By Lansana Fofana
FREETOWN, May 15 1998 (IPS)

Details are slowly emerging here about a controversial operation involving the use of British arms and mercenaries to restore President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah to power in Sierra Leone.

An investigation has been mounted by British Customs and Exercise Department to ascertain whether the Foreign Office gave its blessing to the mission, which clearly subverted U.N. Resolution 1132 of October 1997. That resolution explicitly prohibits the supply of arms to the war-torn country.

Details emerging now say President Kabbah struck a deal with the British firm Sandline International for the operation, involving 10 million pounds sterling and substantial mining concessions to be paid after the junta which seized power on 25 May 1997 was toppled.

This is the type of information needed in London. But astonished government officials here say they do not understand why Britain is carrying out the inquiry.

“I would have to say that if the British government and British officials were involved in supplying arms, then the British people should be proud of their government,” said Sierra Leone’s information minister, Julius Spencer.

Spencer argued that people questioning the role of British officials in returning Kabbah to power should be ashamed of themselves since “even if the law was broken, people should be happy that it was broken for a good reason”.

Kabbah’s spokesman, Septimus Kaikai, agreed. “After all, the universal call was for the illegal junta to go, and force was indeed the last option suggested by the international community. So why all this fuss about mercenaries and arms,” he wondered.

As expected, the British High Commissioner, Peter Penfold, who has been temporarily recalled home to help in the investigations, is fast becoming something of an icon in Sierra Leone.

“Bravo Penfold, Bravo Britain; Penfold is a True Friend of Sierra Leone,” screamed a headline this week in the independent tabloid, The Democrat.

“Sierra Leoneans are stunned by the double standards displayed by Britain over the issue of High Commissioner Penfold’s role in the restoration of democracy here,” said the paper.

It added that: “As far as the majority of Sierra Leoneans are concerned, efforts to discredit the role played by Britain through Penfold, can only come from covert supporters of the ousted junta who, by the same token, are enemies of the people of this country.”

Another tabloid, The Vision, revealed that President Kabbah paid an initial 700,000 US Dollars to Sandline and that Presidential Affairs Minister Momodu Koroma and Attorney-General Solomon Berewa were insiders to the deal.

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