By Isaac Massaquoi
Like many other Sierra Leoneans, I think that after the initial shock caused by the Al-Shabaab attack on the Westgate shopping mall in Kenya we are returning surprisingly quickly to our usual ways of life before our troops were deployed to Somalia which triggered the Al-Shabaab threat to attack us.
After Westgate, top security people in this country were all over the media using their hackneyed phrases and clichés talking about new measures to protect the nation against such attacks including the fact that police officers would for the first time since the end of our civil war, be visible in unusual strength at major public facilities, immigration checks would be stepped up and actions would be taken to properly protect our borders. I even heard a badly scripted radio jingle attempting to mobilise and prepare the people to play their role in protecting Sierra Leone against the Al-Shabbab militants.
The police even went very close as to causing a diplomatic rift with Pakistan when seven missionaries from that country were quickly arrested in the centre of town for alleged links to militant groups like Al-Shabaab. They were eventually released after questioning but the incident adequately captured the mood of the nation at that time. How come we appear to be snoring again at a time when we should be at the highest point of alert! We all know what Christmas is like in Sierra Leone.
I recently had a lively conversation with a friend who was at the highest point of cynicism as far as the possibility of an Al-Shabaab attack on Sierra Leone territory was concerned. My friend likes analysing international affairs and having in mind the different labels the media attach to political thoughts. I will safely put my friend in the category of the extreme leftists.
Let me try and capture the main ingredients of his argument on the threat of Al-Shabaab against Sierra Leone. He believes that an Al-Shabaab attack on mainland Sierra Leone is totally impossible because the logistics of the Islamist group carrying that out discourages any such attempt. He also believes Munu and others in the security structure have latched on to this fear of Al-Shabaab for their own ends. He would even want to be told what it costs the nation in monetary terms for all the extra deployments.
As you can see I totally disagree with him in some areas but on the third point, we are together. There are many other people who share all his views, and in a democracy those views should be taken into consideration for what they are worth.
In the weeks following the attack on Kenya, I have visited a number of places in and out of Freetown, including some of the most important public facilities. And from my point of view, which is that of an ordinary citizen, I am very afraid that I don’t get the feeling that I am perfectly safe from a determined terrorist seeking to hurt me and my country.
I have to say that as an ordinary citizen, I may not have all the necessary information I need to make a final judgment, but those in charge of the business of keeping the nation safe should ask themselves some questions around why, after all their efforts, people somehow don’t feel pretty satisfied that the Al-Shabaab threat would remain a threat or that even where they try to actualise it on our territory, our security forces would quickly neutralise them without any loss of life or destruction to public or private property.
I suppose you can accuse me of engaging in needless speculative journalism to sell papers. I can live with that. But don’t forget to try and road-test my statement anywhere in this country. The result will be interesting.
These days when I drive by Youyi Building and the Treasury Building I notice some police barricades and a few more officers standing around in a way re-assuring passers-by that their security and particularly that of government property was assured. But the point is that the way Al-Shabaab operates should have taught our security planners a lesson more profound than beefing up their presence at main government installations in a show of force.
Al-Shabaab is a classic guerrilla group, just like Revolutionary United Front rebels who ravaged Sierra Leone throughout the 90s. They select extremely soft targets and unleash such deadly force on ordinary civilians so that they implant terror into the population with the ultimate aim being that the population will then bring pressure to bear on their governments to withdraw troops or cut support to the international effort to rid troubled Somalia of an Al-Qaeda affiliate.
Like a thief in the night, Al-Shabaab might find their way into civilian centres and cause havoc like they did at that Uganda cinema during the last World Cup and at Kenya’s Westgate shopping mall. Of what military significance were both places, one wonders.
There is no problem prioritising government buildings under this enhanced security posture and I know it’s totally impossible to deploy armed police to every home in this country. I should add that even that is not a guarantee of security. But I believe that we must have a security plan that is so organised that every Sierra Leonean realises that it's part of their patriotic duty to be concerned.
May be we should be at the level we were at, in terms of security alertness in the months following that dastardly 1999 attack on Freetown. These were times when small communities took the security of their areas in their own hands. There were lots of excesses here and there as some vigilante groups exploited the situation and involved themselves in criminality. The idea, however, of the population being mobilised sufficiently and skillfully to help in their own security, should remain paramount.
Some of the measures can be as basic as operators of video clubs telling their viewers just before some big European football match to report strange people and suspicious movements immediately. All video clubs must be made to do it otherwise the few who decide to obey would succeed to drive away their customers into the hands of their unscrupulous competitors.
I am looking for posters in communities with clear and concise messages about the security situation. The particular radio jingle now running on some radio stations should be withdrawn and replaced with a professionally produced one that will be distributed to all radio stations across the country. The police should intensify night patrols in small and remote communities to complement the few checkpoints in central parts of the city. In short, assurances of our safety should be backed by visible signs in our backyards. Even for normal peacetime policing this is very important. For a nation threatened by a crude and vicious rebel army like Al-Shabaab, more visible policing is an absolute must.
© Politico 07/11/13
