The spokesman of the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces, Major Samuel Moody, has told Politico that the deployment of Sierra Leonean peacekeepers to war-torn Somalia will start in late August at the earliest with a support group that will include the engineer regiment.
The regiment will identify locations for the main body of peacekeepers to deploy in as well as administration buildings and shelter.
Maj Moody said the main battalion-strong contingent would “hopefully” leave in September casting doubt somehow over the exact time of deployment of the 850 soldiers. They were initially scheduled to deploy in June.
Moody said the delay had nothing to do with threats by the Islamist group, Alshabaab who have warned the soldiers to stay away or face an orgy of attacks and killings if they do go ahead with the deployment.
The military spokesman said the delay had been due to the arrival of a team from the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) whom he said were still being awaited. He could not say when the team would be here, but said the soldiers were still being trained and prepared for the deployment.
The AMISOM team, he said, needed to certify the equipment the peacekeepers would be using, which will be sent to the Kenyan port city of Mombasa before their deployment. He said Minister of Defence, Pallo Conteh and the Chief of Defence Staff, Maj. Gen. Samuel Williams were currently in Kenya to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with the Kenya Defence Force because, according to Maj Moody, the two countries will form a brigade with RSLAF serving under the KDF. He said the KDF were impressed with “progress made by the RSLAF” which was a battered outfit during and following the 10-year-long civil war.
The transformation of RSLAF to an international peacekeeping force is being cited as one of the successful fairy tales in post conflict countries around the world.
