see out the development needs of the country but people “misleading the masses” would always amplify the false notion that all politicians or political parties are the same and none would make any difference from what obtains now.
“These are misleading statements. Not everyone is the same even across our families and so political parties too are different. But they don’t want you to see those realities. They want you to accept that we are all bad and hence you should vote for your relatives and put them into high positions so that they can go and drive Prados and expensive vehicles because they consider these positions as means of self-enrichment. This is why many National Assembly Members are today constructing storey buildings from the big allowances and pay packs,” Hon Touray said.
He said the allowances paid to NAMs, the president, the ministers and higher officials are far too high. “And the sad thing is they increase these allowances every year calculating that they need to hasten the construction of their storey buildings before their five years end in case they are not reelected,” he said.
The Wuli NAM then asked where are the allowances of the poor farmers?.
The farmers allowances, he said, come from the groundnut price which they failed to increase leaving the farmers to remain in poverty.
“So you see, the people who voted for the officials in the National Assembly and government continue to remain in poverty, with no access to safe drinking water, electricity, good health care, employment and other opportunities. This is the reason young people are risking their lives in the perilous back way journey,” he said.
Notion that roads are built by the president
Hon Touray called out politicians who campaign that roads are built by the president, explaining that these roads are funded from taxpayer funds approved by the Natuional Assembly and given to the president and his ministers to construct roads and other infrastructure projects.
“So if they build a bad road, it should hurt you because it means something went wrong somewhere with your money. They give these contracts through dubious means. A minister for instance will give a contract and negotiate with a contractor to use parts of that fund to build him or her, a house. If the project costs D10 million, D2 million will go into that house and the remaining sum is used by the contractor to build the road and the contractor will also take his profit out of that and the road will therefore be poorly constructed. This is corruption and such acts are too rampant in this country. When a government is corrupt it retards development. It hampers the development of the people,” Touray said.
