SIERRA LEONE-POLITICS: Renewed Rebel Attacks Jeopardise Peace

By Lansana Fofana Reprint | | Print |

Lansana Fofana

FREETOWN, Oct 21 1996 (IPS) - Renewed attacks on villages and fighting between the government forces and the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) have jeopardised moves towards restoring peace in Sierra Leone.

At the weekend, the rebels stepped up their attacks in the agricultural-rich northern province, displacing thousands of villagers from their settlements.

On Sunday, the township of Bumbuna, about 48 kilometres from the northern province capital of Makeni, was raided by a band of rebels, according to media reports reaching here.

“I saw over 20 rebel fighters all clad in military combat fatigues. Some had AK-47 assault rifles, while a few had rocket- propelled grenades,” 60-year-old Pa Sorie Koroma, a survivor of the attack, said in one report.

“They opened rapid fire and when the residents fled in panic, they then went on a looting spree,” Koroma added.

A few civilians were reported injured in the attack and the rebels also looted stored rice from the villagers’ homes.

“A young lady and her husband were bayonetted by the young rebels, while five other young men were forced to transport the looted rice to the bush,” another eyewitness, businesswoman Marie Turay, told the media.

The increased attacks, according to analysts here, may be a signal that the seven-month-old civilian government of Ahmed Tejan Kabbah may have to brace itself for war, instead of a diplomactic solution to end the five-year-old civil war.

“The RUF rebels have demonstrated clearly their disregard for the peace process…,” said Lt. Col. Gabriel Mani, the brigade commander in Makeni. “I believe they have resumed full-scale war and may not even pursue the diplomatic option, given the ferocious nature of their attacks.”

Last week, the rebels attacked the villages of Rowaka and Five Mile, about 40 kilometres east of Makeni. Two men were reportedly killed in the attack and thousands of dollars worth of rice was looted by the rebels.

“It is clear that the rebels are in short supply of rice and so are desperately raiding farming villages,” according to George Thomas Cole, an agricultural officer in the northern district.

Farming villages have been the main targets of the RUF. Rebels have reportedly gone into the fields to harvest the rice and have forced the local farmers to transport it to the bush.

“It is harvest time and you should expect that the rebels would keep harassing us for food,” farmer Mohammed Baryoh told IPS.

The RUF, nestled in the south eastern part of the country, launched its armed insurgency in March 1991 to oust the civilian government of Joseph Momoh, which was finally overthrown in April 1992 by Captain Valentine Strasser.

The rebels however have refused to lay down their arms, insisting that all foreign troops – South African mercenaries, Guineans and Nigerians – must leave the country.

Soon after he assumed office in March, President Kabbab met the RUF leader Corporal Foday Sankoh and agreed to a cease-fire, as one of the measures to restore permanent peace. Talks between the government and the RUF broke down in May.

The five-year conflict has left some 10,000 dead and displaced about a quarter of the country’s 4.5 million. During his address to the United Nations General Assembly two weeks ago, Kabbah asked for assistance to stop the fighting.

The RUF however also accuses the government of not being committed to the cease-fire.

“We don’t think they (the government) are serious about the cease-fire,” the RUF spokesperson, Fayia Musa, said last week. “Their troops started attacking our positions and so we can’t sit idly by watching them.”

The government fears that the RUF may begin to attack strategic positions. The most worrying concern is the rebels’ threat to disrupt the much-delayed hydro-electric project at Bumbuna in the north.

“If the rebels succeed in capturing Bumbuna, then Kabbah is in big trouble,” said political analyst John Bangura of the University of Sierra Leone.

“One of his campaign pledges was to complete the decade-old hydro-electric dam project so that the nation would have continuous supply of electricity, and this is now under fire,” Bangura added.

But one of Kabbah’s senior advisers warned the rebels that: “We won’t let go of Bumbuna or for that matter, any other strategic place…”

New investors may also decide to take their money elsewhere if the country shows signs of prolonged fighting. “This country needs investors and they can only come in if there is stability. I hope the rebels stop fighting,” said Bassie Kamara in the ministry of trade and industry.