It was in France that someone I introduced myself to mistook my country for a small town in Portugal. This was in the winter of 1998. More than half of Sierra Leone had been buried in war. In fact Freetown, the capital city, had only being recaptured from the rebels eight months earlier by the ECOWAS Monitoring Group (ECOMOG) after the former had subdued it for almost a year. I remember that CNN had fully covered the war four times then. And all in all, the international community had agreed among themselves that the resilience of my people, I mean the Sierra Leones, and the intervention of the sub-regional power, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) was unrivalled in all the history of modern day military intervention. Yet there was my new French friend, 38 going 40 with no information on my country. Later he came close to saying that Sierra Leone must be a South African or a Nigerian city. And here as I give my talk, I have a feeling that there are many more who can hardly go beyond the one sad information that in Africa there is a republic called Sierra Leone and that it is at war with itself to this day.

Sierra Leone is situated on the West Coast of Africa, latitudes 7 and 10 North and longitudes 10.50 and 13 west. It is bounded on the North and North East by the Republic of Guinea, on the East and Southeast by Liberia and on the West and South by the Atlantic Ocean with a coastline stretching some 300 miles extending from the boundary with Republic of Guinea to the north of the mouth of the Great Scarcies river on to the Southeast of the mouth of Mano river.

After four days I left France and returned to Sierra Leone. Less than two months later, the rebels launched the greatest of all their terrors on Freetown. The blast of guns was practically unending whiles looting and raping were carried on like it were a funfair. Civilians at home like those out in the streets were hit by ‘stray’ bullets. The half dead were mutilated and their debris spread in main streets to caution detractors who felt like openly condemning the exercise to stay action. The entire populace was gripped by this fever. Many remained glued to their radio sets. It never occurred in the imagination of all that their government that had so promised them of improved military security can be easily overcome. By noon much of the city was gutted in fire with millions of dollars worth of property destroyed. Added to these, the maximum and other prisons were broken into. Hard core criminals were instantly freed in the name of a ‘revolution’. These prisons were holding hundreds of rebels. They too turned their anger on innocent civilians: the young and active as well as the aged had their limbs and legs hacked off. In other situations, the rebels offered faeces to civilians to eat; they forced children to have sex with their parents; they slit the stomachs of pregnant women. It was not so much the absence of a leadership like it was the absence of law and order. The entire nation had been turned into a jungle! Survival of the fittest became the order of the day. For two weeks, the nation went to bed with no leader in the land. This shook the world so hard that the ruling government was forced to negotiate with the rebels. The government knelt pants down! A much smaller country than Sierra Leone, French West African Togo became the agreed place for the peace talks. The sittings took place in Lome, the capital city. Between May 25 and July 7, 1999 when the agreement was signed, the stage was set for the future of what came to be known as the Lome Peace Agreement. But before all of these, there was the question of where to hold the talks. Although the government announced its indifference as to the venue of the talks, yet it was wary about many of its French West African neighbours whom it had accused of supporting the rebels. Whereas the government suggested venues as far as Europe and Southern Africa, the rebels insisted on Sierra Leone’s French West African neighbours.

It is important to understand the nature of the Sierra Leone civil conflict before we attempt to explain the Lome Peace Agreement. Let us briefly go back to the political history of Sierra Leone only with a view to tracing the birth of the conflict. Sierra Leone became an independent, sovereign state within the Commonwealth on 27 April 1961, thus ending British colonial rule. The founding fathers were already disunited before the attainment of independence. So that when it came, a good number of them were in jail. Among those in jail was the man who was to set the stage for Sierra Leone’s anarchy, Siaka Stevens. Siaka Stevens joined and left the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) challenging it on many fronts. Political tension heightened when he joined forces with other anti-SLPP politicians to found the All People’s Congress (APC). The SLPP though revered was faced with a stiff challenge by the APC. The birth of the APC gave rise to ethnic tension primarily between the two largest groups, the Mende and the Temne. Whereas the SLPP became a predominantly southeastern party, the APC found power in the north and the west. With the British having moved out, political manoeuvering became the order of the day. Beginning 1967 the culture of violence reigned in every election. Baseless politicians and political parties with no patriotic intent were rising as they were falling. After Siaka Stevens had failed to convert himself into president for life, and being that he was growing old and exhausted, he handed power over to the military as a way of protecting himself.

