One could begin by pointing out, as a way of dismissing the idea, that it is being pushed by the opposition and profoundly discredited and demonstrably anti-democratic. All Peoples Congress (APC) party. This is a serious objection, but it won’t be necessary to even begin asking for credentials. The idea is simply nutty, and not only because it is also unconstitutional.

The idea of an interim government presupposes that there is a potential power vacuum: the nation is at the moment of great transition, from a particularly odious system to a more open, democratic one, and there is a need to set up a fair, unbiased and preferably "non-political" body to oversee that transition. Or, as in the case of unbelievable Liberia, there is what Ali Mazrui has called "normative collapse": the basis of legitimate authority had been destroyed, there is no central authority, the idea of government itself had been liquidated in an orgy of national self-immolation. Liberia, by the way, had several interim governments during their war but that did not guarantee the emergence of a democratic or responsible political order. All of these are not true of Sierra Leone, where, in spite of its terrors and brutalities, the rabid banditry compounded by a very pedestrian leadership style determinedly basing itself in the west end of Freetown, the idea of government is still very much alive. There is a recognized and recognizable political authority, a working, if contorted constitution, some level of political decency. Above all, national elections are scheduled according to the very constitution which guarantees that the APC and all the other political voices could be aired and listened to; could participate in those elections.

So why is there this frenzy about an uncertain and potentially undesirable change? "I am not out to overthrow President Kabbah," a local newspaper quoted Alfred Akibo-Betts, a leading voice in the interim government campaign. I have had a certain admiration and liking for Mr. Akobo-Betts: he is probably the most nationalistic figure in Sierra Leone politics, and he is probably the only one in the APC with any claim to decency. Yet this denial smells to high heaven. The interim government idea essentially advocates limiting Kabbah’s term of office, shortening it by extra-constitutional albeit perhaps non-violent means. In a democracy that amounts to a coup d’etat, a fact which may not be very clear to the APC, which, afterall, does not have a history of democratic conscience. But Akibo’s denial may just be sincere. Surely the whole campaign, in this land of incredible misery, may be just an expression of despair, of certain boredom, the pathos of a nation whose problems increasingly look incomprehensible. That is a very charitable view, made rather unwelcome by one important factor.

It could be an inspiration for political chaos. All things remaining equal, there is always certain freshness about the opposition mouthing all kinds of wayward rhetoric, the more uncomfortable to the President’s party the better. In today’s Sierra Leone certainly all things are not equal. There is a dreadful, bewildering and dangerous situation. Statements calling in effect for the overthrow of the government cannot be innocuous. They can inspire far more reckless and opportunistic elements to actions that can only endanger everyone and destroy the basis of our very young and beleaguered democracy. Is it any wonder that among the voices in the interim government campaign has been a group, previously unknown, which is insisting that Johnny Paul Koroma, whose Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC) coup killed hundreds of people and destroyed property and the economy to the estimated (estimated by some reliable sources) value of over $5 billion, should be head of that interim government? Who can beat that?

This is why one would hope that for once the APC should rein in its curious narcissism.