POLITICS-SIERRA LEONE: Exposing The Hidden Hand Of Libya

By Lansana Fofana Reprint | | Print |

Lansana Fofana

FREETOWN, Oct 16 1998 (IPS) - Libyan plan to invest in Sierra Leone’s tourism and industrial sectors may suffer setbacks if trial of detained rebel leader, Foday Sankoh, continues to expose Tripoli’s hand in the funding of the West African country’s civil war.

Last week state prosecution tendered documents before court purportedly written by the rebel leader, soliciting financial assistance from Libya to sustain the war in Sierra Leone.

Sankoh, who was extradited from Nigeria this year, has been slamed with nine-count charges of “treason, aiding, abetting and incitement”.

While one of the documents requested half a million US dollars to purchase arms and ammunition “for fast and smooth operations of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF)”, another acknowledged receipt of 29,000 US Dollars from the People’s Bureau of Libya (embassy) in the Ghanian capital of Accra.

The documents show that the RUF’s dealings with Libya began soon after Sankoh launched his bush war in March 1991.

In one such documents, Sankoh requested “2 million US Dollars plus another 7,000 US Dollars urgently…as funds solicited from Burkina Faso had not been received.”

According to “confessions” made by a number of ex-RUF combatants, the core fighters of the movement got initial military training from the Libyan desert town of Benghazi, under the “World Mathaba Movement (WMM).”

WMM is believed to be the brainchild of Libyan leader, Colonel Muammar Ghadafi, who has always been eager to export his revolutionary ideas to sub-Saharan Africa.

Rebel leaders like Charles Taylor of Liberia (now its president), Gambian renegade Kukoi Samba Sanyang who led a botched invasion of his country, Sankoh of Sierra Leone and Gbago Zoumanigui of Guinea, all allegedly received money and trainning for their fighters from Libya.

“We spent three months at a military training camp in Libya with a number of other Africans and were told that after training, we would return home to fight against our corrupt governments,” says Mohamed Kanneh, a 27-year-old ex-RUF fighter.

Kanneh, along with other young men and women, between ages 16 and 27, was recruited by Sankoh in the late 1980s, taken to Libya, allegedly through Burkina Faso, for military training.

“In Libya, we were given allowances, clothing and stuffed with revolutionary literature which many of us barely understood,” Kanneh recalls.

Sierra Leone reacted by closing down Libya’s embassy in the capital Freetown, and clamping down on the perceived followers of Gadaffi’s “Green Book” in the west African country.

“That doctrine was the instrument of brainwashing of our youths so it was totally repugnant,” says a top government official in Freetown.

Things began to change in Sierra Leone when the RUF teamed up with renegades of the national army in May 1997 to overthrow the civilian government of President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah.

In its nine-month reign, the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), which was the merger between the RUF and the army, instituted a reign of terror that left hundreds of civilians dead or injured.

In its bush war, the RUF destroyed several towns and villages and forced about a quarter of Sierra Leone’s population to flee into exile, mostly in neighbouring countries.

Because of its atrocities against civilians, burning and looting, the RUF’s external support considerably waned, coupled with military pressure heaped on it by government forces and their militia allies.

Today, the RUF has disintegrated, with pockets of rebels fighting in remote parts of the country, without any strong chain of command.

Before Sankoh’s revelations, a Libyan delegation, made up of government officials and business executives, visited Freetown last week, and expressed interests in rehabilitating the country’s derelict hotels.

The visit came two months after President Kabbah travelled to Libya and Iran to seek financial support to rebuild his war- ravaged country. Both countries promised to deliver.

But, following Sankoh’s revelation, Sierra Leoneans seem to be changing their minds about Libya.

“The government must be cautious in wooing friends. We can’t claim to be dealing with friends who also deal with our enemies, the rebels,” says Jonathan Fullah, a high school teacher in Freetown.

Says an ex-RUF fighter, trained in Libya: “I know the Libyans quite well. They are sly and can change colours anytime.