The Courier

Poster of Special Court – punishable crimes 2008.

© Debra Percival

By the 16th century, English sailors referred to the country as ‘Sierra Leoa’. During the late 1700s, Bunce Island, close to Freetown, became one of the major slave trading operations along the West African coast. It was in 1782 that British philanthropists founded the ‘Province of Freetown’, resettling some of London’s black poor in Sierra Leone in the ‘The Province of Freedom’. Thousands of freed enslaved Africans were returned to Freetown. They settled from all over Africa and came to be known as the ‘Krio’ people. The Krio language is spoken widely amongst the country’s 15 ethnic groups today.

In 1808, Sierra Leone became an official British crown colony and the seat of government for its other West African colonies along the coast. The establishment of one of the first higher education colleges in West Africa in 1827, Fourah Bay College, excelled in medicine, law and education and led to Freetown being known as the ‘Athens of Africa’.

One-party state

Sir Milton Margai, leader of the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP), was appointed the country’s Chief Minister in 1953. Sierra Leone won its independence from the British in 1961 and Margai became its first Prime Minister. Siaka Stevens, candidate of the All People’s Congress (APC), won the elections of March 1967, but was ousted after just a few hours, only to be returned to power in 1968. In 1971, the country became a republic with Stevens, then Prime Minister, appointed as Executive President. In 1978, a new constitution proclaimed Sierra Leone as a one-party state with the APC as the sole legal party. Major Joseph Saidu Momoh became President on Stevens’s retirement in 1985 following a one-party referendum.

President Momoh’s constitutional review recommended re-establishing in 1991 a multi- party democratic constitution. By this time, suspicions of abuse of power and mismanagement of the diamond resources were rife, both of which were triggering factors of the civil war that ensued.

Former army corporal, Foday Sankoh, and his Revolutionary United Front (RUF) campaigned against Momoh, capturing towns on the border with Liberia. Its initial attacks were on the Kailahun District in the diamond-rich east.

Another factor at the start of the conflict was war in neighbouring Liberia. Charles Taylor, then rebel leader of the National Patriotic Front of Liberia, allegedly helped the RUF in return for Sierra Leonean diamonds.

Due to the government’s failure to deal with the rebels at the time, army captain Valentine Strasser launched a military coup sending Momoh into exile in Guinea in April 1992. Strasser formed the National Provisional Ruling Council (NPRC), which was to last four years.

New elections

By 1995, the rebels held much of the diamond-rich eastern province and were on the doorstep of Freetown. The NPRC allegedly hired mercenaries from the private security firm, Executive Outcomes, to repel the rebels. But there was unhappiness about the handling of the crisis and Strasser was subsequently ousted in a coup led by his defence minister, Brigadier General Julius Maada Bio. Bio subsequently re-instated the constitution and called for elections. SLPP candidate, Alhaji Ahmad Tejan Kabbah, was democratically elected and voted into office in 1996.

An alleged attempt to overthrow Kabbah by Major General Johnny Koroma resulted in Koroma’s trial and imprisonment. Unhappy with this decision, a group of soldiers, the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), overthrew the president and released Koroma – who in turn became president and invited the RUF to join him in government on banning political parties, demonstrations and shutting down private radio.

These moves led to UN Security Council sanctions in 1997 including banning arms and petroleum products in 1997. In March 1998, the West African Peackeeping force, ECOMOG, reinstalled Kabbah. The next year another attempt to overthrow the government by the AFRC, with RUF backing, left 5,000 dead in Freetown and widespread devastation.

UNMSIL

In October 1999, UN peacekeepers restored order and disarmed rebel forces. A total of 17,000 ‘blue helmets’ of the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNMSIL) were eventually sent to the country, describes Christian Holger Stohmann, Information Officer with the United Nations Integrated Office in Sierra Leone (UNIOSIL) in Freetown. The ensuing 1999 ceasefire and peace agreement in the Togolese capital of Lomé ensured positions in government for the rebels.

But Sam Bokari, one of the rebel leaders, retaliated against the presence of UN troops who were attacked and abducted in the east. A contingent of 800 British paratroopers arrived to secure the airport for the peacekeepers and Foday Sankoh was captured. In May 2001, the disarmament of rebels began with the aid of Sierra Leone’s national army.

In January 2002, war was officially over. The SLPP’s Kabbah won a landslide victory in multi-party elections the same year. He was defeated by APC candidate, Ernest Bai Koroma, in the 2007 Presidential election. Koroma campaigned on a ticket of change.

Mutilation

It is difficult to meet someone who hasn’t been directly affected by brutal war crimes. Horrific accounts of mutilation, with victims chosen at random, are still vivid. One young Freetown resident, ‘Kenneth’, describes how he was ordered to stand flat against a wall with his hands tied whilst rebels argued about whether to sever his limbs. He was freed, but many others were multilated, including women and children. Another young man ‘Kanu’ recounts how his sister disappeared for three months in the bush where young women were stolen to cook and clean for rebels. Rape was common. Many child solders were killed. For victims with missing arms and legs, it is now doubly hard to find employment in a country where 65 per cent young men 18-40 have no employment.

