SIERRA LEONE: LOSING THE BATTLE AGAINST CORRUPTION?

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 05 FREETOWN 000755 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/30/2016 TAGS: PGOV KCOR UK SL SUBJECT: SIERRA LEONE: LOSING THE BATTLE AGAINST CORRUPTION? REF: A. 05 FREETOWN 1049 ¶B. 05 FREETOWN 892 ¶C. 05 FREETOWN 542 ¶D. 05 FREETOWN 126 ¶E. 05 FREETOWN 105 Classified By: Ambassador Thomas N. Hull, reasons 1.4 (b),(d) -------------- Summary -------------- ¶1. (C) Summary: On August 24, the High Court of Sierra Leone acquitted six defendants accused of procuring an overvalued, non-functional forklift for the Sierra Leone Port Authority for lack of evidence. The acquittal in this case, which was the only corruption case involving high-level government officials that had actually made it into the court system in recent years, is only one of many signals that Sierra Leone's Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) is in trouble. Although there has been some progress in prevention activities and convictions of low-level public officials, a number of factors contribute to the ACC's current malaise: poor leadership, lack of political will, a slow, non-transparent investigatory mechanism at the ACC, and an environment where the rich and powerful are still free to bribe and intimidate. It is probably true that convictions against corrupt minor government officials serve as a limited deterrent at the lower levels of government. It is also true that the real way forward against corruption over the long term is through education and prevention. Right now, however, Sierra Leone's weak governance infrastructure still provides a permissive environment for widespread corruption among the country's ruling elite and other moneyed minorities, and the ACC is not yet up to the challenge of hitting corruption head-on at this high level. Finding the way forward will be difficult, because it requires everyone -- including donors -- to change the way they approach the problem. End Summary. -------------- The Forklift Debacle -------------- ¶2. (U) On August 24, Justice Akiiki Kiize, a Ugandan judge contracted to the Sierra Leone High Court, acquitted six defendants accused of misappropriating USD 66,000 in procuring a non-functional forklift for the Sierra Leone Port Authority (SLPA). They were acquitted for lack of evidence. The defendants in the case were senior public officials: former Minister of Transport and Communication Momoh Pujeh, former Ministry of Transport and Communication World Bank technical consultant Shamsu Mustapha, former Accountant General Martin Katta, former Ministry of Trade Permanent Secretary Foday Kallon, former SLPA Chairman Dr. Mohamed SIPDIS Dabo, and former SLPA Managing Director Patrick Kemokai (now deceased). ¶3. (U) The forklift procurement took place in 2001, but the ACC only indicted the six in July 2004. The case finally went to court in May 2005 after some allegations of impropriety in the Attorney General's office (ref E). There was plenty of surprise to go around once the defendants were actually arraigned: the press reported that Mustapha tried to leave Sierra Leone once he found out the trial was going to move forward, and Dabo assaulted a British photographer who attempted to snap a shot of him. Dabo's wife, Neneh, the head of the ACC's Prevention Department, was dismissed from her job, as her presence at the ACC was considered a conflict of interest. The trial progressed slowly, however, and Kemokai, the principal defendant, took away what little momentum there was in the case by falling ill: a few months after the trial commenced, he left for the UK for medical reasons, where he died in May 2006. ¶4. (C) According to ACC Special Prosecutor, Ugandan attorney Lewis Tumsintwe, the judge dismissed the remaining defendants because he found there was no evidence that linked them directly to receiving the ill-gotten gains from the forklift purchase. One of the problems, Tumsintwe said, was that six of the principal witnesses who were able to link the remaining defendants to the misappropriation of funds had departed Sierra Leone and, consequently, were "unable" to testify personally in court. Since none of those witnesses, who were all secretaries, would have been able to finance FREETOWN 00000755 002 OF 005 their own travel, Tumsintwe suspects the defendants paid the witnesses to leave Sierra Leone. The other problem was that the UK man who sold the forklift for USD 66,000 less than was subsequently billed to SLPA was allegedly threatened twice and "decided" not to come to Sierra Leone to testify as a witness. Ultimately, the only evidence of the price paid for the forklift was a document investigated by UK police in Northumberland and faxed to the ACC, which the judge ruled was insufficient without corroborating witness testimony. -------------- While There is Some Progress... -------------- ¶5. (U) The ACC has been more successful at getting convictions when the political stakes are not so high, and the High Court has been convicting low-level government officials on corruption charges. The Head of the Investigations Department, Festus Robin-Taylor, stated that the ACC has investigated a total of 560 