Report : SAH Naqvi

Some reports in the media quoted a spokesman of India’s United Nations mission as saying, “We have decided to withdraw from Sierra Leone as part of a routine rotation out of the mission so as to give other member states a chance to participate in the mission.”
However, the actual reason behind the Indian withdrawal is the fact that Maj Gen Jetley was becoming a liability for the interest groups working in the strife-torn West African countries.
In fact, in the eye of the storm lies a confidential report submitted by Major General Jetley on the prevailing pathetic situation in Sierra Leone, stating the Nigerian unwillingness to contribute to the UN cause of restoring peace in the war-torn state. It was this report, which prompted Nigerian Chief of the Army Staff Maj Gen Victor Malu to demand Jetley’s removal for calling the Nigerian Army and officials as ‘corrupt’.
Major General Jetley’s report traces the background of the Sierra Leone crises and analyses the relationship between the serving forces and the relations of some highly placed Nigerian Army officials with the rebel forces.
Tracing the background of the Sierra Leone crisis, the report says that the Lome Peace Accord was signed in July 1999 to end the eight-year-old civil war in Sierra Leone. The primary reason for the signing of the accord was that a stalemate had been reached in the fighting and the West African states were finding it extremely difficult to support their peacekeeping force — ECOMOG due to the extreme financial drain on their fragile economies.
The report says that the Lome Accord called for deployment of a peacekeeping force comprising ECOMOG and UNAMSIL to oversee the peace process. And this was interpreted by the Nigerians (who formed the major chunk of ECOMOG) that ECOMOG would form a major part of the UN Peacekeeping Force and that the ECOMOG Force Commander Maj Gen Kpamber would head the UN force. However, when Gen Kpamber went to UN Head Quarters in New York, he was very disappointed to learn that he was not going to be the Force Commander of UNAMSIL, and that Nigeria would have three battalions as part of UNAMSIL, out of which they would have to concede one battalion to the Guineans.
The Nigerians therefore felt that they were not getting a fair deal in the peace process in Sierra Leone despite the sacrifices they had made to pave the way for the peace process. This to a very large extent is the genesis of the crisis, which has led to the India’s withdrawal.
Explaining the relationship between ECOMOG and the rebel Revolutionary United Force (RUF), the Jetley report says that the public opinion in Nigeria was against the continued deployment of Nigerian troops as part of ECOMOG in Sierra Leone, however the Nigerian Army was interested in staying in Sierra Leone due to the massive benefits they were getting from the illegal diamond mining.
Besides Brigadier Gen Maxwell Khobe, commonly known as the ‘Ten Million Man’, for allegedly receiving up to $10 million to permit the activities of RUF, the ECOMOG Force Commander Maj Gen Kpamber was also involved in the illegal diamond mining in connivance with RUF leader Foday Sankoh.
The report further says that after the initial fighting between ECOMOG and RUF, the relationship had thawed when a stalemate had been reached militarily. It is understood that a tacit understanding was reached between the RUF and ECOMOG of non-interference in each other’s activities.
The RUF leader, Foday Sankoh was also under the impression that the UN Peace Keeping Force which had been agreed to in Lome, was primarily a rehatted ECOMOG with Maj Gen Kpamber as its boss. However, the coming of a neutral peacekeeping force (UNAMSIL) under an Indian General, keen to implement the peace accord was not what Sankoh had bargained for. The rebel force leader viewed UNAMSIL as a big obstacle in his ambition of becoming the next President of Sierra Leone. Maj Gen Jetley says in his report that he was sandwiched between the RUF and Nigerian forces which severely hampered his functioning. He alleges that his orders were defied by Nigerian battalions, not once but, many times. He writes that, many a times without his permission the Nigerians carried out operations in Sierra Leone.
About the capability of different military units, Jetley’s report says that most units under his command other than India, Kenya and Guinea had very little or no equipment with them. They had not been properly briefed in their country about the mission which resulted in the troops lacking the mental aptitude or the will to fight the rebels when the situation so demanded, and their resorting to handing over their arms on the slightest danger to their life.
In his report, Jetley said that in the Sierra Leone case, the mission directive given to him conflicted with the interests of not only the warring factions but also of the major players in the diamond racket like Liberia and Nigeria.
As an Indian, and having no hidden agenda to promote, Jetley wrote that he became a victim of the machinations of these countries. By placing their stooges in the right places they had not only tried to scuttle the peace process but had also tried to denigrate him and the country he represented, to promote their own personal ambitions and personal interests.
Though India withdrew its troops, the fact that the decision came as a setback for the UN, was underscored when Bernard Miyet said: “It is a loss to see them leaving.”