SIERRA LEONE: Govt Wants Junta Members Returned For Trial

By Lansana Fofana Reprint | | Print |

Lansana Fofana

FREETOWN, Mar 15 1998 (IPS) - Sierra Leone’s civilian government wants former members of the military regime arrested and extradited from neighbouring countries to stand trial for the various atrocities committed during the nine-month rule of the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council’s (AFRC).

“We call on all neighbouring countries and the international community to arrest and extradite any junta official who surfaces in their territories,” Sierra Leone’s Vice President Albert Demby said.

He added that the amnesty package for the AFRC, which was negotiated last year in neighbouring Guinea between AFRC representatives and members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), would not be recognised, because the junta had refused to hand over power peacefully to the democratically-elected government.

During the Mar. 10 celebration in the Sierra Leonean capital of Freetown to mark the return of the civilian president, Ahmed Tejan Kabbah, the vice president also appealed to the Nigerian leader, Gen. Sani Abacha, to extradite the jailed leader of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), Foday Sankoh, “to stand trial for the atrocities his rebels committed against the people of this country”. The RUF formed an alliance with the AFRC regime.

After four years of military rule, President Kabbah came to power in February 1996. He was ousted by junior military officers led by Major Johnny Paul Koroma on May 25, 1997, and fled to Conakry, Guinea with a large majority of his government.

According to a pro-Kabbah newspaper published in Freetown, the majority of residents interviewed in the capital city have called on the government to execute members of the junta who have been captured by the Nigerian-led West African Peacekeeping Force (ECOMOG), which ousted Koroma’s regime last month.

More than 500 junta officials and their collaborators are detained at Pademba Road Maximum Security Prison in Freetown.

“Kill Them All!”, screamed the front-page headline in this week’s edition of the ‘Freedom Now’ newspaper. “The majority of Sierra Leoneans wish nothing but death as punishment for the culprits,” the newspaper said in its article.

In his first nationwide address since returning to the country, however, President Kabbah said that revenge killings should not be the order of the day, and that his government would follow the judiciary process.

“The due process of the law must be allowed to take its course and we now know those who, together with collaborators, wrecked this nation,” President Kabbah said.

According to reports, the retreating junta forces killed some 150 civilians in Freetown and burnt more than 50 homes. In the second largest city of Bo, the number of deaths and houses destroyed was reported to be twice as high.

“These people do not deserve amnesty. They must be tried and punished, because they caused the country tremendous damage,” said Francis Davies, a resident of Freetown whose home was destroyed by the AFRC forces.

Among those detained by ECOMOG at the Pademba Road prison are about five editors of pro-military newspapers. In a harshly worded statement issued last week, the Sierra Leone Association of Journalists (SLAJ) said that all newspapers registered by the ousted AFRC should be ordered by Kabbah’s government to cease publication. According to one editor interviewed, “the pro-junta editors received newsprints, films and other printing materials as favours from the AFRC…”

SLA members also allege that editors and journalists who supported the AFRC often identified journalists for harassment by the military.

“We went through the most awful times, because journalists were brutalised, detained and tortured by junta officials for publishing critical articles about the regime,” said Jonathan Leigh, editor of the ‘Independent Observer’ newspaper.

Leigh’s office was stormed by the military and “I was locked up in a container, beaten by soldiers in turn, and then forced to drink my own urine and do forced labour,” he said.

Healing the wounds in this West African nation is one of the major challenges facing Kabbah’s returning government.

So far, President Kabbah has not indicated what will happen to AFRC members and collaborators who are found guilty of charges brought against them. But his spokesman, Julius Spencer, told reporters “We have the death penalty on our statutes and I think those who are found guilty will be dealt with accordingly.”