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The AWMS issue - A symptom of the larger Sierra Leone
issue
- Monday 18 February 2013.
Opinion
By Imodale Caulker-Burnett, USA.
During the debates
over the controversy regarding the location of the Annie Walsh
Memorial School,
as an Old Girl of the school, I added my voice. It occurred to me that the
Annie Walsh issue was really one symptom of a larger problem which the
country must deal with.
If one considers the
location of most of the schools (maybe with the exception of the Grammar
School, the Collegiate School, and the Methodist Girls
High School) , there are crowds of traders around most of them. If
the argument is that the vicinity around the school is packed with market
people, and it is therefore no longer conducive for learning, and that
building a ‘Markit’ (according to Professor Blake),
is the alternative, then all other schools are in danger of going the way of
the Annie Walsh. The Albert Academy and the Government Model
School, are examples of crowded environments. The bottom of Berry Street is
loaded with markets, and Okada and Taxi stands. A new highway even runs
parallel to the Albert
Academy encroaching on
the campus.
Yes, there is a
serious need for re-planning the city of Freetown,
but we must always have in the forefront of our planning, the preservation of
our historical monuments both in Freetown
and in the Provinces, for the benefit of future generations. (This will also
benefit the Tourism business, as visitors are always interested in the
history of the country they are visiting.)
Regardless of what is
finally decided about the AWMS, we need to begin a dialogue with each other,
and with the powers that be in the government, in order to seriously discuss
the future of Sierra Leone.
I think it is time to take a look at our history and determine how it has
impacted where the country is today, and where we want to go from here.
Freetown, Annie Walsh Memorial
School
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I would argue that
the division of the country into Colony and Protectorate in the early days,
(when the British purchased the Peninsular, for the newly arriving Freed
Slaves, then annexed the rest of the country as a Protectorate) is the source
of the problem and is where we must begin. I would also argue that our
problems have little to do with which party is in power, but much to do with
the limited education the colonialists provided in the provinces in
comparison with that which existed in the colony at that time, as well as the
quality of education offered today. With the exception of schools like the Bunumbu Teachers College, the Harford
School for Girls, the Magburaka
Secondary school and Bo
Secondary School, there were precious few other schools in the provinces and
not everyone went to school then, (not everyone goes to school even today).
African History was not taught in any school in those days, and neither was
Sierra Leone History. As a result, up until the late 1960’s and early 1970’s,
but for people like the late Dr. M.C.F. Easmon, who
established the Freetown Museum and took students in Freetown, on a few tours
of historical sites such as the Banana islands and Bunce
island, many of us knew nothing of African or Sierra Leone history. Not many
people from Freetown had been to the
provinces, and indeed, many of the provincials knew even less about Freetown.
In the Old days, as
far as the provincials were concerned, the Colony was ‘Sierra Leone,’ which they saw as
different from their various ‘Countries’. When Independence
came, with the ‘Majority Rule’ of Democracy, whether we liked it or not, the
country was primarily ruled by those from the provinces, with their limited
education and limited knowledge of Freetown.
In my opinion, many of them were not really well equipped. The fact is, the way things are done in the provinces is very different
from the way things are done in Freetown.
Now with the Rebel war, (which brought many of the provincial people to Freetown for safety, and
caused an exodus of many of the ‘colonial’ people – the Krios,
as well as many of our educated elite,) the Colony and the Provinces have
finally merged and we are not prepared for it on any level. But we must find
a way and be willing to merge the two.
We have to have ‘Wan Wod’ in order to solve our problems We cannot now begin
to talk as if we are ‘One Country’. WE ARE NOT YET ONE COUNTRY. That does not
happen automatically, and it will not happen by one Tribe looking down on the
other, nor will it happen by criticism from the Diaspora who are 6,000 miles
away, and can only visit home infrequently. It will also not happen if the
statistics are still showing that 80% of the population is illiterate.
We have a long way to
go before we get there. But we have to begin somewhere. In order to develop a
vision for our country, we must begin by respecting our differences and
learning about each other, and determining how we see ourselves as Sierra Leoneans, (not as one tribe or the other, or one party or
the other) but as one country and one people. There are some of us who are of
mixed culture – children of Colony/Provincial parentage, and we may have the
advantage of being familiar with both cultures. We should be part of the
dialogue and the process of building a Sierra Leone which we can be
proud of.
Related articles:
Prince of
Wales School – Symbol of a Dysfunctional System
Illiterates rule
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