Sierra Leone continues to make remarkable progress in ending its eleven-year civil war. There is no longer active fighting, and the army and police are fully deployed across the country. The battlefield capacity of the insurgents, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), has been significantly diminished, and their political arm, the Revolutionary United Front Party (RUF-P), fared poorly in the May 2002 elections that saw President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah re-elected in a landslide with just over 70 per cent of the vote and his party win an overwhelming majority of seats in parliament. Those elections were the first major test for the country following completion of the disarmament process and the official declaration of the end of the war in January 2002.
This was the first truly non-violent vote in the country’s history, in large part because of the substantial international peacekeeping presence. However, a number of concerns are on the horizon that could threaten long term peace prospects. First, there were many questions about the fairness of the electoral process and the level of fraud and coercion that shrouded it.
Secondly, the returns revealed potentially dangerous divisions between the army and President Kabbah’s ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP). A large majority of the security forces voted for Kabbah’s opponents, indicating there is at least some animosity between the executive branch and the armed forces.
Thirdly, the elections also demonstrated that ethnic tensions between Temne in the North and Mende in the South and in the central part of the country remain significant. These underscore the need for a more inclusive government in Freetown. President Kabbah’s SLPP party swept votes across the South and East while its main rival, the All People’s Congress party (APC), maintained its stronghold in the North. The results left Sierra Leone dangerously close to single party rule, with an executive branch and a parliament heavily dominated by the SLPP.
Regrettably, President Kabbah appears to have emerged from his victory with diminished commitment to the peace process. He has done little to establish a cabinet that is broad based, inclusive and designed to promote the goals of national reconciliation.
The international community has expended time, effort, and approximately U.S.$2 billion in an expensive but so far successful peacekeeping mission. This investment made the election possible, but it is still too soon to declare victory. Many root causes of the war, particularly the culture of “winner-take-all politics”, have not been eliminated.
The election will only be significant if accompanied by fundamental reforms that begin to change Sierra Leone’s political landscape. The international community needs to use the post-election period to work hard at consolidating the peace process.
The newly elected government has six months before the start of the dry season “when conflict could resume ” to tackle problems. Reform of the security forces must continue. Aside from the divisions revealed by the vote, there are still considerable question marks concerning the capability of the security forces to secure the country and the capacity of local militias to challenge their authority.
Renewed conflict in neighbouring Liberia reinforces the need for the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) and the British military and police training teams to remain. President Charles Taylor of Liberia retains destabilising regional ambitions and the tools to pursue them, despite his current domestic difficulties, including elements of the RUF insurgents and Kamajor militias now inside Liberia that he can redirect against Sierra Leone’s still fragile peace structures.
The Kabbah administration must also tackle the corruption that permeates all levels of government and society. The international community has assisted in developing accountability systems, but other measures are still needed.
