By Umaru Fofana
The United States over the weekend warned about a terror threat against its citizens and its interests in the Middle East and North Africa. It led to the closure of its embassies in some of the countries in the regions. In some cases the Sunday closure has been extended to last for a few more days.
The threat may not have been as palpable against US interests in Sub-Saharan Africa as it is in North Africa but threat nevertheless there still exists in our neck of the wood. Coincidentally, the US warning came at the same time when East African leaders called for more troop contributing countries to step forward to address the situation in Somalia, arguably the hottest spot in Africa south of the Sahara in the war against radical political Islam.
Even though the warnings issued by the Americans and African leaders do not point to the same threat, they point to the same thing – Al Qaeda and its affiliates and cells across the world are aiming at wreaking havoc. In the case of the Americans the days leading up to and following the end of the Muslim Holy Month of Ramadan can be made deadly by these extremists. In the case of Somalia, the more gains the AMISOM peacekeepers make, the more territory they control and the more men and weaponry they would need. Consequently, the more the retreating Islamist Al Shabaab group get frustrated. And the more likely it is that they may resort to any tactic and antic.
Those international peacekeepers include our own – troops of the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces (RSLAF). They are helping bring back peace to a country which has known nothing but war and misery for decades. Already the RSLAF have been tested in their troubled deployment area of Kismayo. True to their threat before the troops arrived, the Al Shabab militia group, an affiliate of Al Qaeda, have attacked the Sierra Leone infantry battalion stationed there. They were beaten back. Next a landmine ambush against an RSLAF patrol which they also survived reportedly unscathed.
I have no doubt our troops will acquit themselves pretty well so long their bosses back home stop discouraging them. Some of the men have complained that their money is being deducted by some of their commanders far away from the combat zone. Insensitive! But that is for another day. What is for today is the apparent lax in security back home here. From our porous borders manned by security personnel who look more for goods to extort than for weaponry, to the nonexistent state of security preparedness at our government buildings and other public places and parks.
Youyi Building houses the highest number of government functionaries in the country. Apart from State House and perhaps the Office of the Vice President, the several decades old nine-storey building should have the most effective security apparatus in place. But it is a building where layabouts roam always, and all ways and at will. Anyone can just drive in there unconcernedly, and abandon their car which could be laden with bombs. Anyone can walk up into the building and place an explosive right inside it. No one searches anyone. Let alone the presence of metal detectors or anything at all to screen with.
Anyone can walk into the Ministerial Building on George Street unchecked, unnoticed, undisturbed. The Police headquarters has no security presence. Not inside it. Not outside of it. The few officers around are not on guard. Apart from the Defence Headquarters, no other government office outside the presidency has any sense or presence of any form of security. The few parks that we have and the other public places on beach are naked as far as security is concerned. If trouble broke out there would be no need to real help by the time it arrives. Sometimes we seem to forget as a nation that in time of peace and tranquillity we must be prepared for war and instability. So we spend more on war than on peace. Foolish!
The President, because of his apparent popularity in the capital Freetown is being left to look vulnerable. He may not feel so but he is vulnerable. No Sierra Leonean would want to harm our elected leader. Definitely not! However politically divisive our country may be! But with a youth population that is hopelessly out of job, some of them high on drugs if only to bury their frustration, with borders that are made even more porous by compromised security forces, it sounds like a perfect breeding ground or manure for Al Shabaab to flourish. Yet we are not waking up to the reality and are busy playing politics with everything including our safety and security, like we do with talk about development and prosperity.
In recent times I have been to seven of the country’s twelve districts. There is pent up anger especially among the youthful population. The Al Shabaab militia group threat is still hanging over us like a Damocles. The threat, I repeat, is that because we sent in troops to Somalia we have become a target. The same way Charles Taylor threatened in 1990 when Sierra Leone agreed to host the West African intervention force (ECOMOG) for Liberia. We shrugged it off and sat hopelessly unprepared until the dagger was placed in-between our legs. And the rest as they say is history. Ours is a very soft target right now.
I am not asking for checkpoints to be set up in all corners of the country in a knee-jerk fashion. Surveillance! Surveillance! And I know for sure that it is not happening. I am asking for effective provision of the wherewithal to the police and soldiers, and for their seriousness to defend the motherland. It is disgraceful the pitch darkness, for example, under which our police officers and soldiers operate at the checkpoint on entering Bo, the country’s second city. There is no security outfit leading to Makeni. The condition under which the officers and men live at the Matotoka checkpoint is a disgrace. As for those at Mile 38 the gateway to Freetown, they are a humiliation to the word “security”. They look for nothing but money. They stop vehicles without searching them for arms or contraband. They just ask for money. Indirectly if that works, or directly if it does not.
Sierra Leone is a majority Muslim country. The Sierra Leonean Muslims like the majority of followers of the Mohammedan faith the world over lack the propensity to take away their own life. It is un-Islamic and un-Sierra Leonean. It is not in our nature. But even the meekest or most subservient of people can be radicalised. Especially where all hope is lost. And some of the preachers of both main faiths in the country are sounding increasingly radical lately.
I only hope the Office of National Security are up to something good. I doubt they are. But I still hope they are. If the Al Shabab threat does not wake us up when it should, by the time it does, we may never wake up for a very long time.
© Politico 06/08/13
