A Few Thoughts on... the Crisis in Sierra Leone
by Brian Farenell
(c) 1997
1 September 1997
The Sierra Leone crisis is fraught with irony and a healthy dose of hypocrisy
on the side.
What happened? In early 1996, after several years of a destructive civil
war, Sierra Leonians went to the polls and democratically elected El Hadj
Ahmed Tejan Kabbah as the country's first civilian president in several
years. The election followed a peace accord signed with the rebel Revolutionary
United Front (RUF). But after having been in power for most of the decade,
Sierra Leone's military could not deal with the marginalization, however
small, that is a prerequisite of civilian rule.
On 25 May 1997, the military, led by a Major Johnny Paul Koromah, seized
power and exiled President Kabbah to neighboring Guinea. While Koromah
justified the coup d'etat by saying that, under Kabbah, Sierra Leonians
"had suffered too much," his troops were viciously looting the stores of
the national capital Freetown and they even burned the Ministry of Finance.
In the midst of an assault by Nigerian troops (who were in Freetown on a
peacekeeping mission) on Koromah's soldiers, the would-be head-of-state
lashed out against Nigeria, saying that his regime's "patience was
growing thin" and that regional and international organizations should
"take serious note of the naked aggression by the Nigerian troops." I
suppose he would know naked aggression if he saw it.
After the 1996 elections which brought Kabbah to power, many of the
hundreds of thousands of Sierra Leonian refugees who'd fled to Guinea
and Liberia returned. The economy slowly, but surely, was improving.
The civil war was over. Stability, at long last, seemed to be on
the way.
But not fast enough for the military. Or perhaps too fast. Kabbah was
preceded by three military rulers, the last two of which were in their
mid-20s when they took power. The military had gotten used to the perks
of office. They weren't used to sharing; they didn't like deferring to
anyone else. So they re-took power.
This is typical of many militaries. Sierra Leone's problems had built
up throughout the last 30 years of independance (and before). The
military expected Kabbah to clean the entire mess in just 12 months.
It was an unreasonable expectation and the military knew it. And ironically,
Koromah would have given *himself* four times as long.
Koromah promised he and his colleagues would stay in only until the year
2001 and then cede to democratic elections. He is even reported
to have prayed to Allah to protect his power should ECOWAS (West
African Economic Community) countries invade Sierra Leone. Not to protect
his fellow citizens. Not to protect his great country. But to protect
his power. This, along with his soldiers' actions immediately after
the coup, should remove any doubt as to the purity of his intentions.
Furthermore, why should anybody believe his promise to leave in 2001? If
the military junta was so deferrential to civilian democratic rule, why
did it illegally seize power from a democratically-elected civilian in
the first place?
The government of Major Johnny Paul Koromah has no legitimacy and he
knows it. At the recent summit of ECOWAS heads of state, the organization
invited the exiled Kabbah to represent Sierra Leone and even denied a
specific request by Koromah's "government." To date, not a single other
country has formally recognized the junta. The country is still
represented at its embassies abroad by Kabbah appointees. No one
really takes them seriously so it's time Koromah and his boys stopped
pretending; one gets the impression they consider this akin to a game of
cowboys and Indians 9-year olds play and not the running of a real
country of with people with real problems.
The coup was a bad blow to a fragile sub-region, which was tenuously
celebrating the apparent end of a brutal civil war in Sierra Leone's
neighbor Liberia. Over half a million Liberian and Sierra Leonian
refugees had fled into Guinea, thus putting a tremenedous strain
on the already limited resources there and causing incredible tension
in border areas. There is also a low-level conflict in southern Senegal,
another one recently settled in Mali and Nigeria appears to be on the
brink of explosion, chaffing under 14 years of one of the most repressive
dictatorships in the world.
It's also a step backward for African democracy in general. Multi-party
democracy is a relatively new concept in most African countries and
was largely thrust upon them by the US and France, without much
consideration for the specifics of Africa's realities or its cultures.
Republican institutions need time to take root. Americans forget that
our democracy has been around for over 200 years. We forget that, in
our early years, an offer was made to George Washington for him to
become the nation's king! We forget that 85 years after independance,
America was so instable as to suffer through a long civil war; most
African countries have been sovereign for about half that long. Furthermore,
the US government looks almost nothing like it did 75 years ago; most
African countries have been independant for 35-40 years.
Nigeria, the sub-region's military (if not economic) Goliath, has strongly
advocated using force to remove the junta. This has been
received cooly by most of the other ECOWAS members, who've for the
moment, opted for economic sanctions. The very fact that it's Nigeria is
pushing most heavily for the removal of the illegitimate regime, is
fraught with difficulties.
In 1983, a civilian government in Nigeria was toppled by the military,
who've been in power ever since. The Nigerian military has constantly
promised to return power to civlians - empty promises. Elections
were held in 1993 and apparently won by Moshood Abiola, but were
inexplicably annuled by the then-dictator Ibrahim Babangida and
Babangida was subsequently imprisoned (where he remains to this
day).
The current Nigerian government headed by Gen. Sani Abacha (who was
Babangida's defense minister) is arguably the most brutal and repressive
regime in the world, certainly on the continent. (Abacha is doubtlessly
comparable to such infamous figures as Saddam Hussein and the Burmese junta).
Rule of law simply doesn't exist. It is also one of the world's two
most corrupt countries according to Transparency International and
other such organizations. Abacha has promised to hold democratic
elections before the new millennium. I wonder if he thinks anyone
takes him seriously. I doubt he actually cares.
So the contradictions are clear. A military dictatorship which seized
power from democratically-elected civlians and promising to return it
to them via an endless transition program is leading the fight to remove
a military dictatorship which seized power from democratically-elected
civilians promising to return it back to them via an endless transition
program.
Shortly after the junta took power, Nigerian troop launched an ill-prepared
attack on Koromah's troops; Goliath was routed. This attack, the
subsequent loss of life along with Nigerian hypocrisy did the unthinkable.
It mariginally increased sympathy for the detested junta! With friends
like Nigeria does President Kabbah really need any enemies?
In the ECOWAS summit, member nations called for, among other things,
"the early reinstatement of the legitimate government of President
Tejan Kabbah." While Nigeria is the most blatantly hypocritical, they
are not alone. Nine of the 15 ECOWAS heads of state originally came
to power through the barrel of a gun.
Most of ECOWAS, unlike Nigeria, prefers to give economic sanctions
and negotiations a chance of working before seriously considering
military alternatives. An invasion to return Kabbah to Sierra Leone
would catastrophic to the already ravaged infrastructure of the
capital. Furthermore,, while it seems most Sierra Leonians want the
return of their legal leader, they don't want a bloodbath to accomplish
it. Were Kabbah to be returned by a means which causes the deaths
of thousands of his countrymen, it would surely engender a tremendous
resentment against him and seriously undermine both his credibility
and popularity.
Editor's note (28 February 1998): in late 1997, the junta and Kabbah's
people met in the Guinean capital Conakry. Negotiations produced an
accord whereby Koromah would relinquish power back to Kabbah by April 1998,
with his troops given amnesty for their crimes. However, shortly after,
the regime appeared to have second thoughts about the Conakry agreement.
The Nigerians sensed that the junta would go back on the accord and
launched an invasion to definitively removed them from power. Fortunately,
it appears the country was spared a bloodbath, as the junta's troops
showed little spine (or perhaps the unprecedented: concern for the
well-being of their fellow citizens) and Nigerian troops took control
of Freetown with little problem. The recently also captured the second
city of Bo. State television announced that Kabbah is to return to
the country sometime in mid-March.
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