As the electorate in Guinee get ready to vote in a few days at the Presidential elections, they will have to make a simple but important choice. A choice between a man of Vision or a man that is selfish.
By Alfred Babuk

Cellou Diallo, the candidate of the UFDG, has made an unfortunate transformation. Many years ago, Diallo seemed to be a man of promise. However, that promise has melted under the sweltering heat of his personal ambition. He previously held several ministerial posts, culminating in serving as prime minister for two years. Given his time in government and the vast opportunities these offices provided him over the years, he is expected to behave with the wisdom and maturity of a statesman. Sadly, unbridled ambition for office has turned Diallo inside out. Whatever reason and judgment he once had, is gone. He is now a man whose appetite will end up eating him. We only hope that it does not wreck the nation in the process.

Diallo wants to be president so badly that he is willing to set the nation ablaze to capture this objective. He would rather be the captain of a sinking ship than be a contributing passenger to a safe and good voyage. Instead of holding the nation above his personal desires, he exalts his wants above the needs of Guinea itself. He does not operate according to the principle of democratic service to the people. He believes the presidency is his birthright, that the people should have no say in his ascension to the highest office in the land. He wants to scuttle the election, replacing it with his coronation. This man does not really want to be president but will settle for the office because it is closest thing to being a modern king in his mind. But his idea is not to serve and govern the people as their representative. His goal is to rule and make the people serve him.
Someone should inform this conservative economist that his dreams are of a bygone past. They are buried in the cemetery of forgotten ways. There they must remain if we are to progress. While Cellou Diallo might be stuck in the past, Guinee has moved forward. The people seek a better future for Guineans, no matter their ethnicity and social station. No one is more Guinean or less Guinean than anyone else. Diallo is wrong in believing the presidency is his due. The only thing due is that the people are due a fair election so that they may determine the leadership they want.

Faced with imminent defeat at the polls, Diallo has revealed the bleakness of his true nature. Instead of campaigning in a positive way to convince people to vote for him, he always speaks in undertones of violence and mayhem. Instead of relating closely with the people, he remains aloof and distant. He does not interact with the people well. He keeps them at arm’s length. He does not seek to express a vision of a brighter future nor show the empathy and humane compassion needed of a leader at this time. He would rather sit on his high chair and decree to the people then seek to explain to them and lead them democratically.


His campaign has been almost completely negative. His platform is not progress but fear. His messages are that no other electoral result will be fair unless he wins. Moreover, he exhorts his supporters to fight if he loses. Yet, he shows no proof of any conspiracy against him or of any electoral malpractice significant or widespread enough to sway the process.

He beckons to ethnic prejudice, seeking to stoke confrontations that have no place in the modern Guinea most of us want. The way a man runs an election mirrors his personality. The way a man wins an election is the measure by which he will govern the nation. Diallo seeks to scuttle the election because he knows he will lose it. Diallo seeks to foment ethnic violence because that is the only way he can scuttle the election. This is not the type of man to whom we should entrust our nation and all of its many peoples.
Behind the quiet and dignified exterior is a petty and mean heart willing to sacrifice the welfare of the people and the wellbeing of the nation to achieve his personal objective. Falling so far from the exalted office of prime minister, Cellou has revealed himself to be an incorrigible ethnic chauvinist, an unseemly rumor and hate monger. The man is not fit to be president of a modern and diverse Guinea. If he wants to go back in time, he is free to do so. However, he has no right to drag our nation along with him.