A Country Rebuilding

Steve Dennie

May 2001

Bob Eberly, a former missionary in Sierra Leone and a member of the Otterbein UB church in Greencastle, Pa., traveled to Sierra Leone in February 2001 for about three weeks. Since there are no direct flights, he flew into Ghana, and from there took a plane to Freetown. He had previously visited Sierra Leone in October 1999, and much had changed.

Freetown

"When you arrive in Freetown," says Bob Eberly, "the United Nations is everywhere. They really are trying to control the crowds at the airport, control the begging, the riff-raff. There are two ferries between the airport and the city, but only one was running. The other had been sent to Ghana to bring back refugees.

"People are more relaxed on the street. They are more confident. When I went in 1999, they would come to me, two or three of them, to see if I could help get them out of the country, or help get them in business. But I didn't see that this time, didn't see the frustration on their part. So things are getting back to normal. Of course, with the United Nations there, the economy for them is improving, because the UN is spending a lot of money there. There was no shortage of supplies."

The United Nations has 17,000 troops in Sierra Leone, and Great Britain has its own troops operating separately. The military presence is clear. The jet helicopters and jet airplanes at the airport. The jeeps, pickups, and armored personnel carriers. The blue-helmeted troops on the streets.

The United Nations is spending a huge amount of money to keep the peace. "It's like having two kids who are fighting. You pay a bodyguard to keep them from fighting, and now you are spending your money on the bodyguard and can't feed your two kids. You get that feeling. And, of course, our suspicion in the West is that when the United Nations leaves, it'll be back to what it was.

Missionary June Brown's former home in Sierra Leone.

The ruined Bumpe High School Chapel.

"Great Britain is there, but they refuse to cooperate with the UN. They are training the new Sierra Leonean army. There are conflicts all the time between the British and United Nations. India has a lot of soldiers there. So do Mali and a lot of West African countries."

While Bob was in Freetown, gunfire was heard in the prison where guerilla leader Foday Sankoh is being held. Armored cars quickly streamed through the city streets to the prison. "It turned out that a gun went off accidentally, but they really responded."

Bo

"I spent most of my time in Bo. The road from Freetown to Bo is open now, but I didn't have the courage to take land transport, because I'm not sure of the situation. But while I was there, the nationals came to Bo by vehicle. I'm anxious to do that next trip, because there's a lot to see on that trip.

"In Bo, everybody goes about their business as usual. The UN soldiers are intermingled in the crowd. The markets are open. Supplies are there at a good price. They're not gouging. There are a lot of United Nations people in Bo, but that's where they are deployed to respond, not because they are keeping the peace. Bo itself is calm.

"The diamond areas to the east, near the border with Liberia--that's where the fighting is. You don't need to go far out of Bo, toward Kenema, until you get into the diamond area. The United Nations is still not in control. It's easy to control areas where there are no diamonds, because nobody wants it."

The Mattru Staff.

Mattru

"You don't see any United Nations people in Mattru. Life there is back to normal. You wouldn't know there was still a war in the country, though you can still see the damage."

For the past two years, the Europe-based organization (and former Nobel Peace Prize winner) Doctors Without Borders has been operating the Mattru Hospital under a contract with the Sierra Leone Conference.

"I knew the hospital was open, but I didn't realize it was operating near to the capacity that it is operating. They're really doing a great job. The first time I was there, they had a clinic. The next time the maternity ward was open and they had a few beds. This time, it was a full-fledged hospital.

"Doctors Without Borders has poured a lot of money into the hospital during the past two years to get it set up again.The hospital has been repainted, and there is a lot of new equipment--in fact, the old equipment is on a pile out back. Beds, things you use in the ward, IV drips--most of that is new. They've got it looking very nice.

"The staff are really professional. I didn't get to see the European doctors, but all of the national staff were very professional. They were very busy working with patients. I didn't go to the tuberculosis ward, but there were even patients there."

Bob noted that the spiritual element, so clear when people like Dr. Ron Baker were in charge, is missing. Then, there was prayer before surgery, devotions. But not anymore. Nevertheless, quality healthcare has returned to that part of the country, and it probably wouldn't have happened without the intervention of Doctors without Borders.

"The water system and generator are not functioning well. They didn't invest in those two things. They're using a small portable generator. Charlie Snider [from Ontario Conference] put in the water system. The tower is still there, and the tank is in good shape. They may be pumping up with the small pump. If they open the hospital again in a long-term way, the generator and water system will need improvement, but the building itself is in good shape."

Doctors without Borders goes into conflict areas, and only does this during crises; they're not a long-term medical provider. When the crisis is over, they leave. In May, the contract between the conference and Doctors without Borders expires, and it's not clear what will happen to the hospital then.

"We traveled to Mattru in a government agriculture truck. The road to Mattru is as bad as I've ever seen it. And it was the dry season. What happens during the rainy season is, you get these big dips, a mud puddle starts, and it keeps washing it out until you get a crater you can lose a car in. As soon as dry season comes, they used to come along and grade the road, and all during dry season, you were packing that road down on the level. But rainy season was about to start, and nobody had graded the roads yet. So as soon as rainy season starts, the road to Mattru will be impassible."

Rebuilding

"I found the people rebuilding. That was the interesting thing to me. I've been going to Sierra Leone since 1980, and I've never seen so many mud blocks being made. Before the war, mud blocks had almost become a thing of the past. They would use concrete or cement block, and there wasn't a lot of building being done. But this time, because of the lack of money, the ingenuity of the nationals is kicking in.

"The people are rolling up their sleeves. One lady from our New London church built a house. I visited there. She said she would get up at 6:30 in the morning to make mud blocks."

"Even our churches are rebuilding. The Lumley church is expanding. The Bo congregation is building a church five times as big as the previous one. I hardly recognized the Wellington church. They've redone it, made it bigger, put stone on the base. They really increased its appeal and added more seating capacity, without any help from anybody else. The people there are doing it.

"The churches are growing. One of the churches is having three services. The pastors are struggling, but they're doing a good job."