cases, 54 of which were referred to court, since its inception in 2000. Of the 54 referrals, 29 resulted in convictions. ¶6. (U) The ACC's community relations department claims that they follow the examples set by Botswana and Thailand, which place an emphasis on prevention rather than investigation. In this vein, the ACC, with funding from the Germans, sponsors "integrity clubs" in 21 schools across the country. The ACC has also sponsored anti-corruption community theater performances in 64 communities, helping Sierra Leoneans identify and discuss corrupt practices that prevail in their communities. ¶7. (U) The ACC has targeted ministries identified as corruption "hotspots" for preventive activities and claims to have made some progress. For example, the development and implementation of "Best Practice Guides" for port auctions (Customs and Excise) and grants-in-aid awards (Ministry of Education) have reduced the number of reports received at the ACC regarding malfeasance in both ministries. The ACC's prevention department has also participated in drafting new policy guidelines for the Ministry of Lands to reduce the illicit sale of state lands, and worked with the Ministry of Internal Affairs to transform the process of registering and issuing national identity cards and passports to reduce falsification of both types of documents and increase revenue for the Ministry from the fees associated with registering legitimate documents. -------------- -------------- New Leadership, Disappointing New Direction for ACC -------------- -------------- ¶8. (C) A signal of the ACC,s new direction came soon after former ACC Commissioner Val Collier,s humiliating parliamentary hearings (refs B and C) and subsequent dismissal in November 2005. One of the first acts of his successor, Henry Joko-Smart, was to reinstate Neneh Dabo, wife of one of the defendants in the forklift case. ACC Community Relations Officer, Koloneh Sankoh, was prominently featured in a recent photograph of a Sierra Leone People's Party (SLPP) support group donating a 30 million leones (approximately USD 10,000) to Vice President Berewa for his 2007 run for President. Collier himself now lays low and rarely answers phone calls from friends. "I don,t have a lot of friends these days," he told PolOff. Collier said that he would rather come home at the end of the work day and watch satellite TV, since people he socialized with tend to get harassed afterward. About Sankoh, Collier had this to say: "That,s what the ACC is about these days. Protecting the SLPP." (Comment: PolOff initiated the meeting with Collier after a newspaper article claimed Collier was scheduled to appear in court to defend himself against some of the same allegations that had brought him before two parliamentary committees. Although the article was not true, the politics of intimidation are clear, since it is likely that someone paid to have the article planted in the press. End Comment.) ¶9. (C) Joko-Smart appears to be making a habit of blaming everyone but himself for the ACC's shortcomings, claiming the the ACC staff is corrupt and unprofessional. He points out that an entrenched clause of Sierra Leone's 1991 Constitution makes it impossible for the ACC to bypass the Attorney FREETOWN 00000755 003 OF 005 General. Joko-Smart also refuses to hear cases that he claims are based on insufficient evidence. As in the forklift case, he said, witnesses to corruption are not willing to testify in court with evidence. Furthermore, he claims that ACC special prosecutors are inappropriately using laws not applicable in Sierra Leone during their reviews in order to prosecute higher level officials. Some of these excuses contain an element of truth, especially regarding witness intimidation problems (like in the forklift case), and the prosecute-high-level-officials-at-all-costs mentality (catching the big fish has always been a high priority for the ACC,s UK donors). ¶10. (C) The Freetown newspaper "The Exclusive" carried a story on September 7 purporting to announce the arrival of the ACC's new Principal Investigations officer - former Scotland Yard Detective Chief Inspector Hamish Campbell, who led the hunt for the killer of BBC TV presenter Jill Dando. The article points out that Campbell was suspected of tampering with a key piece of evidence in the Dando trial and questions his appropriateness for the ACC job. (Comment: Campbell has actually been at the ACC since January and was advised to stay "under the radar screen" to avoid a fate similar to Andy Felton, the "cowboy" former ACC Deputy Commissioner who recently resigned after weathering a barrage of criticism from the Kabbah government for his investigation tactics. Campbell successfully laid low until now, but it appears that someone in Sierra Leone is not/not happy with another meddling Brit. While it is true that the UK's Criminal Case Review Commission has been reviewing the Dando conviction for the past two years, those in police circles see Campbell as the unfortunate one who happened to head a case that became a media frenzy. End Comment.) -------------- The ACC Faces Serious Problems -------------- ¶11. (U) The Anti Corruption Act of 2000 established the ACC as an