"The diamonds of our country are our children"

With these words, the Minister for Education, Youth and Sport, Dr Bah welcomed the first steps of the Equiano Centre at a ceremony on Friday 19 February 2010. Although President Koroma was unable to attend, due to the sudden death of an aide, a crowd of some 5000 people flocked to the ceremony. Dr Bah was joined by the Hon. Victor Chukuma Johnson, Deputy Speaker of the Parliament, her Hon. Haja Afsatu Kabba, the Minster for Fisheries and Mining Resources, the Hon. Joseph Koroma, the Minister for Presidential Affairs, Claude Kamanda the MP in whose constituency, Number 95, the Equiano Centre is based and many many local leaders and dignitaries, community group, and representatives of all the schools who have benefitted from the Build On Books programme.

Joe Kosonca, read out the speech the President had intended to deliver. Education is a key pillar of President Koroma’s Agenda for Change and his speech stressed the importance of taking steps to improve literacy. The President declared that: “Today, our freedom is threatened by ignorance, illiteracy, the scarcity of books and libraries, and the reluctance to build a reading culture. We should confront head-on this challenge to our freedom. Let us continue to draw inspiration from Equiano and free ourselves from the chains of ignorance.” The President also highlighted the benefits we hope the project will bring, in particular the apprenticeship programmes and the opportunity to improve technical capacity.

He continued: “That is why I salute CODEP and the people of Waterloo for this wonderful effort.”

However it was not just a day for the politicians. Perhaps the stars of the show were the children of the REC school, one of the beneficiaries of the Build on Books programme. They entranced the crowd with a short sketch demonstrating just what the delivery of their books had meant to them. Their assured performance and deft comic timing brought tears of laughter laced with real emotion at what has already been achieved by the people of Waterloo.

We were all deeply honoured by the support shown to CODEP by the local community. Claire Curtis Thomas who had expressed the hope that we were working amongst friends, was told she was wrong: “You are not our friends, you are our brothers and sisters.” As the President concluded: “The community of Waterloo have come together with a renewed purpose and clear focus to improve the lives of its people. We have great hope that this project will succeed, and help provide a better future for the people of Sierra Leone. It is now down to CODEP and our friends and supporters to help the community of Waterloo deliver.