meta_pixel
Tapesearch Logo
Log in
The John Batchelor Show

#SierraLeone: President Bio pulls Freetown into darkness visible. Gregory Copley, Defense & Foreign Affairs

The John Batchelor Show

John Batchelor

News, Arts, Society & Culture, Books

4.52.8K Ratings

🗓️ 20 December 2023

⏱️ 17 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary


#SierraLeone: President Bio pulls Freetown into darkness visible. Gregory Copley, Defense & Foreign Affairs
https://thenewsnigeria.com.ng/2023/12/18/sierra-leone-current-bodyguards-of-former-president-koroma-also-involved-in-coup-plot-information-minister/
1939 Sierra Leone

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Sure, this is Peloton. This is a 15 minute low impact ride. But so is this.

0:07.1

We're here together for a 10 minute empathy meditation.

0:10.4

And even this. We get here in with a 20 minute hip-hop shadow boxes session.

0:16.5

Ah what more could you ask for? Well with thousands of classes on our bike treading

0:20.9

app there's more to Peloton that you might have thought.

0:23.8

This is Peloton. Internet connection and Peloton all acts as membership required.

0:28.6

C1 Pel and the world. I'm John Batchelor to Africa, to Sierra Leone. A fabled land, the product of the British Empire once upon a time, and now profoundly

0:45.8

troubled with the president who will not leave, Bio is his name, and a governance that has collapsed

0:52.4

except for one man, a Caudillo called in South America, a strong man, Bio.

0:58.0

What he wants and where we're going next, I welcome Gregory Coppley of Defense and Foreign Affairs to comment.

1:04.4

Well, what he wanted was in late June of this year, he just wanted to be reelected as

1:10.2

president, but he failed to control the election process, which he thought he could

1:16.3

just coerce into supporting him.

1:19.3

When it didn't, he basically tried some transparent moves to suppress the opposition.

1:26.7

He started killing people and the like, and you had a situation where nobody accepted the election result.

1:33.8

All of the foreign observers said it wasn't free, fair, and transparent.

1:38.0

And basically, he was left with a population which did not believe he was the legitimate president of the country

1:46.7

and so there was a massive ongoing unrest and insurrection.

1:53.6

At one stage they were looking at a negotiated settlement with the local opposition parties, but the party said, well, you've got to release or

2:08.0

release or charge with criminal offenses, those politicians and

2:12.8

and figures, opposition figures who you've arrested.

2:15.1

Well, the reality was that President Bia and his people had actually killed

...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from John Batchelor, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of John Batchelor and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.

Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.