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First Lady Fatima Maada Bio has expressed serious concern over the conduct of the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) internal elections, citing shortcomings in the voting process that could compromise the credibility of the results.
In a recent video statement, Mrs. Bio revealed that official ballot papers were not provided during the party’s delegate elections. “There were no ballot papers. They went and cut A4 papers and gave them to people to use for voting,” she said.
She explained that on the improvised ballot papers, candidate Maada Kemoh Kai was listed as number one, while Engineer Kallon was listed as number two, a system she said was vulnerable to manipulation. “It is very easy to change number one to two, but you can’t change two to one,” she stated.
Highlighting the importance of proper electoral procedures, the First Lady questioned why only plain paper was used, noting that printing 170 official ballots for 166 delegates would have ensured accountability. “If you want to conduct a credible election, you will print ballot papers and include the two candidates’ faces, or at least use symbols, so there will be no cheating,” she added.
She concluded by stressing the risks of using improvised materials in elections, saying, “They took white paper, cut it, and served it to delegates, telling them to write one for Maada and two for Kalloh. That is the ballot paper for a party as old as the SLPP.”