During the presidency of Brigadier Joseph Saidu Momoh, the Sierra Leone Armed Forces became politicised, and in 1991 the army was confronted in gorilla warfare by the rebel forces of Corporal Foday Sankoh. The army was caught unprepared largely because, until the rebellion, very few soldiers could hardly load and unload an AK 47 assault riffle. All the ‘fist fight’ training the military had then was employed in the service of the APC to quiet civilian insurgencies in the country.

As far as the pioneer president of the APC, Siaka Stevens was concerned, the military had to be maintained more as a fulfillment of the principles of state governance rather than as a fighting force meant to react to external aggression. Eventually the APC kept rigging elections, and Siaka Stevens kept returning as president, presiding over a rundown economy and a disgruntled people for seventeen years and his party for twenty-three years. Opponents of the APC who dared to contest as independent candidates developed their own militia groups known as thugs. Violence was institutionalised.

The Sierra Leone civil conflict can be better explained in sub-regional context. By the late 1980s dictatorial leadership had gained roots in large parts of West Africa. The wave of discontent had blown across like the dry wind of the harmattan from the Sahara desert. The cold war in Europe and America was at its peak. The Libyan leader had fallen out with the super powers. African leaders who choo se to serve as vehicles for western and other foreign propaganda were supported to stay longer in power. Very soon schools and colleges all over Sierra Leone began having clandestine meetings to discuss the philosophies of Colonel Mohamed Gadaffi’s, Green Book and North Korea’s Juche idea. Before long the government of Joseph Saidu Momoh fell out with university students who wished to challenge the Sierra Leone concept of democracy. The military was now being undermined by rising militia groups, which hired soldiers as mercenaries. Thus the theatre was set for the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) under the leadership of Corporal Foday Saybana Sankoh to declare war on the APC!

Since starting his rebellion, Foday Sankoh’s RUF has had to fight four governments. There was the imposed APC government of Joseph Saidu Momoh, 1991 through 1992, the military juntas of Captain Valentine Strasser and Brigadier-General Maada Bio’s National Provisional Ruling Council (NPRC), 1992 through 1996 and the elected SLPP government of Alhaji Ahmed Tejan Kabbah, 1996 to date. The SLPP government has had more ins and outs with the RUF than any of the other governments. To try to end the war, President Kabbah has had three peace negotiations with Foday Sankoh. There was the Abidjan Peace Accord signed in neighbouring Cote d’ voire in November 1996, the Conakry Peace Plan signed in neighbouring Guinea in June 1997 and the Lome Peace Agreement signed in neighbouring Togo in July 1999.

The Lome Peace Agreement was signed after a deliberation that lasted for one month and two weeks. The key players were the Government of Sierra Leone and the RUF. It must be noted here that the AFRC and the RUF were considered as one faction. The mediators were the government of Togo, the United Nations, the Organisation of African Unity and the ECOWAS. The observers were the governments of the USA, the UK, Liberia, Libya, Nigeria and Ghana. Others were IRCSL and Sierra Leone’s civil society.

The following were the clauses agreed on and signed by the Goverment of Sierra Leone and the RUF:

Governance

On the 27^th of March this year a donor’s conference on Sierra Leone was held in London. The United Nations made a submission to that conference. That submission is very important in helping us understand the present status of the Lome Peace Agreement. In its introduction, the UN subimission noted that, "While much has been accomplished in the eight months since the signing of the Lome Peace Agreement, it is clear that much more needs to be done to advance peace, democracy and human development in Sierra Leone."

The UN submission went on to list the achievements of the Lome Peace Agreement:

"First and foremost, following the December 1999 decision of the Government of Nigeria to withdraw its ECOMOG troops, UNAMSIL’s mandate was broadened and its military comp1```````````````onent expanded to up to 11,1000 personnel with the adoption of Security council resolution 1289 (2000) of 7 February. In particular, UNAMSIL assumed some of the tasks – such as the provision of security at key locations including all DDR sites – previously performed by ECOMOG as of 21 March, more than 7,3000 UNAMSIL troops had deployed in Freetown, Hastings, Lungi, Port Loko Lunsar, Masiaka Makeni, Magburaka, Kenema, Daru, Mile 91, Bo, Moyamba and Kailahum."

