Post-Conflict Reconstruction Intervention and Reconstruction In Sierr

Question: Discuss about thePost-Conflict Reconstructionfor Intervention and Reconstruction In Sierra Leone. Answer: Project Description: Sierra Leone, a state that has been elusive of peace for over a decade, witnessed to a horrifying civil war that began in 1991. In the early months of 2002, President Kabbah formally declared the end of the conflict, leading to the beginning of the reconstruction. In 1999, Lome Peace Agreement was signed but peace became a disillusion factor for the people of Sierra Leone, as fighting continued. Cause of Conflict in Sierra Leone: As per the report of Truth and Reconciliation Commission for Sierra Leone, the conflict in the country was due to reasons such as prevalent corruption, bad governance and refutation of primary human rights, leading to a widespread rage which made conflict unavoidable (Turner Houghton, 2015). Causes of conflict in Sierra Leone has many perceptions, one being that the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) started its terror campaign against their Government because of the abusive behavior meted out to them. But that campaigns idea quickly turned into something very worse. The RUF was left behind with a team comprising of criminals who were devoid of any social or political objective. Initially the thought level was that diamonds have been the factor for Sierra Leones civil war, but that was negated when people started talking about the collapse of institutions as the main cause for triggering a collapse in the country. The peacekeeping mission in Sierra Leone started in 1999, and the United Nations Integrated Peace building Office was created in 2008, overtaking that peacekeeping mission that got developed way back in the late 90s. The whole idea of such an agency was to promote and protect the human rights along with offering the required political advice to the local Government. The present Sierra Leone President, Ernest Bai Koroma along with the U.N. chief Ban ki-moon stated that UNIPSIL will be withdrawn with immediate effect from the country, which indicated Sierra Leone has come a long way from being a country inflicted with wars. As stated by the U.N chief Sierra Leone is an example of a successful Post-conflict reconstruction. Peace along with long term improvement and stability is what Sierra Leone has transformed it into. Nature of Mission: The largest United Nations peacekeeping mission set out for Sierra Leone along with assistance from United Kingdom and the United States to set things right in the devastated country. The country was fortunate enough to receive a lot of international aid from the international community (Farah Handa, 2016). Leading groups like the Department of International Development and United Nation Mission in Sierra Leone worked on four objectives: reintegration, rehabilitation, repatriation and reconstruction. Sierra Leones reconstruction cost the United Nations $16.6 billion per year. The United Kingdom and the United States were not far either in providing monetary help to the country. The aim was to build the schools, clinics and homes that have been demolished in the war. Free elections were also conducted to bring in a sense of democracy among people. These efforts were short term in matters related to peace but hold an important part in the history of Sierra Leone. UNAMSILs mission was to ensure the safety and security of the people of Sierra Leone; the civilians were protected against any major threat of physical violence. The agencys main responsibility was to co-operate the Government of the affected country and bring each and every party of the country to the table for a unified peace agreement. Key Mission/Project Success: The United Nations Mission Nations in Sierra Leone has been a success story. It has been very active in rebuilding the countrys infrastructure and giving local communities the opportunity to get the services of the government. It has also been effective in disarming a lot of youths in Sierra Leone. Moreover, it has played an important part in assisting the local government to fight and stop the illegal trading of diamonds and control the industry (Shaw, 2014). It was during the war time that insurgents used money from blood diamonds to purchase weapons which gave rise to such a conflict. The success factors of UNAMSIL were that it was able to align the political will with the required necessary resources. The international power commuters hailed the success of this mission with the right authorization and resources taken into account. Moreover, there was alignment of the military force with the stability programs helping in formation of a positive alternative to conflict like Demobil ization and Reintegration (DDR) and other projects related to civil affairs. This agency had to face a lot of challenges during its stay in that country. RUF did inflict a lot of damage to the organization, kidnapping hundreds of peacekeepers at one point of time, this lead to a chaos situation the country, with extreme pressure from the international community over the rebels to obey the ceasefire rules. UNAMSIL and other collaborators worked together to reconstruct the law system of the country, providing training to the local police power. The agency has been very effective in