TRYING TO GET A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL LANDSCAPE OF SIERRA LEONE FROM INDEPENDENCE TO THE PRESENT THROUGH THE EYES, IF YOU WILL, OF THE SIERRA LEONE TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION COMMISSION. How did a peace-loving nation become engulfed, seemingly overnight, in horror? What events occurred in the history of the country to make this conflict possible? Explanations put forward have varied from bad governance and the history of the post-colonial period in Sierra Leone to the urge to acquire the countrys diamond wealth and the roles of Libya or the Liberian faction leader Charles Taylor.1 The international community initially dismissed the war as just another example of tribal conflict in Africa; another failed state imploding in the context of environmental degradation and acute economic crisis.2 8. In order to compile a clear picture of the past3 the Commission devoted considerable resources towards examining the pre-conflict history of the country. These efforts were intended to locate causes of conflict in Sierra Leones past, place the conflict within its proper historical context and offer explanations for what went wrong. 9. The Commission identified social trends that spawned division and confrontation between the various groups that make up Sierra Leone. It picked out fault lines and key events that created the structural conditions for conflict. It highlighted decisions on the part of the political elite that were designed to strengthen their grip on power at the expense of common benefit, progress and ultimately peace. 10. Central to the Commissions study of history was the social and political interaction among Sierra Leones constituent groups. The nature and extent of such interaction - often negative and limited - influenced peoples perceptions of the state in which they lived and their own places within it. These perceptions in turn presented the greatest challenge to the concepts of nationhood and citizenship. They undermined the positive sense of national identity needed to build a strong and unified independent nation. 11. The Commission examined the colonial period and the first few years of independence together under the section entitled The Historical Evolution of the Sierra Leonean State. In this section, four distinct phases proved crucial to understanding the roots of the conflict and some of the challenges that the country still faces today:
Posted on: Sun, 24 Aug 2014 01:47:19 +0000
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