Lucky to be alive

Sierra Leone is wounded from a nine year civil war with more than 400,000 forced to seek refuge in the neighbouring countries of Guinea and Liberia. Although Sierra Leone has diamonds, minerals and fertile land for farming many people have not got enough to survive and depend on help. The war has so far killed 150,000 Sierra Leoneans and thousands have been beaten, abducted, maimed and raped.

"Many people lost their lives because of unbelievable things", says Solomon (33). "I’m lucky to be still alive", he adds. The young man works with Christian Aid, a member of the ACT alliance in Freetown. He was in the capital when the rebels entered the town in January 1999. He speaks of his experience, when for nine days he tried to hide in his house which the rebels looted twice.

The first time a young rebel took Solomons walkman at gunpoint. But when the rebel tried to play music the walkman didn’t work. Solomon told him that the batteries where bad. The rebel took new ones from his pocket and ordered Solomon to put them in. But Solomon was so nervous that he did it the wrong way, and when the walkman would not work the young rebel accused Solomon of cheating and threatened to kill him. With tumbling fingers Solomon changed the batteries around.

When the music started the rebel began to dance and left saying: "You were lucky today". "The rebels shot people when they noticed that they were trying to cheat them", Solomon says. He points out that people often tried to hold something back, when the rebels demanded money from them. Not everybody was as lucky as Solomon.

Gibrill Sesay (42) for example was maimed by the rebels, who cut off his left hand in 1998. At the time Gibrill was a diamond digger in the northern part of Sierra Leone. "My wife was raped and killed", he says, then the rebels took him and told him to hold his hand to the ground. Gibrill even knows the name of the man who chopped his hand off - Staff Sergeant Alahi Bayo - he told Gibrill: "Go and tell your president to give you another hand".

Issa Bangura (43) lost both hands. He was a diamond digger as well and the only one maimed in a village of 450 people. Although he begged the rebels to leave him one hand they had no mercy. The man who amputated his hands came from a village in the same neighbourhood. This Captain Way said to him: "My job is burning and killing". Now Issa is being trained in the amputee camp to use protheses. He is lucky to have found a new wife after his first wife had abandoned him.

Asked if they wanted revenge, Gibrill says, if we don’t forgive them, the fighting will never stop: "we need peace now". He would like to return home, but the rebels are still there. "Diamonds have brought us to this end", Gibrill moans. 410 amputees and war wounded live in Gibrill’s camp in Freetown. The youngest amputee is an eleven month old child. Children suffered most in this conflict: between 15,000 and 20,000 alone fought as soldiers, many after being abducted by the rebels.

The war affects not only the life of individuals, it affects the whole society, which is disintegrating. "Nowadays everybody thinks only of taking care of themselvers and not of the community as a whole", says Osman Mansaray (30). He is working at the airport in Lungi and has to live on a wage of US $50 a month, but he needs at least US $150 to make ends meet. Besides his two children he has to take care of the three children of his elder brother, who was shot by the rebels on the street in Freetown. His unemployed younger brother is living with his family as well. Osman relies on tips from passengers, whom he helps to get through the customs at the airport.

Now Osman is looking for a better paid job. But the chance of finding one is not good. In the early 90’s he worked as a barman in a hotel in Lungi for three years. He liked his job and he earned enough money to make both ends meet, but due to the war everything is closed down and the beatiful beaches are deserted. Who wants to go for a holiday in Sierra Leone?