"Some of the institutions envisaged under the agreement have now been established, including the Commision for the Consolidation of Peace (CCP) headed by Johnny Paul Koroma, the Constitutional Review Committee and the National Electoral Commission. The Stature for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission has been enacted by parliament. Parliament has also conducted hearings for the Commission for the management of Strategic Resources, National Reconstruction and Development (CMRRD), headed by Foday Sankoh."

The UN is a moral guarantor to the Lome Peace Agreement. It is in fact believed that it is in Sierra Leone that the UN has had the largest peace keeping operation than in any other place. In its submission, the UN spelt out that "One of the main priorities for the United Nations in Sierra Leone remains the speedy establishment of a credible peacekeeping presence throughout the country to create the necessary climate of confidence and security conditions for the implementation of various aspects of the Lome peace process." But unlike the UN, I will not look upon the Nigerian withdrawal of its ECOMOG troops, the deployment of UN troops or the formation or adoption of committees as achievements. So far as these have been done, they remain deeply cosmetic. But of course of the more than 30-pages submission, the UN had only those two achievements to talk about for an accord going one year old now.

The UN submission also chronicled the hiccups the Lome Peace Agreement is facing. It cautioned that many parts of the country is still beyond government control and are tense and volatile; that the cease-fire is not respected "in particular in the [Occra] Hills area and in the Northern and Eastern Provinces, including ambushes against civilians, the maintenance of illegal roadblocks, movements of rebel fighters and obstruction of peacekeeping and humanitarian activities in the diamond-rich RUF strongholds."

The submission also rightly stated the poor and slow start of the disarmament process, the delay in reconstructing the Sierra Leone Army, mistrust among the stakeholders, and lack of adequate funds to address the plight of refugees and internally displaced people.

Reporting on the nature of the Lome Peace talks, the observer team of civil society had this to say about the RUF: "It is our assessment that this group is yearning for peace. But they seem to be dogmatic about the ‘way’ to this peace. This is evident in their insistence for Transitional Government and the Withdrawal of ECOMOG to name but a few. This makes us wonder whether they do not have a hidden agenda that may bear negatively on the peace process." And about the government it said, "We have no doubt about the Government’s desire to ensure that Sierra Leone attains sustainable peace now. However, the discrete manner in which decisions, the non-adequate involvement of civil society, the fear of setting bad precedence and constitutional impediments are among the issues that the government is struggling with."

We probably must look at one factor that led to the collapse of the Abidjan Peace Accord that President Kabbah first signed with the rebel leader, Foday Sankoh. That treaty was more impressive than the Lome Agreement. More speeches and commitment were made during the Abidjan deliberation than that of the Lome. This treaty for a while ensured quietness in the war front. It proved to the whole world hat both leaders had control over their fighters, that both leaders were the answers to the long conflict. It became clear that the two leaders had no personal grudges beyond the national issues both represented their peoples for. The treaty was not meant to end national issues both represented their peoples for. The treaty was not meant to end with just a temporary cease-fire. It meant that both parties in the interim were to ensure that a lasting peace was achieved. The rebel leader promised to come from the bush. In fact an office was already allocated the RUF at a place called No. 2 Pademba Road in Freetown. Philip Palmer, Deen Jalloh, Fayia Musa and Dr. Mohamed Barrie were the first emissaries of RUF men to occupy the office. A commission for the consolidation for peace was formed to bring the SLPP and the RUF to a first of a series of round table discussions to put an end to the war. But along the line, the treaty suffered a hinge. The international community was not responsive to the needs of the accord in the way that it ought to have been supported. Also, because of mistrust, Foday Sankoh never got to come to Freetown as promised. As a consequence the four emissaries of the RUF attempted to usurp power from Foday Sankoh while compromising with the rival SLPP. Philip Palmer announced from Freetown that he had torpedoed Foday Sankoh as RUF leader. Shortly after, General Sani Abacha of Nigeria arrested Foday Sankoh in some controversial charge. The government of President Kabbah never commented on these developments in the face of the suspicious fingers pointed at it. Certainly enough the crack in the RUF led to the breach peace accord. Thus the Abidjan Peace Accord was sabotaged on two fronts: at home by the government of President Kabbah and abroad by the indifference of the International Community.

