By Jensen Brian Abass Cummings
Hope Is Just Delayed Disappointment: It Doesn’t Put Food on the Table for Sierra Leoneans
In Sierra Leone, hope is sold like bread — cheap, plentiful, and never enough to fill an empty stomach. From political rallies to living rooms, we cling to hope as if it were a plan. But for countless ordinary Sierra Leoneans, hope has become little more than delayed disappointment.
Every day, families wake up with hope that food prices might drop. Workers hope that salaries might stretch further than just halfway through the month. Parents hope that their children’s education will open doors that remain stubbornly closed. Graduates roam city streets, CVs in hand, hoping for an interview that rarely comes.
It’s no secret that we are a resilient people. We survived a brutal civil war, buried loved ones to Ebola, and endured the global economic shocks of COVID-19. But resilience alone does not pay rent. Hope alone does not cook rice. And optimism alone will not keep the lights on when power fails for the tenth time in a week.
Step into any market in Freetown or a village in Port Loko, and you will find that “hope” is no match for rising inflation. Traders struggle to restock goods. Farmers fight high costs with low returns. Youth unemployment remains one of our greatest crises — and the price is young people risking their lives on dangerous migration routes, desperate to escape a future they no longer trust at home.
The consequences of living on hope alone are clear. Empty promises breed cynicism. People lose faith in their leaders. Some turn to petty crime, or find themselves ensnared in cheap politics that buys votes but never delivers results.
Yet every election cycle, hope is polished up and repackaged: new slogans, old pledges, same outcome. The next five years slip by, and the cycle repeats.
But this country cannot run on recycled hope. It must run on jobs. On working hospitals stocked with medicine.. On policies that lift small businesses, support local farmers, and make sure our natural wealth benefits the many, not just the connected few.
It’s time to be honest: hope that does not deliver change is a trap. If we want more than slogans, we must demand it — with our voices, with our votes, and with our refusal to applaud empty promises.
This generation of Sierra Leoneans deserves more than delayed disappointment. We deserve leadership that works for us, and a country where hope is not our only plan for tomorrow — but a reality we build today.
Copyright –Published in Expo Times News on Wednsday,9th July, 2025 (ExpoTimes News – Expo Media Group (expomediasl.com)