completing works that has been assigned to it by the Security Council. It also helped the country experience its first ever free election in a fair way. Human rights was the one thing missing from the table of Sierra Leone, which was restored by this mission, along with setting up a special court for putting people on trial responsible for war crime (Roome, Raven Martineau, 2014). The mission has also been successful in co-operating with other agencies of the UN to generate projects of income, especially for the local youth who have been the worst sufferers during that civil war. They also funded in agricultural projects along with providing free medical facility to the remote areas of the country. UNAMSIL was not short of any challenges while working in Sierra Leone. UNAMSILs challenge included helping the Government in organizing a fair election in 2002. It did everything from supplying equipments of communication, logistical support and providing security. The election procedures were a success with people with voters flocking to the polls. The next challenge that lied ahead of the UNAMSIL was to reintegrate the ex-fighters into the society of Sierra Leone and providing resettlement for the persons who have been internally displaced. In order to meet those challenges the Security Council put up a new mission: the United Nations Integrated Office for Sierra Leone (UNIOSIL) to help bring serenity to the country. The main job of UNIOSIL was to strengthen the work of the UNAMSIL and assist government in fixing the long problem of human rights and hold more free elections that can give Sierra Leone a democratic society (Nilsson Kovacs, 2013). Key Mission Challenges and Failures: Bad Governance: If a countrys Government is lacking democracy, then it acts as a potential threat to both its peace and security. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has stated that their main objective as a part of the reconstruction process is to promote good governance and transparency associated with its works. Different agencies of different countries have provided the world with the same statement that the Sierra Leone Government is highly corrupted at different levels (Jackson, 2015). The lifestyle of the officials representing the countrys Government was the prime example on how much corruption has eaten up the whole system. It was disheartening to see the poor suffering directly because of this corruption. The people of Sierra Leone barring those government officials were deprived of the basic services. All the funds that came through were taken in by the government officials, leaving a few or almost nothing for the general people (Shepler, 2014). If the judicial system is handicapped then nothing can be done to solve the crime and corruption in the country. Extortion and bribery took over the whole judicial system of the country. Poor people were accused of one thing or the other and they were put behind bars without and proper trial. Another reason for bribery and extortion was the low salary factor of magistrates, judges and the prosecutors. According to Monk Mundy, (2014), cases were remaining pending in the judicial courts, giving rise to the power of Paramount Chief Courts, where executives were enjoying more authority and control. Unemployment of the Young and the Strong: One of the major causes of the Sierra Leone civil war was the continuous injection of the youth blood into the Revolutionary United Front or the RUF (Perrin, 2013). The reason for such a happening was not because of the youths inclination towards war, but due to the lack of social incentives and poverty which played a major part in them choosing that path. They were suffering economically and politically and the failure of state institutions forced them to join the RUF and take part in the civil war (Boersch-Supan, 2014). Over the past decade one of the greatest failures of this reconstruction of Sierra Leone has been in its economic front. Sierra Leone has been ranked 176th out of the 177 countries by the UNDP Human Development Index, where life expectancy of people is just 41 years. It has been mostly affected by illiteracy and poverty. Around 65% of its population has remained illiterate and 70% of it has been living in poverty in Sierra Leone (Hultman, L., Kathman Shannon, 2013). Poverty is a factor that has the power to cripple any society, and unemployment of youths resulted in them choosing the wrong paths of life. There was no absolute meaning to what they were doing, but only causing massive destruction in the face of humanity. Unemployment affected three fourth of the Sierra Leones property, mostly aging between 18-35 years. Another major factor that needs to be focused on is that the people who were employed were not paid properly, or at times not paid at all. Therefore, it became impossib le for them to free themselves from the clutches of the poverty. Sierra Leones reconstruction focused on matters that required immediate solution like demobilization and disarmament of their past combatants. Hostility has always been a part of Sierra Leone, and it was evident when the UN peacekeepers faced a setback. Several peacekeepers died while many were taken hostage by the rebels in order to satisfy their demands. The peace process was severely affected when the main rebel group continued its attack on