POLITICS-SIERRA LEONE: Withdrawal Of African Peacekeepers Begins

By Lansana Fofana Reprint | | Print |

Lansana Fofana

FREETOWN, Dec 28 1999 (IPS) - The withdrawal of the Nigerian-led West African peacekeeping force, ECOMOG from Sierra Leone has left heavy hearts, among the civilian population, especially women.

For over a week, the Nigerian contingent which dominates the force, has embarked on what it describes as “phase withdrawal of troops”, to make way for the deployment of a wider United Nations force, that would eventually carry out the disarmament of former fighters.

ECOMOG had been the stabilising force in Sierra Leone since 1997 when renegade soldiers from the Sierra Leone army toppled the government of President Ahmed Tajan Kabbah in a coup d’etat and invited rebels of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) to form what became the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC).

However, the AFRC itself was overthrown after a nine-month reign of terror and the ousted civilian government re-instated by ECOMOG.

But a peace deal signed in July between the government and rebel forces, called for the supplanting of ECOMOG with UN troops, in the implementation of the accord.

Less than 5,000 of the 14,000-strong ECOMOG force that comprised troops from Nigeria, Guinea, Ghana and later Mali, would remain in Sierra Leone to provide security for the government and the population, while the UN force carries out the disarmament, demobilisation and re-integration of an estimated 45,000 ex- combatants.

Already, Nigeria has pulled out about 3,000 of its 11,000 troops in ECOMOG and officials of the Nigerian contingent (NIGCON) told IPS the withdrawal process will continue, more rapidly.

Mali had since withdrawn its contingent, while Guinea and Ghana are replacing their troops with a token force that will serve in the new UN force.

But this development is not at all going down well with the ordinary Sierra Leoneans who have borne the brunt of the eight- year-long brutal conflict. “How could our saviours (ECOMOG) leave at this crucial stage?” asks 42-year-old Hamid Kalawa who works for a Freetown commercial bank.

He says: “This is total madness because ECOMOG soldiers have died in their dozens to save out lives and they have been the nemesis for the murderous rebels. There will surely be a gap.”

There is growing fear that the in-coming UN troops who are drawn mostly from India and Kenya, may easily leave if the country slips back to anarchy. At least UN military personnel in Sierra Leone had evacuated before when the situation got bad, leaving the civilian population at the mercy of the rebels.

Says, a Freetown resident, Kelfala Turay: “This is a very unfortunate development because I sense the gradual demise of ECOMOG which had become a model in regional peace-keeping. What then would be left for us if international politics swallows up ECOMOG ? This region is doomed.”

Apart from the academic discourse on the future of ECOMOG and the realistic situation on the ground which smells doom, with thousands of armed and ex-combatants terrorising civilians and refusing to disarm, women too have been shedding tears.

Monday’s departure of hundreds of Nigerian troops from the Lungi International Airport in Freetown left many weeping and wailing women. Some displayed their “ECOMOG babies” protesting that they would have no one to support them in the absence of their ECOMOG boyfriends.

Unconfirmed reports say at least one woman killed her one-year- old baby when she saw the baby’s father board a Nigerian jet homebound. Another, upon hearing of the return of her Guinean boy- friend, aborted a four-month pregnancy and died in the process.

The stories have been one of horror on different fronts. Child protection agencies and women activists say there are currently “hundreds of ECOMOG babies” in the country and that their presence is bound to create social problems for the government, in the post-conflict era.

“We are currently documenting cases of this nature and hope to come out with a comprehensive documentation on these babies and their suffering mothers,” explains Beatrice Parkinson of the Forum for African Women Educationists (FAWE), a non-governmental organisation (ngo).

Wary Sierra Leoneans only hoped that the fragile peace accord, signed in July in the Togolese capital of Lome, would hold and the absence of ECOMOG, as the main actor in the country’s security, would not plunge Sierra Leone into another disaster.