After the war had escalated again, it was necessary for another round of peace talks. This was the Conakry Peace Plan. This time the signatories were the ECOWAS Committee of Five and representatives of the AFRC that had together with the RUF seized power and had forced President Kabbah and his government into exile in Guinea. The only concern of these talks was to appeal to the AFRC/RUF to restore the government of President Kabbah within six months of April 1997. Again the peace plan was breached as the AFRC/RUF refused to return power to President Kabbah. With the blessings of the UN, ECOMOG engaged the AFRC/RUF in a war and successfully returned President Kabbah to power.

I will compare the Lome Peace Agreement to the balance the cyclist has to maintain. Unless all of us together are mindful of that, the process will carry on a snail pace and eventually like the first two, fail. It must be noted here that the tussle for both the government and the RUF to agree on the nature of the accord nearly thwarted the peace talks. It can only be concluded that both parties surrendered more than they had wished to. The Lome Peace Agreement brings together a presidium of three: President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah and his SLPP, Chairman Foday Sankoh and his RUF and Major Johnny Paul Koroma, the man who made the infamous military coup that brought in the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC).

The Lome Peace Agreement was welcomed in Sierra Leone with a mixed feeling. After ten years of war, it was clear that the various governments on the one hand and the RUF on the other were incompetent to win. And as the war heightened, civilians got trapped as human shields. Left alone with the government, the war was still prosecutable whereas the rebels believed that very soon they would seize power for the second and final time. But the civil society saw no end to the war. And so with the resolve of its civil society organisations, the campaign was launched to end the war with no clear-cut winner. Therefore, we can rightly say that the Lome Agreement is the people’s agreement in so far as it was forced to happen as a result of their agony. But at the same time, many people have looked upon this agreement as a fragile one. By July 7, 1999 when the agreement was the agreement was signed, the country had been divided between the three forces of the government, the RUF and the AFRC. More than fifty thousand combatants were armed under different commands. There is also the issue of funds to implement the agreement. The economy of Sierra Leone having grounded by corruption and war, it is clear why we have to turn to the international community for financial support if the agreement is to succeed. At the recent donors’ Conference in London, the funding requirement of the UN in Sierra Leone shot up to $ 107,903,495. This money is needed to address the support for:

The DDR programme;

Extension for State authority (1) the police (2) civil affairs;

National reconciliation and democratisation (1) political (2) human rights (3) children;

Support for the restructuring of security forces;

Public information;

Emergency humanitarian assistance.

As usual, the west made their pledges. Those who pledged at that conference were Canada, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the United States, the African Development Bank and the European Union. The trouble is that these pledges are not honoured in time to address these issues. So that when next Sierra Leone is discussed, the issues keep multiplying.

The Lome Peace Agreement must also be tied to the political order in the rest of the West African sub-region. What happened in Sierra Leone and neighbouring Liberia was intended to be the beginnning of a bloody revolution meant to destabilise the sub-region. I think it was a syndicate with deep roots in Africa, Europe, Asia and the Americas. Red eyes for the rich natural resources of countries like Sierra Leone and Liberia was a major factor for these wars. Therefore for the Lome Peace Agreement to succeed, dangerous spots like the Gambia, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Togo and Mali are to be the other Great concern for the ECOWAS, OAU and the UN.

The picture is not all gloomy. The agreement may be cash trapped, but it has underneath it the people’s resolve. The peace agreement is under the perfect protection of our civil society organisations. These organisations are responsible for greasing the nuts. These organisations bestride the door between the agreement and the factions on the one hand and between the agreement and the civil society on the other. The Lome Peace Agreement has been the most articulated agreement in Sierra Leone. The warring factions may not be committed to the agreement but they have little choices. The civil society organisations have erected powerful in institutions of transparency, orderliness, public awareness and drive around the agreement. The local press and electronic media are serving as trusted partners in this direction.

One must not expect a ten-years genocide to emerge with saints. Our war was shaped by an error of political independence. Thus half way into our independence a terror was foretold. Today as we embark on returning Sierra Leone to the peace it once knew, we are genuinely erecting democratic systems where there were none. The Lome Peace Agreement will be the hardest task at hand when compared with the ten-years war we have gone through. Back home my people have a saying, carefully dissect an ant if you must see its intestines whole.

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