The curtain falls for Minkailu Mansaray but his spirit endures

Yoni Emmanuel Sesay: Sierra Leone Telegraph: 20 June 2026:

Some deaths announce themselves not merely as the passing of a person, but as the falling of a curtain on an era. The death of Hon. Alhaji Minkailu Mansaray feels like such a moment.

Across the APC family there is mourning. Across communities where he lived, worked, and served, there is sadness. Within his family there is grief that words can scarcely comfort.

Yet this is a drama that requires no dance. The tears are genuine. The sorrow is real. The loss needs no performance.

Former President Dr Ernest Bai Koroma captured the depth of this loss when he referred to Hon. Minkailu Mansaray as “the soul of the party.” It was a fitting description, for a soul does not merely occupy a body; it animates it, steadies it, gives it memory, conscience, and direction.

For while Sierra Leone has lost a politician, many of us are mourning something deeper: the passing of a spirit of leadership that seems increasingly rare in public life.

Much has been said about Hon. Minkailu Mansaray’s distinguished career as Minister of Mines, Party Chairman, strategist, and political leader. History will record those achievements. Others will recount the offices he occupied and the influence he wielded.

What I remember most, however, is the spirit he carried. It was a spirit that understood that leadership was not about standing above others, but about drawing strength from them. A spirit that valued contribution over applause, service over recognition, and collective success over personal glory.

One of my earliest and most enduring memories of him dates back to the 2007 elections during the APC’s determined struggle to reclaim what many supporters regarded as the nation’s fountain of honour. The atmosphere was electric with hope and expectation. Everyone had a task to perform.

At one point, he drew me aside and addressed me in the familiar manner he always did:

“Or Sesay…” Then he said: “You collate the electoral numbers. I and others will use other means to bring honour to the APC Party.”

At the time, the statement seemed ordinary. Years later, I realised it contained an entire philosophy of leadership. In those few words was an understanding that no movement succeeds because of one person. Some organise.

Some persuade. Some negotiate. Some mobilise. Some analyse. Some work in public view. Others labour quietly in the shadows. Every role matters. Every contribution counts.

The APC would eventually prevail under the charismatic and visionary leadership of Dr Ernest Bai Koroma. History remembers the victory. I remember the lesson.

The lesson was that great institutions are built when individuals subordinate ego to purpose.

It was a principle Hon. Minkailu Mansaray did not merely preach; it was one he lived.

I encountered that same spirit again in 2013 when I travelled with him and five other party officials on a mission to conduct executive elections for APC diaspora branches in Frankfurt, London, and Maryland.

As leader of the delegation, he possessed authority, but never wore it heavily. He provided direction without arrogance. He exercised influence without intimidation. He commanded respect without demanding it.

What impressed me most was not his experience, but his disposition. He listened before speaking. He sought understanding before judgment.

He treated ordinary party members with the same courtesy he extended to senior officials. He carried himself with the confidence of a man who had nothing to prove.

Travelling with him revealed something that public life often conceals. Behind the seasoned politician was a man who genuinely believed that politics was ultimately about people. Not power. Not titles. Not positions. People.

He understood that parties are communities before they are electoral machines. That institutions endure only when people feel respected within them. That leadership is measured not by how many followers one commands, but by how many people one empowers.

Perhaps this was why Ernest Bai Koroma once described him as “the soul of the party”.

Hon. Minkailu Mansaray did not simply serve the APC; he helped give it feeling, memory, patience, and institutional instinct. He was part of that inner moral fabric by which a party recognises itself beyond slogans, banners, campaigns, and contests for power.

Perhaps that also explains why he remained more of a pragmatist than an ideologue. I recall him observing that political doctrines, constitutions, manifestos, and slogans are ultimately human creations, shaped by the aspirations and realities of ordinary citizens.

It was a simple observation, but a profound one. For beneath it lay a conviction that public service must remain rooted in humanity. While others became prisoners of rigid positions, he remained attentive to the human beings those positions were meant to serve. That spirit made him more than a Party Chairman.

It made him a counsellor. A bridge-builder. A reconciler. A steady hand during turbulent times.

Today, as the APC mourns his passing, it is this spirit that deserves our deepest reflection.

The party he loved continues to wrestle with internal divisions and competing ambitions. Sierra Leone’s politics remains vulnerable to polarisation and mistrust.

His absence is therefore more than the loss of an individual. It is the loss of a voice that consistently reminded us that institutions are strongest when people choose cooperation over conflict and service over self. Yet perhaps this is where his final lesson lies.

The greatest tribute to Hon. Minkailu Mansaray will not be found in speeches, resolutions, or ceremonial displays of grief. It will be found in whether those who remain can preserve the spirit he embodied.

The spirit that understood that no individual is greater than the cause. The spirit that recognised that different people contribute in different ways. The spirit that placed unity above factional triumph.

The spirit that valued service above personal acclaim. The spirit that sought to build rather than divide. If that spirit survives, then a part of him survives with it.

And so, as mourners gather, I find myself returning to those words he spoke in 2007: “You collate the electoral numbers. I and others will use other means to bring honour to the APC Party.”

What appeared to be a simple campaign instruction was, in truth, a window into the man himself: A man who believed leadership was shared. A man who believed success was collective.

A man who understood that the strongest institutions are built not by towering personalities, but by people working together toward a common purpose.

The APC mourns a leader. His family mourns a beloved father, husband, brother, and relative. Friends mourn a companion. Sierra Leone mourns a notable figure in its democratic journey.

But beyond all that, we mourn the passing of the man Ernest Bai Koroma once rightly called “the soul of the party” — a spirit whose lessons remain urgently relevant to our time.

The curtain has fallen for Minkailu Mansaray. The actor has taken his final bow. But the spirit endures. It endures in the memory of those he guided, in the party he helped steady, and in the wisdom he left behind for all who still believe that politics, at its best, is service before self.

This is indeed a sad drama. And it requires no dance.

May his soul rest in perfect peace

Editor’s Note

The remains of Minkailu Mansaray arrived in Freetown yesterday from Senegal