A Special Court established post-war by the United Nations, at the request of the Sierra Leonean government, still sits but is due to wind up during 2010, explains Francesca Varlese, project manager at the EU Delegation in Freetown. The EU has been giving financial backing to the Court since 2003, providing services such as a live video feed to listen to the ongoing trial of Charles Taylor from the Hague and internships so the Court’s legacy will continue.

Opinion is however divided over the Court’s effectiveness, says Ambrose James who is Country Director of the NGO, ‘Search for Common Ground’, which produces videos and radio broadcasts to voice the views of all Sierra Leoneans. He says Sierra Leoneans have mixed feelings about the Court. Firstly, the ‘big rebel leaders’ like Sam Bokari, ‘Mosquito’, and others either died or fled.

Then there is also confusion about why some members of the Civil Defence Force are before the Court. After all, they opposed the rebels. “People didn’t realise that they carried out some human rights abuses, so this is where there are complications,” says Ambrose James in his Freetown office. He added that there are also questions about the functions of the Special Court and a Truth and Reconciliation Commission – a creation of the Lomé Peace agreement. One metes out forgiveness, the other punishment.

Two million Sierra Leoneans were also displaced either internally or in neighbouring countries. The war and previous upheavals have left their legacy on the economy and society. Sierra Leone numbers 177 out of 177 in the United Nations’ Human Development Index for 2007-2008, having ranked particularly low in child mortality and other statistics on health and education.

Very young children eek out a living on the streets selling bags of fruit or biscuits. Adult literacy is just 30 per cent and 68 per cent of the population lives on less than a dollar a day.

High expectations

There’s a lot of hope vested in the new government of Ernest Bai Koroma. He has pledged to govern in a “business” style and faces a popularity test in the upcoming local elections in July 2008.

There are other promising changes in government. An Anti-Corruption Commission created in 2000 is intent on stamping out corruption in all walks of life, explains Abdul Tejan-Cole, who has been at its helm since December 2007. He suggests radio jingles to encourage the public to become whistleblowers and wants parliamentarians to declare their assets.

There is a lot to do to build the apparatus of government with the country currently dependent on budget support from major donors, which fill the gap in government revenue.

The big four donors in Sierra Leone are the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID), the EU, the African Development Bank (ADB) and the World Bank (WB). All meet regularly to discuss “benchmarks” for the disbursal of budget aid such as whether the government is managing its finances and meeting anti-poverty targets.

Together, the four give €52M of budget support annually, or 17 per cent of the Sierra Leone national budget. In 2007, fiduciary difficulties interrupted budget aid, which was largely due to unpredicted fuel price rises, explains Hans Allden, the EU’s Head of Delegation in Sierra Leone. He stressed the delicate nature of budget aid; good financial management on the one hand and a predictable flow of budget aid on the other: “If not, all kinds of payment problems arise which even affect security. A group of hungry, unpaid people is not good for stability.”

The EU and DFID, which coordinate their aid strategy in Sierra Leone, currently provide 42 per cent of total donor funding to the country. Each concentrates on what it does best: the EU on infrastructure and governance, and DFID on education, health and sanitation. Other EU countries with bi-lateral aid programmes for Sierra Leone are Ireland, Germany, Italy and France.
 
And according to Hans Allden the country would eventually like Sierra Leonean nationals to train as peacekeepers themselves. This is, he says, “a matter of immense pride for the country.”

Statistics for Sierra Leone

• Area: 73,326 sq km
• Population: 5.9M (2007)
• Forecast: 6.9M (2015)
• UNDP Index: 177 out of 177 countries  
  (2007-2008 Human Development Report)
• Life expectancy: 41.8 (2005)
• Adult literacy rate (% age 15 per cent or older): 34.8 (1995-2005)
• Under five mortality rate (per 1,000 births): 282 (2005)
• Imports: €306M (foodstuffs, machinery, fuels)*
• Exports: €163.5M (diamonds, rutile, cocoa, bauxite, coffee, fish, iron ore, palm kernels)*

Political landscape

President: Ernest Bai Koroma since September 2007 

Unicameral House: President elected by popular vote every five years. President’s tenure is restricted to two terms. Parliamentarians are elected by popular vote every five years.

Main political parties: All People’s Congress (APC), Sierra Leone People’s party (SLPP), People’s Movement for Democratic Change (PMDC).12 independently elected Paramount Chiefs representing the country’s districts also sit in Parliament.

Sources: World Bank, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), European Commission, Sierra Leone Encyclopedia 2007.

* 2006

Websites: www.sfcg.org
www.sc-sl.org

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