How world war 1 affected this

Source: Sierra Leone Weekly popular Sierra Leone newspaper focusing on the rights of colonial
Africans, March 8th 1919.
After Africa's sons had shed their blood on the altar of liberty and after having experienced that
terrible plague called the influenza epidemic, are we not the same people? The South African
Natives Congress has decided to send a delegation to England to place before the Imperial
authorities the disabilities of which the coloured people complain. Liberia has asked for a place
in the Peace Conference. What is Sierra Leone doing? We have been sleeping too long. It is high
time we take up the world's work and cry - reconstruction!