By Our Reporter
Brigadier General Komba Mondeh of the Sierra Leone army is one of the country’s well known military officers having served at home and abroad in various capacities including a stint as Chief of Defence Staff. Although his image was somehow tainted for participating in the coup against the APC government of General Momoh and for being one of the kingpins of the NPRC military junta that emerged from that coup, he still commands some respect among some civilians and soldiers alike.
But all that is likely to fizzle away if he does not move fast to settle a financial transaction involving him and a US-based medical doctor, Dr. Ismael Kalokoh.
Here is what happened: In August last year, Mondeh’s son, who is studying at a university in Boston, United States of America, ran into trouble with his university for failure to pay his tuition fees. The young man, desperate, appealed to his father (Brigadier Mondeh) for urgent action. Mondeh in turn called on a friend of his in California who in turn pleaded with Dr. Kalokoh to co-sign an application for a bank loan of 4000 United States Dollars.
But Kalokoh, concerned about the young man’s academic future, decided to provide the loan himself out of his personal savings. So on August 30, 2012, Kalokoh sent $4000 dollars to Mondeh’s son. Mondeh promised to pay him back as quickly as possible.
Shortly after, Mondeh (photo) again sent an urgent message to Kalokoh telling him he was in Paris and needed a loan of $1000. Kalokoh again obliged.
Since then Dr. Kalokoh has been trying to get back his money from Mondeh without success. At one point Mondeh proposed to pay back Kalokoh with a piece of land he said he owned at a place called Kamayama in Freetown. So Kalokoh sent his sister, who lives in Freetown, to go and have a look at the land only to discover it is under litigation, contested by some people who say they are the rightful owners. Exasperated, Kalokoh lost interest in the land and demanded only his money. He has also hired a lawyer to commence legal proceedings.
The evidence against Mondeh is overwhelming. There are telephone messages (voicemail)from Mondeh pleading with Kalokoh to give him time, voicemail from Mondeh’s wife, voicemail from the intermediary in Califonia, voicemail form the intermediary’s wife, not to talk of email messages and text messages, all of them pleading with Kalokoh for a loan that has taken almost a year to be repaid.
The Patriotic Vanguard has learnt that Mondeh has pleaded with Kalokoh’s lawyer in Freetown to wait until the end of this month (May) to repay the loan.
It’s not known whether Kalokoh would wait till the end of May to get back his money. In fact we are reliably informed his lawyer here in Freetown will soon commence legal action against Mondeh.
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