Rebel Chief Is Focus Now in Sierra Leone

By the time Pvt. Sorie Bangura got his hands on Foday Sankoh last Wednesday, the wounded rebel leader was quivering and pleading for his life.

“People were trying to kill him, so shots were fired in the air,” Bangura said outside Sankoh’s ransacked home here. “He was weak. He had a bullet wound in his leg. Everyone tore off his clothes. ‘I am disgraced already,’ he said to me. ‘Don’t kill me.’ ”

Bangura didn’t kill Sankoh, who during nine days on the run was the most wanted man in Sierra Leone. Instead, the army private joined a throng of former and current government soldiers who dragged the naked leader of the Revolutionary United Front, or RUF, to a police station. From there, Sankoh was turned over to military authorities.

A week later, what to do with Foday Sankoh remains the most troublesome question in this violence-torn West African nation. Virtually nothing can move forward--from efforts to free United Nations peacekeepers held hostage by the rebels to the need to resuscitate last year’s peace accord and defuse widespread public anger--until Sankoh’s fate is determined.

“He is on everybody’s mind,” said Ahmed Kamara, a student at a technical college here in the capital. “He needs to be dealt with. He cannot be ignored.”

But the teetering democratic government of President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah is not rushing to tackle the messy matter. There is a concerted strategy to bring calm to the Sankoh debate by emphasizing the need not to jump to action.

Authorities say a May 8 shooting incident outside Sankoh’s home by his bodyguards that left as many as 21 people dead is under investigation, as are several other criminal allegations against the rebel leader. In the meantime, Sankoh, who has not been charged with a crime, is being detained at an undisclosed location under provisions of the country’s state-of-emergency legislation.

“As an individual, I would want to put him on the road and run over him with a bulldozer, just like everybody else,” Justice Minister Solomon Berewa said. “But that would not be good for our country. Dealing with him properly--according to the rule of law--is a real test for everyone interested in seeing things go well in Sierra Leone. This is not so much about the man, but the future of our country.”

Ironically, Sankoh is the center of attention at the very moment he has lost most of his influence as a military and political force.

It is widely believed that even before his arrest in Freetown last week, his control of the rebel movement was slipping. He told his government captors that he had been robbed by his own men. Western military officials say two of his commanders--Sam “Mosquito” Bockarie and Essa Sesay--are vying for his leadership post.

Sentenced for treason in 1998, the former army corporal and television cameraman escaped the death penalty last year as part of a peace deal that ended eight years of civil war in which he was the government’s principal challenger. He was awarded a major government job--overseeing the country’s diamond operations--and given the perks and privileges of a vice president. His hillside home, now awash in sewage from smashed toilets and pipes, was among the finest government residences in Freetown.

Fankoh’s decision to plunge the country back into chaos by taking up arms against government forces and then seizing more than 500 U.N. peacekeepers has cost him dearly in the eyes of war-weary Sierra Leoneans. Public anger is so great that many witnesses say it was a miracle he survived his capture. Few will even listen to talk of giving him another chance.

“He needs to be dead,” said a waitress and young mother named Louisa, who said she has seen too many atrocities committed by the RUF to forgive the man known by his followers as Papa.

On Monday, a delegation of Kenyan officials visited Sankoh in the hope of securing the release of about 250 peacekeepers, including many Kenyans, still being held by the RUF. The officials later told reporters in Liberia that Sankoh seemed deflated and defeated and “gave the impression of a man not able to do much now.” He also reportedly expressed regret for the turn of events and requested a meeting with President Kabbah.

Presidential spokesman Sefimus Kaikai said Kabbah had not spoken with Sankoh since the rebel leader’s detention.

“He has these ploys and will say anything to get himself out of a situation,” Kaikai said. “His credibility is zero. He is not a man of integrity.”

Kaikai said the government wants to separate Sankoh from its dealings with the RUF. In the past, the spokesman said, too much emphasis was placed on the rebel movement’s leader.

“Putting such a premium on one person got us in this quagmire to begin with,” Kaikai said. “He is the leader, but there is also an entire organization. The moment we put the premium back on him, it will complicate the situation for all of us.”

Even so, the public is watching with intense interest, with the view that Sankoh’s case is a bellwether of how the government will deal with the RUF as a whole. The Freetown media are rife with sensational headlines about secret deals, prison escape plans--even a report that Sankoh is about to die of his leg wound.

Berewa, the justice minister, said authorities are investigating every twist and turn of Sankoh’s sordid career and will make a recommendation about whether to prosecute. If he stands trial, Berewa said, he will not be alone: The intention is to include as many top RUF accomplices as possible.

Berewa expects that any trial would be so big and involved that the Sierra Leonean government would seek foreign assistance in terms of logistics and personnel. Few courts in the country are operating, and the main courthouse in Freetown, where Sankoh was convicted of treason, is overcrowded and pocked with bullet holes from last year’s fighting.

Officials are even looking into the possibility of lifting Sankoh’s amnesty protection, which would reopen his treason conviction and death sentence.

It was that sentence that led to the last rebel advance on Freetown in January 1999, when the guerrillas hacked off the limbs of hundreds of people, kidnapped children, raped women and killed thousands of residents.

RUF rebels are demanding Sankoh’s release in exchange for the detained U.N. peacekeepers, but government officials say they will not budge, even with the memory of January 1999. They also rejected a call Tuesday by Liberian President Charles Taylor, a longtime friend of Sankoh who has been brokering the U.N. hostage releases, for a cease-fire.