Obiora Ikoku surveys the lead up to the failed November 2023 coup attempt in the West African country.
Star ratings
Income distribution
64.8% of the country’s population lives in poverty while a tiny elite own much of the national wealth. At least 78 % of the population is severely food insecure.
Literacy
Sierra Leone has a literacy rate of 49% (Liberia 48.3%, UK 99%). Despite the post-war rebuilding effort, Sierra Leone's public education system still faces many challenges including inadequate funding, high pupil-to-teacher ratio and low completion rate.
Life expectancy
Life expectancy 61.8 years (Male: 60.06 years, Female: 63.50 years). Communicable diseases such as malaria, which accounts for 38% of all hospital admissions, are the leading cause of death.
Position of women
Although there has been some improvement since the enactment of the Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment Bill, women continue to suffer discrimination. Marital rape, school-related sexual abuse and female genital mutilation contribute to a significant problem of gender-based violence.
Freedom
Significant human rights abuses include arbitrary arrest, detention and unlawful killings by the police as well as regular interference with the freedom of peaceful assembly and restriction of press freedom.
LGBTQI+
Sierra Leone criminalizes same-sex sexual activity between men. According to the Offences Against the Person Act 1861, sentences include a maximum penalty of life imprisonment, although there is no evidence of this ever having been carried out.
Politics
Julius Maada Bio of the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) was elected president in 2018. Protests in August 2022 over the soaring cost of living saw at least 21 protesters killed. Bio's re-election the following year was marred by violence and irregularities, and his regime has become more authoritarian since a failed coup in 2023.
Excellent
Good
Fair
Poor
Appalling
At a glance
Leader:
President Julius Maada Wonie Bio
Economy:
GNI per capita: $870
(Liberia: $710, UK: $47,700)
Monetary unit:
Leone (1 SLE = 0.04396 USD)
Main exports:
The top exports of Sierra Leone are Iron Ore ($477M), Titanium Ore ($221M), Diamonds ($101M), Rough Wood ($74.2M),
and Aluminium Ore ($51.4M)
Population:
9.1 million people. Population density: 122 people per square kilometre (Liberia: 60, UK: 279)
Health:
Under 5 mortality rate: 100.8 per 1,000 live births (Liberia 73, UK 4).
Maternal mortality per 100,000 live births: 717 (Liberia 742, UK 13.41).
Environment:
Coastal areas have hot and humid weather while the climate is more temperate inland. The country is ranked in the top 10% of countries vulnerable to climate change (though its own emissions are very low). A third of the population lives on the coast, making their homes vulnerable to worsening floods.
Culture:
Sierra Leone's culture is rich and diverse. The country has unique styles of dance and song, often accompanied by the kelei (slit-log drum), sangbei (single-skin drum), and segbure (rattle). Rice is typically served with sauces made from cassava leaves, groundnut soup, or stew.
Religion:
Muslim 77.1%, Christian 22.9%. Muslims, Christians and traditional or animist believers live in relative harmony.
Language:
English (official but regular use is limited to the literate minority), Mende (principal vernacular in the south), Temne (principal vernacular in the North), and Krio (English-based Creole spoken by 10% of the population but understood by 95%).
Human development index:
Sierra Leone's Human Development Index (HDI) in 2022 was 0.458, ranking it 184 out of 193 countries and territories (Liberia 0.927, UK 0.940).
Only a minute after arriving in Sierra Leone any first-time visitor will realize the popular saying ‘nothing is free even in Freetown’ is no joke at all. The moment of enlightenment occurs as soon as you touch down at the airport, where every inbound and outbound passenger is mandated to pay a $25 security levy to the privately owned US civil aviation company Securiport.
The fee was borne by the government until three years ago, when President Julius Maada Bio blamed Covid-19 and the global economic crisis for the change. It’s another impediment to recovering the once-booming tourist trade following the decade of civil war in the 1990s.
A sunny view of the shoreline of a fishing village
The shore in the fishing village of Tombo. CHERRDOR DARAMY.
While its contemporary situation is defined by imperialism, Sierra Leone’s history is anchored on the brutal legacies of the transatlantic slave trade and colonialism. Initially home to only Indigenous African tribes, chiefly the Limba and the Mande people, from the 15th century – when the arrival of Portuguese voyagers plunged it into the orbit of the transatlantic slave trade – the region began to undergo the seismic disruptions that transformed it to the multicultural society it is today. Starting as a transit port for the slave trade, Sierra Leone became from 1787 onwards a settlement for freed slaves returning from England, and later from Nova Scotia in Canada. Many of the African Americans arriving from 1791 had hoped for freedom and integration in Britain in exchange for backing the loyalist side in the US War of Independence, but found themselves spurned in London. It was not until 1808 that Sierra Leone officially became a protectorate of the British Crown, setting off 152 years of imperial subjugation. Rebellions against colonial rule were common but always brutally suppressed.
A woman in bright clothes carries water on her shoulders through a dusty village.
Women carry water from a well in Sinkunia, Falaba District. CHERRDOR DARAMY.
With independence in 1961 however came elite corruption and a brutal competition for power between the two dominant political parties, the Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) and the All People’s Congress (APC). In 1978 Sierra Leone became a one-party state – setting off a course of events that culminated in a civil war beginning in 1991. The US political war thriller movie Blood Diamond lays bare the savagery of the war, especially the hacking off of limbs by rebel forces. But the war in fact began as a rebellion against a corrupt Freetown elite.
Since the end of the conflict, Sierra Leone has taken remarkable steps towards consolidating peace. From 2008, public investment averaged 6.5 per cent of the country’s GDP. But much of the population has seen little benefit, and Sierra Leone remains one of the world’s poorest countries despite its valuable exports.
A man in dirty clothes crouches over large motor tyers.
A man repairs motor tyres beside the railway line in Brookfields, Freetown. CHERRDOR DARAMY.
Overall, the country is grappling with a cost of living crisis that has seen a dramatic rise in hunger and a drug epidemic. The economic and social situation has led to frequent flashes of anger – in August 2022 a violent protest convulsed Freetown and led to the death of at least 21 protesters and six police officers.
Once very powerful, Sierra Leone's trade union movement is now hampered by a leadership sold out to the neoliberal consensus of social dialogue. In a vacuum of working class leadership, unions have offered neither a programme for fighting back nor an alternative perspective for a way out of the crisis. This has left the fate of the country entirely to the corrupt ruling elite. The bitterly contested 2023 general elections, which saw President Julius Maada Bio of the SLPP win a second and final term of office, again raised possibility of elite infighting tearing the country apart. A failed coup in November 2023 might just be a warning.