President Ernest Koroma of Sierra Leone has been invited to the White House to meet with President Barack Obama this week. This is ground-breaking news for all Sierra Leoneans because it means our country has now been recognized as one of the world’s democracies, albeit a young one.
It also means our President’s stature and profile has been elevated to the biblical level of "eating and drinking with kings", or to put it plainly, receiving the hand of friendship and cooperation of the leader of the most powerful nation on earth.
I cannot recall a Sierra Leonean President being invited to the White House by any American President in recent times. As far as I know, President Koroma is the only democratically elected Sierra Leonean leader in over 30 years or perhaps more, to be invited to the White House! In fact a Sierra Leone embassy source has categorically stated that "President Ernest Bai Koroma stands to be the first sitting President of Sierra Leone to be formally invited by a sitting Head of State(President Barack Obama) of the most powerful nation in the world(United States of America)."
This White House invitation of President Koroma is thus, in my humble opinion, like him receiving a kind of Nobel Prize for good governance, a certificate for good leadership that will open the doors to stronger and more robust cooperation and trade between not only the USA but other world democracies like Canada, Japan and others.
With this recognition of our President and our country, the future can only be bright for all Sierra Leoneans at home and abroad.
Congratulations, President Koroma, we are proud of you!
Photo: President Ernest Bai Koroma (file photo).
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