POLITICS-SIERRA LEONE: No Lawyer Willing To Defend Rebel Leader

By Lansana Fofana Reprint | | Print |

Lansana Fofana

FREETOWN, Sep 7 1998 (IPS) - No Sierra Leonean lawyer appears willing to defend Corporal Foday Sankoh, Sierra Leone’s rebel leader, who has been charged with treason here.

Most lawyers contacted by IPS on Monday, and who declined to be quoted, said they would not stick out their necks to defend the rebel leader, who is widely regarded here as Sierra Leone’s “enemy number one”.

Sankoh, who is in his mid-sixties, was extradited from Nigeria about six weeks ago on allegation of illegally entering that country with ammunition.

Two weeks ago, 16 people — including five journalists — were sentenced to death for collaborating with Sierra Leone’s defeated military junta.

Immediately following the judgment, Sierra Leone’s exiled opposition described the trial as flawed, claiming that no “independent” lawyer was allowed to defend the accused. But the government has rejected the claim.

Sankoh, too, who was paraded before a magistrate here in handcuffs last week, questioned Sierra Leone’s legal system, and the peace which the government claims is now prevailing in the west African country. “Is this the peace you are persecuting me for?”, he asked, after court registrar, Mildred Solomon, read out the charges against him on Sep 4.

Attorney-General, Solomon Berewa, appeared for the state, and would be leading the prosecution when the rebel leader makes another appearance on Sep 11.

Sankoh started his rebellion in March 1991, attacking Sierra Leone’s eastern border towns, from Liberia, with his Revolutionary United Front (RUF), allegedly backed by the former National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL).

Within four years, the rebels succeeded in advancing 48 kilometres to the Sierra Leonean capital of Freetown, with the rebellion spreading into Sierra Leone’s three provinces of the east, south and north. The trail of destruction left behind is colossal as rebel forces burned down towns and villages.

An estimated 15,000 people are believed to have died since the war broke out and about a quarter of the country’s 4.5 million population forced into exile in neighbouring countries.

However, in November 1996, a peace accord was signed in Abidjan, Cote D’Ivoire, between president Ahmed Tejan Kabbah and the rebel leader, under the auspices of the international community.

Although the deal was meant to end hostilities between Sierra Leone’s belligerents, RUF rebels intensified their military campaign mostly against civilian populations in the interior of the country, prompting the peace accord to collapse.

The situation deteriorated when renegade soldiers of the now- disbanded Sierra Leonean army overthrew the government of President Kabbah in May 1997, and invited RUF forces from the bush to help form a government.

The rebel/military alliance, known as the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), headed by Major Jonny Koroma, ruled for nine months, before it was toppled by a Nigerian-led West African peacekeeping force ‘ECOMOG’ in February.

Sankoh, who was then in detention in Nigeria was named vice chairman of the AFRC. He never served that junta as he arrived in Sierra Leone after the junta’s overthrow, and as a prisoner.

Even as Sankoh was being whisked from the courtroom, to an undisclosed place of detention, on Friday, RUF’s second in command col Sam Bockarie, alias ‘Mosquito’, threatened to wage a campaign of genocide, if the rebel leader was not immediately released.

“I will order my troops to kill every living thing including chickens if our leader is not released,” he was quoted as threatening by a leading European radio station, monitored here.

Refusing to be intimidated, Presidential spokesman, Septinus Kaikai, told journalists last week that: “Corporal Sankoh is a Sierra Leonean and like all else, he is subject to the laws of this country. He would be tried and if found guilty, would be dealt with accordingly”.

Kaikai also ruled out negotiations with the rebels. “ECOMOG and the pro-government forces are currently on top of the war situation and by all indications, rebel elements still holding out in the bush will soon be flashed out,” Kaikai said.

His hardline stance has been welcomed by most Sierra Leoneans here. “Foday Sankoh should be tried and killed”, said Joseph Tucker,” a government official here. “His wrists should first be amputated, his eyes gouged out and then butchered with a machete, as his rebels have been doing to innocent civilians”.

Ismail Sillah, a businessman here, wondered, “why the government has to go through this legal waste of time?”, instead of having “this monster publicly tortured and executed”.

Small wonder lawyers are unwilling to defend Sankoh, who on Monday warned that he would not make any statement to the police or in court if international monitors were not at hand to witness the legal proceedings.

The government has assured that international observers would be allowed to monitor the trial.