|
Monday, July 28, 1980
https://www.time.com/time
Monday, Jul. 28, 1980
SIERRA
LEONE: From Athens to an Ill-Run Sparta
Corruption and repression in the realm of
"the Pa "
The spotlight of publicity turned briefly on
Sierra Leone earlier this month, when the Organization of African Unity met
in the tiny (pop. 4 million) West African state and installed its President, Siaka Stevens, as the O.A.U.'s
chairman for the coming year. But when the big bash was over, Sierra Leone
was left with more problems than ever: an authoritarian government, a
languishing economy, all-pervasive corruption and $200 million in bills from
the summit conference. As TIME Nairobi Bureau Chief Jack E. White discovered
during a visit to Sierra Leone, the country's plight is disturbingly similar
to that of neighboring Liberia, where Stevens' friend and predecessor as
O.A.U. chairman, President William Tolbert, was killed in April during a coup
staged by noncommissioned officers. White's report:
"Sierra
Leone under Stevens is like Liberia under Tolbert: a time
bomb waiting to explode." That grim forecast comes from a Western
diplomat who has had long experience in both countries. Indeed, even a casual
visitor is likely to spot similarities between the two West African
republics. Both countries became havens for former slaves in the 19th
century. In Sierra Leone,
the "creole" descendants of these
settlers still dominate the country's business and educational elite—as did
scions of the freed slaves in Liberia
until the recent coup. Sierra Leone
gained its independence from Britain
in 1961; seven years later, Stevens took power after a revolt led by
low-ranking soldiers. That power grab bore a certain resemblance to the
army-led coup in Liberia,
headed by Master Sergeant Samuel Doe, that ousted
the long-entrenched Tolbert regime.
In March serious rioting broke out in Sierra Leone's capital, Freetown, when the government announced a
hike in gasoline prices from $2.50 to $3 per gal. The rioting was reminiscent
of the savage protests that erupted in Morovia last
year after Tolbert increased the price of rice. Stevens, a burly former union
leader whose folksy style has earned him the nickname "the Pa,"
concedes that "we could get into trouble," when his government
announces another boost in fuel prices, possibly this week.
Sierra Leone
was once known as the "Athens of West Africa," because it is the
home of the area's oldest institute of higher learning, Fourah Bay College.
Today the country is more like an ill-run Sparta. Since he took over as President,
Stevens—who is 74 by his own reckoning, but may be as old as 85—has gradually
molded Sierra Leone
into a tightly controlled one-party state. Two years ago he pushed through a
new constitution outlawing all opposition to his All Peoples Congress
(A.P.C.). Although he served as opposition leader during the government of
his predecessor, Prime Minister Sir Albert Margai,
Stevens now claims that the idea of competitive politics is alien to Sierra Leone's
people. Says he: "We don't understand the concept of a loyal
opposition." In December the governor of the central bank, Samuel Bangura, objected to what he described as Stevens' plans
to pocket a large portion of Libya's
$5 million contribution toward defraying the costs of the O.A.U. summit. Bangura was found dead outside his mansion. Police at
first called his death suicide, but after an outcry they charged a 17-year-old
girl, two gardeners and a night watchman with his murder.
A few days before the opening of the O.A.U.
conference, police combed the streets of Freetown, rounding up every potential
dissident in sight. When the Tablet, the only opposition newspaper, published
a vivid account of the story, a band of rock-throwing toughs assaulted its
offices. Though police witnessed the attack and failed to intervene, Stevens
claims no responsibility for the assault. "These are just small
boys," he says of the Tablet's editors. "I can't be bothered with
them."
Stevens may find it more difficult to brush off
the mounting criticism within his own party of the exorbitant costs of the
O.A.U. summit. Two years ago his government pledged that it would spend no
more than $100 million on preparations for the conference; Western diplomats
believe that the total bill may come to twice that figure—a heavy burden for
a country with a per capita gross national product of $210. Moreover, there
is widespread suspicion that the Pa personally profited from the meeting.
Lebanese businessmen who chipped in to a $3 million fund that was supposed to
help underwrite the summit charge that Stevens pocketed a large amount of the
money. Says a Western diplomat in Freetown:
"He often confuses the national bank account with his own."
As titular head of the O.A.U. until next July's
meeting in Nairobi, Stevens is expected to
lead the battle for economic sanctions against South Africa. But his government
has tight links with the apartheid regime; 49% of the national diamond
corporation is owned by an offshoot of South Africa's De Beers Corp.
Stevens insists that "the South Africans once had a monopoly on the
diamond trade in this country, but we are trying little by little to break
it." That plan has focused recently on efforts by a Stevens
business associate, American Entrepreneur Maurice Templesman,
to help Sierra Leone
get financing from the World Bank for an ambitious deep diamond-mining
venture. A sometime escort of Jackie Onassis, Templesman has hired New York Lawyer Theodore Sorensen,
once the chief speechwriter for John F. Kennedy, to represent his interests.
In Freetown,
it is widely suspected that Stevens takes his cut of his country's dealings
with De Beers. That rumor may have prompted the angry remark of one black
nationalist leader at the recent summit, namely that African nations doing
business with South Africa
"ought to be disciplined by the O.A.U." Since all too many
countries on the continent have trade dealings with Pretoria,
the chances of any such disciplinary action against Sierra Leone
are very slim indeed. ∎
|
|
|