Sierra Leone

Abstract

On March 23, 1991, a band of armed insurgents attacked the town of Bomaru (Kailahun District) on Sierra Leone’s eastern border with Liberia. With a force estimated at between sixty and one hundred fighters, armed with AK-47 assault rifles, automatic and semiautomatic machine guns, and rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), the group quickly overran the town before withdrawing to Voinjama in Liberia, from where they had launched their attack. The attack left 2 officers (a major and lieutenant) of the Republic of Sierra Leone Military Force (RSLMF)¹ and 11 civilians dead. The initial reaction of the government in Freetown was to dismiss the attacks as an incident resulting from a commercial transaction gone awry. Indeed a profitable trade in stolen goods looted in Liberia by National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) fighters had been going on between them and Sierra Leone border guards who would receive the looted goods and sell them in Sierra Leone on behalf of their NPFL counterparts. In fact one of the dead soldiers (Major Emmanuel Foday) had been reprimanded for his close relationship with the rebels, some of whom he had in the past even traveled with to Freetown to party. So when the news of the attacks came, it was initially assumed to be about revenge against those dishonest border guards who had cheated their NPFL counterparts.

This uprising will bring out the beast in us.

—Fela Kuti