Sierra Leone

By David Mundell, MP for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale

MANY people may know of Sierra Leone through the Leonardo Di Caprio film ‘Blood Diamond’ or from the horrific television images of child soldiers during the country’s brutal civil war. I have just spent eight days there on a self-funded volunteering trip as part of Project Umubano, which is organised by the Conservative Party.

During the past two years Umubano has focused on Rwanda and I led the justice project there during the past two summers. This year we sought to widen the project and see whether our team of five lawyers could deliver a sustainable project in this West African country, whether it is described as a post-conflict state or a failed state as it often is.

Sadly Sierra Leone comes at the top (or bottom) in virtually every global health and poverty statistic. Largest percentage of people living on less than $1 per day, highest child mortality rates, lowest life expectancy rates, percentages of children in education and so on. The reasons for its shocking statistics are not self-evident like Rwanda. These issues flow from what happened in the colonial period and post-independence. There was no genocide of the Rwandan proportions (which saw one million people killed in a hundred days) but there was one of the bloodiest and longest civil wars in recent African history.

It is certainly a chaotic country, but it is evident as soon as you leave the airport that it is a green and fertile place with huge natural resources, most notably diamonds. There is evidence of civil war all around including the international war crimes court building which is in a secure compound in the heart of the capital city of Freetown.

But it is the people that are the main evidence of what happened. Firstly there are the amputees; the people who fell victim to the RUF which was the principal “rebel force” who tortured victims by cutting off their limbs. They hobble about on crutches or pushed along in ramshackle wheelchairs often begging for money, particularly from westerners. And yet they live among many of the very people who perpetrated those acts of violence – the child soldiers, now young men, who have been “rehabilitated” by being given funds to buy a motorcycle and operate a motorcycle taxi business. These boys were often taken forcibly from their families, groomed by manipulative adults in the insurgent forces and fed a cocktail of drink and drugs – the result was unwavering loyalty to their new masters and merciless brutality in terms of the violence they showed towards their victims. You are left wondering just how it is possible for people to go from being members of their community to killers and back to members of a community again. I wonder what these young men feel about their actions, whether they feel remorse, because the big question is whether it could happen again?

My Conservative colleagues and I were in Sierra Leone to work with a community justice project trying to help ensure people across Sierra Leone, including those in rural areas, have access to justice.



It is not going to be possible to deliver a multitude of lawyers to be available in every village and town and, therefore, the way forward is the development of community paralegals, who will work in our equivalent of a citizens’ advice bureau. Our work with these people is the core of the project in that we helped to develop their skills in areas such as advocacy, mediation and interviewing. As I say in my opening remarks at our training session in Makeni, these paralegals are in the front line of delivering all the conventions and treaties that have been written by politicians in respect of human rights and access to justice. Without them there would be no access to the rule of law for millions of Sierra Leoneans and therefore, however modest their numbers and the capacity they currently have, we should be very proud of what these people are doing.

However these learning development sessions are a two-way process and hopefully the paralegals have picked up a lot from my team of lawyers but we pick up many things from them and not least it reaffirms a sense of perspective which we so easily lose sight of here in Britain. We have serious difficulties in this current economic situation but ours is not the daily fight for survival that is the case for so many Sierra Leoneans. Nor do we face the unacceptable level of violence towards women which is still a real challenge for the country. At least they are moving gender issues forward with the appointment of a female Chief Justice who I met with. The justice system as with all other aspects of Sierra Leonean public service faces so many challenges that you could be tempted to think that no difference could be made but I still firmly believe that incremental change, small steps, are really the only way forward. That’s why we are pleased to help with our seminar on commercial dispute resolution because without some form of credible methodology of dealing with commercial disputes, investment in the county is going to be impeded. We work too with the Sierra Leonean Bar Association which needs to grow the capacity of the legal profession and I hope our knowledge of the availability of free internet, legal materials and charitable book providers will be a big help in that regard.



I think we made a difference. I hope we did. Just as with my Conservative colleagues in Rwanda, we want to build a sustainable project that can continue this exchange of skills and experiences. I would encourage anyone who gets the opportunity to play a part in any of these volunteering projects anywhere in Africa, subject to personal safety, to do so because not only is it a fascinating experience to see a country so different from our own and a personal development challenge, it is the opportunity to make a difference to individuals and maybe even the wider community.

David Cameron is right to maintain our commitment to spending on aid even in these difficult times. We have a moral obligation to do what we can to improve the lot of people across Africa and we have the practical incentive that it will be in the interests of western countries that the continent is peaceful and prosperous.