Kufuor 'Meddled' In Sierra Leone Politics?

A Sierra Leone minister has revealed that President John Kufour helped the ruling All Peoples Congress (APC) plan the defeat of the Sierra Leone Peoples Party (SLPP) in the hotly contested 2007 elections.

Minkailu Mansaray, the minister for of labour, employment and social security, had affirmed the country's ties with Ghana before President Ernest Koroma could commission the sea view estate constructed by Regimanuel Gray S/L Limited at Goderich, west of Freetown.

"It was President Kuffour who helped us strategise the defeat of the SLPP. He suggested during our planning stage that we should have 7,000 strong polling agents if SLPP were to be defeated," he said.

The estate enterprise is principally financed by Regimanuel Gray, a Ghanaian company working in partnership with the National Social Security and Insurance Trust in Sierra Leone.

Ghanaian high commissioner in the country Dr. Mokowa Blay Adu Gyamfi observed that: "this is pay back time."

Meanwhile, the party's secretary general Victor Bockarie Foh has dismissed the utterance as loathing, saying Kufour was president of the African Union who could not be partisan.

"He will give general advice to any political party should they approach him," he said.

However, SLPP was never happy about the pronouncement. Secretary general of the party Jacob Jusu Saffa lamented: "The truth will come to light. The minister is an insider. Besides that shows the level of interference in the last elections."