By Oumar Farouk Sesay
There was once an ingenious form of theft known as “sweating gold.”
Thieves placed gold coins in a damp leather bag and shook it repeatedly. Each jolt scraped off microscopic flakes, which were later recovered from the leather. The coins remained in circulation and looked almost unchanged, but their value had been quietly diminished.
The brilliance of the crime lay in taking not the coin itself but its value—so gradually that the damage was barely noticed.
Sierra Leone now risks sweating its Constitution in much the same way.
Rather than earning public confidence through competent governance, governments can be tempted to revisit the Constitution, the census, electoral laws, constituency boundaries, and voting formulas whenever elections approach. Instead of building support through performance, they seek an advantage by adjusting the rules governing political competition.
At its most dangerous, that temptation can extend to weakening entrenched constitutional protections, including the requirement for a two-thirds parliamentary majority and a referendum. At that point, the process is no longer merely scraping dust from the coin. It comes perilously close to taking the coin itself.
The Constitution is the gold coin of the Republic.
Each amendment advanced for short-term electoral convenience may seem modest when considered alone. Yet every alteration, even one enacted through lawful procedure, risks eroding something more valuable than the wording of the document: public confidence that the rules belong equally to every citizen and political party.
As elections approach, the national debate in fragile democracies often shifts from employment, healthcare, education, infrastructure, and economic opportunity to constitutional engineering. Instead of asking how effectively a government has governed, citizens are invited to argue over how the next election should be conducted.
The conversation moves quietly from performance to procedure.
Sierra Leone has not escaped this cycle.
The period preceding the 2023 elections was marked by serious controversy over the national census, electoral arrangements, and the legal framework governing the elections. These disputes deepened partisan divisions and contributed to one of the most fiercely contested elections in Sierra Leone’s post-war history.
The political crisis that followed was severe enough to require international and regional engagement, leading to the Agreement for National Unity and the subsequent Tripartite process, both of which sought to restore dialogue and rebuild confidence in the country’s democratic institutions.
It is against this still-unsettled background that Parliament is once again considering substantial constitutional amendments.
The question is not simply whether each proposal can be defended individually, nor merely whether Parliament has the legal authority or numerical strength to approve it.
The larger question is one of legitimacy and public confidence.
Arguably, no Constitution should be treated as sacred to the point of paralysis. Societies change, and institutions reveal weaknesses. New technologies, demographic pressures, social expectations, and political experience may expose gaps that earlier generations could not have anticipated. Serious constitutions therefore contain mechanisms for amendment. But when those mechanisms are weakened or compromised, the integrity of the Constitution itself is diminished.
Constitutional reform must meet a higher standard than ordinary legislation.
It should begin with a clearly demonstrated public need, not an electoral calculation. It should be shaped by broad consultation, transparent reasoning and meaningful participation across political, regional and social lines. It should allow sufficient time for public scrutiny and should not be rushed through Parliament simply because the governing party possesses the votes—or the power—to do so.
Most importantly, constitutional reform should strengthen the rules for everyone, including those who may one day replace the government proposing it. A credible reform is one whose authors would still consider it fair if they were sitting in opposition.
Timing also matters. Even a defensible amendment can lose legitimacy when introduced near an election or in the aftermath of a disputed election. In such circumstances, citizens may reasonably question whether the change is intended to improve the constitutional order or to influence the next political contest.
Constitutions derive their authority not only from votes cast in Parliament, but also from the belief that constitutional changes are being made in the enduring interests of the Republic rather than the immediate interests of those temporarily exercising power.
In constitutional politics, perception can matter almost as much as legality. Once citizens suspect that reform is intended to improve the governing party’s electoral prospects rather than strengthen democratic governance, trust itself becomes the casualty.
That is how constitutions are sweated.
Democracy is not always diminished by a dramatic coup or the sudden abolition of institutions. Sometimes it is weakened by a succession of smaller acts: a revised provision here, an altered electoral arrangement there, a safeguard diluted, a threshold lowered, or a memorandum on vote counting replacing constitutional provisions.
Each change may be presented as technical, procedural, or necessary. But when such changes repeatedly coincide with electoral calculations, they erode public confidence in the constitutional order. The document remains visibly intact, yet its moral weight steadily declines.
A Constitution must never become an electoral strategy document.
Its purpose is to restrain power, not to secure it. It establishes the rules under which governments compete. It should not become an instrument through which an incumbent seeks competitive advantage over others.
There is a better and more honourable way to gain that advantage: deliver for the electorate.
The strongest argument any government can make before an election is not a revised constitutional formula but a successful record in office.
It is found in hospitals that function.
Schools that educate.
Roads that connect communities.
Jobs that restore dignity.
Courts that command confidence.
Institutions that remain strong beyond the lifespan of any administration.
These are the political equivalent of mining gold rather than sweating it.
Stable constitutional rules help produce stable democracies. They reassure citizens that governments are willing to compete under the same rules they inherited—the tested rules that have applied to both government and opposition—rather than rules redesigned for immediate political benefit.
Democratic legitimacy grows when leaders trust the people enough to defend their record instead of repeatedly revisiting the architecture of electoral competition. Time spent framing, reframing and cajoling support for constitutional electoral changes would be better spent delivering for the people—the most legitimate foundation for electoral success.
History seldom remembers governments with admiration because they devised constitutional formulas that helped them retain power.
It remembers those that governed so effectively that they did not need to change the rules.
The greatest political achievement is not amending a constitution before an election. It is governing with such competence, integrity, and public confidence that no constitutional change is needed for the people to renew a government’s mandate.
That is the difference between reforming a Constitution in the lasting interests of the Republic and exploiting it for electoral gain.
Amend the Constitution only when genuinely necessary. Focus on areas requiring reform, such as the much-debated presidential executive powers in the 1991 Constitution, and on areas it inadequately addresses, such as local government. Strengthen it through consensus, transparency and public trust. Do not alter its electoral framework for political advantage.
Stop sweating gold from our Constitution.
Mine it, instead, from the confidence of the voters.
