Nairobi — Despite the signing of a peace accord in Sierra Leone, there remains many questions one of them being whether the former rebels accused of killing and maiming thousands of innocent civilians will ever answer for their crimes.
It is now seven months since the historic signing of a peace deal between rebels of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) and the government of Sierra Leone in Lome, Togo.
The accord aimed at ending the country's nine-year civil war which claimed at least 100,000 lives and left 50,000 maimed. It also saw the introduction of the rebels into government in that country as well as a general amnesty to the rebels as a way of ending their brutality against innocent civilians.
The question of whether the amnesty offered will end the war has always been a contentious one. And now seven months into the deal, there is widespread clamouring for the rebel leadership to be made to face justice.
"Look at them they are having lunch over there on hamburger and sandwiches while we are here suffering" says Zainab Conteh, 13-years-old as she points with her chin at the posh Cape Sierra Hotel where mostly senior rebel officials were having a lunch.
Zainab and thousands others had their arms amputated during the country's nine-year rebel war. The victims were young teenage girls, women and children some as young as four months old. To them and thousands of other Sierra Leoneans the peace accord signed last July between rebels and the government was just another bogus piece of document.
The most 'offensive' clause according to Ngaojia Ngaojia, a former military officer who lost both limbs in the early days of the war is the issue of a general amnesty.
It was like a child taking its first walk. Foday Sankoh unsure whether his wishes will be granted declared 'give us blanket amnesty and then we can sign the peace accord'. So the rebels bagged another amnesty.
But will this tactic work?
Here one will admit that just a few days before the signing of the July 7 peace accord in Lome, Togo several people were very optimistic that a general amnesty will heal the wounds of the nine-year-old rebel war. But now people are starting to have a second thought.
Foremost against the general amnesty clause is the US based human rights watchdog, Human Rights Watch.
Few hours before the signing of the document, HRW Africa Division Chief, Peter Takirambude in a letter to the UN special Representative to Sierra Leone, Francis Okello called on the UN not to put its signature on a piece of document which pretends that human rights abuses never took place in the country.
Based on that Mr. Okello signed the accord but with an addendum saying that the UN did not recognise the general amnesty offer made to the rebels since it has been done locally.
HRW has also got some local advocates against the general amnesty issue in the country. Puffed up with recent successes by human rights campaigners in and around the continent especially with issues like that of the former Chadian leader currently in exile in Senegal and the former Chilean leader, Augusto Pinochet, the local human rights group, Committee for Human Rights and Justice, CHRJ has hammered home the need for criminal proceedings to be brought against rebels who violated the rights of civilians during the country's nine-year war.
CHRJ Executive Chairman, Edward Kanu discarded the concept of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission claiming that the TRC could only be conducted in a situation where human rights violators have killed hundreds of civilians but not thousands as in the case of Sierra Leone. And that the TRC is to protect the weak and poor not the powerful and rich as in the case of the RUF .
"The Sierra Leonean people will definitely not go on to accept it. In fact it is a recipe for future chaos and anarchy in the country " Ku wrote in a press release. According to CHRJ the RUF 'killer' should be brought to face justice.
The clamouring for an international criminal prosecution for the rebels is becoming an increasingly common sentiment these days and well timed opinion piece some lacking all pretence of objectivity are now becoming a staple food in the local media and this has left the locals to become more weary over the slow pace of the peace process Government and rebel negotiators holed up in the capital are expected to do more than to iron out important structures that will ensure peace for the 4.2 million inhabitants of this impoverish West African State as patience wears thin over the country's wobbly disarmament process.
Fed up with the series of ceasefire violations, casual abductions of UN personnel, urban violence and the snail-pace disarmament process, civilians have started questioning the sincerity of the rebels towards the peace process.
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"We have seen months of talking and preparations. We want to see the plans put in place by the RUF" Abdulai Bayraytay of the NGO Campaign for Good Governance, on the wide spread frustration by civil populace.
On a positive note however a small semblance of peace is looming above certain areas formerly known to be trouble spots, especially in the provinces.
There are few reports of armed clashes these days and few reports of limb amputations by the rebels something which has been a daily occurrence some seven months ago. But for many Sierra Leoneans including Edward Kanu of CHRJ it will be more than a small gestures to distinguish this ongoing peace process from earlier initiatives in 1996. And to many this also includes the prosecution of Mr. Sankoh the rebel leader and his cohorts in an international criminal court for their role in killing close to 100,000 innocent civilians.
AFRICANEWS News & Views on Africa from Africa Koinonia Media Centre, P.O. Box 8034, Nairobi, Kenya email: amani@iol.it
