“I do not expect that detainees will be kept longer than is really necessary,” declared the Prime Minister in the House of Representa tives at the time of independence. “As soon as we are satisfied that the country is out of danger, we will let almost all of them out.” Although the state of emergency was not lifted until August, 1961, the moment when we were apparently no longer considered to be a threat to the security of the State came on May 18th, when I and the last fifteen of my fellow detainees were released from Pademba Road prison.
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Posted on June 10th, 2009 in My Life
Tags: funeral of siaka stevens
Posted on May 26th, 2009 in Politics
Personally, I would neither claim full credit for what has been done, nor apologise for what remains undone. Whatever the temporary difficulties we still have to face — difficulties which I do not wish to minimise — the fact remains that we have built a solid foundation for the future development of Sierra Leone. In this respect, my assessment of our task and the measure of our success are expressed in thesummary of the recently published history of our Party, The Rising Sun, which was researched and written under the direction of the A.P.C. Secretariat including, of course, its Secretary General.
Posted on April 07th, 2009 in Politics
As I get older I find my mind dwelling more and more on the past. Inevitably my thoughts wander back to the time when Sierra Leone became a Republic. At 1.13 p.m. on April 19th, 1971, I declared the State a Republic after a Republican Constitution had been approved by Parliament and passed into law [...]
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Posted on April 07th, 2009 in Politics, Pre Independence
On my return to Sierra Leone in 1949, Governor Stevenson’s Constitutional Proposals had already been put before a Select Committee. This committee consisted of the Attorney General, all seven Unofficial Members of the Legislative Council, plus seven co-opted Extraordinary Members — three Creole and four Paramount Chiefs — and the Chief Commissioner of the Protectorate. [...]
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Posted on April 07th, 2009 in Politics
There was no time to absorb the shock of the assassination attempts. I had three jobs of inescapable urgency to tackle: to pacify the rebellious elements in the army; to fill the vacuum in the nation’s defences created by the disorder of the armed forces; and to make it impossible for the same kind of [...]
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Posted on May 29th, 2009 in My Life
Siaka Stevens, 82, who led this West African nation for 17 years before retiring as president in 1985, died May 29 at his home.
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Posted on May 26th, 2009 in Politics
Most of my activities and statements of the past few years have been I recorded in a book published by my office in 1981 under the title “12 t Years of Economic Achievement and Political Consolidation under the C APC and Dr Siaka Stevens”. It is my belief that this was a period I which, as summed up by the compilers of the book, saw dramatic changes in the Sierra Leone scene and made a profound impact on the nation — politically, socially and economically. I