the agencys people, taking around 500 people captive only to release them a week later. Criticism was leveled against the UNAMSIL stating that the people constituted of the UNAMSIL were under trained and not properly equipped which made their job more difficult. UNAMSIL was organized to add a new element to the Sierra Leone conflict, but it itself became a victim of the situation. Lessons Learned: Sierra Leones reconstruction has seen success in many ways. But then injustice and corruption is still very much a part of the countrys system. Both the peace-building and state-building should remain at the same level in order to make reconstruction a successful affair (Wong, 2016). If the state-building is in failing, then it would affect peace. The situation of Sierra Leone provides a learning lesson for the international community on the basis of reconstruction. The UNAMSILs mission did have a lot of lessons to be taught to others thinking of a post-conflict reconstruction. Working in an alienated country which posed so much of threat at every single moment is a huge risk. The agency has tried a lot in lessening the extortion, bribery factors present in the system of Sierra Leone. Such things do not change overnight. Though the fight is still on and according to the U.N. general peacekeeping process in Sierra Leone would continue. Corruption Needs to be Curbed and Justice is to be Promoted: It is very hard for post-conflict societies to come out clear from the dark past of theirs. It is essential on the part of the donors and the international community to end corruption the country where reconstruction is taking place (Brck, Naud Verwimp, 2013). In Sierra Leones case it was the formation of Anti-Corruption Commission by the donors that became a significant part. However, the sole idea of creating such an association was not fulfilled. Continuous interference of Government and lack of any proper cooperation has made the Commission an ineffective agency. It is up to the international community to pressurize the local government to inflict prosecutorial powers into the Commission. The judiciary system of Sierra Leone needs to be reformed too with suggestions from the International Crisis Group (Roseth, B., Srivastava, 2013). It is highly imperative on the part of the Government officials to declare the financial assets they are holding before they hold on to any governm ent posts. The salary system needs to be fair so that the corruption gets diminished from all the levels of the government. As per Glennerster, Miguel Rothenberg, 2013), one of the most important lessons that needs to be learned from the case of Sierra Leone is that international involvement for state building needs to be a prolong affair. It is important from their part to monitor and analyze the whole situation, what decisions has been made in the post conflict situation and how it has turned out to be. Things should not get jeopardized in the reconstruction process of a country. Corruption is very heavy in Sierra Leone and the international agencies should work together more aggressively in stopping that forever because corruption would not let Sierra Leone go forward. Providing the Youth with the Hope for Future: The true meaning of reconstruction is to rebuild the schools, colleges, hospital buildings that were brought down during the civil war. But surprisingly these are just the small part of the reconstruction process. The problem with Sierra Leone is that the international community neglected certain important points in order to bring in peace which was short lived. The things of high priority were the education factor, economical development and reinstating the basic services for the people of Sierra Leone (Bertone et al., 2014). Proper results need to be accessed to find out how much of all this have been accomplished. The main focus should be on the health segment and the educational aspect of the people. Until and unless the youth are provided with proper education and health facilities, they will not be able to do something meaningful in their life which has long being absent from their lives. Big spending is required in the reconstruction process which was not visualized incase of Sierra Leone. Certain public projects were conducted by the donors, but not anything on large scale. The consequences of the World Bank and IMF on at-risk populations should be considered by the donors, as for the youth of Sierra Leone. It is imperative on the part of the international community to understand the actual needs of the people of Sierra Leone and the affects of the reconstruction activities have on the whole country. A war can never be good for any country and same has been with Sierra Leone. It cannot be said that Sierra Leone is free from everything that crippled their society once. Corruption and unemployment still remains the highest priority for the country. It is very important to concentrate on things that have been left undone, rather than focusing on things that have been done and implemented. The whole process should be transparent enough for everybody to understand what reconstruction is going on and how beneficial it would be for the society. It is not possible in the short process, so enough time has to be invested in building a failed state. 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