independent body and grants it broad investigatory and arrest powers, but it requires the Attorney General and Minister of Justice (a political appointee) to consent before any case is taken to court. This requirement has hobbled the ACC from the beginning, since the Attorney General has refused to refer a number of cases to court. Efforts by the UK (the ACC's primary donor) to rectify the situation fell flat. The 'fiat' solution delegated the court referral decision to a committee of two ACC special prosecutors and one prosecutor from the AG's office, and the majority ruled (ref A). The High Court rejected four cases referred to court in this manner, so the ACC has in effect been forced to resume its original process of referring cases to the High Court through the AG. ¶12. (C) According to ACC special prosecutor Tumsintwe, however, there are plenty of things Joko-Smart could do to make the ACC a more effective organization. For example, there is no reason why any of the ACC's routine investigations should take longer than six months, Tumsintwe said, but he still routinely sees cases from 2001 and 2002. Dragging out investigations just makes it easier for defendants and witnesses to disappear. The investigation process itself is not transparent, Tumsintwe explained, because investigators are not held accountable for results. A tracking database to manage the ACC,s caseload would help tremendously. (Note: The ACC,s former Deputy Commissioner Andy Felton did show us a rudimentary spreadsheet of active cases once, but no such spreadsheet was in evidence during our recent meeting with Joko-Smart, and the "information" sheet we received lacked any case details. End Note.) ¶13. (C) Tumsintwe said that even though it was his job to advise investigators on how to make their cases stronger for prosecution, they rarely listened to him. Ultimately, Tumsintwe left Freetown for good on August 25 when his contract expired. The GoSL, which is responsible for requesting contract renewals or replacements for the ACC special prosecutors has done neither in his case, so he departed with no replacement. The other ACC special prosecutor,s contract expires in two months. -------------- The Politics of Corruption -------------- FREETOWN 00000755 004 OF 005 ¶14. (C) The mechanics of investigations and referrals aside, the ACC,s biggest underlying problem is the lack of political will at the highest levels of government to punish corrupt, but loyal, senior officials. This was evident in the AG's refusal to refer former Minister of Marine Resources Okere Adams' case to court, even though an ACC investigation found that he had misappropriated public funds. Adams hails from northern Sierra Leone, an area where the ruling SLPP is traditionally weak, and is seen as the SLPP's vote-getter for that region. Adams' continued prominence in government after his arrest showed that the SLPP was clearly more interested in maintaining power than making an example of corrupt ministers (Adams is one of the more blatant examples). Despite multiple attempts to bring Adams' case forward (the 'fiat' solution was designed because of it),he has yet to appear in a courtroom. (Comment: The investigation into Adams' corruption also happened to directly involve President Kabbah's son, yet another reason why the case will not likely see the light of day. End Comment.) ¶15. (C) Disloyal officials, however, do not appear to merit the same protection. Although former Minister of Transport and Communication Momoh Pujeh was a member of the protected ruling class, he was abandoned - twice - and had to take his chances in court because his loyalty was questioned. Olu Gordon, editor of the satirical newspaper "Peep!", has pointed this out repeatedly. Gordon wrote in a recent op-ed that Pujeh, whose forklift acquittal was his second escape from the wheels of justice, was "openly conspiring with Charles Margai, Emmanuel Grant, and others to ditch (President) Kabbah at the 2002 SLPP convention." (Note: Shortly after one of his outbursts about the politically selective nature of the SLPP government's willingness to follow up on corruption allegations, Gordon himself was arrested, held in custody for three days, then released without charge (ref D). End Note.) ¶16. (U) September 4 was the first day of a week-long conference in Freetown for African Parliamentarians Network Against Corruption (APNAC). The opening session served as a venue for government officials to speak out against corruption, and speak out they did - eloquently. Although participants said all the rights things, it is unclear if there is a real intent to practice what they preached. APNAC Chair for Sierra Leone Ibrahim Bundu lamented that Africa loses USD 150 billion per year to corruption, but Bundu himself was the auditor on the Project Committee for an Embassy Special Self Help Program whose funding we had to terminate due to the politicization of the project. Post has been unable to collect the remaining funds due to the "unavailability" of the project's financial advisor to sign for the check at the bank. Back in the saddle again, Neneh Dabo herself moderated one of the conference's discussion groups, "Perspectives on Fighting Corruption." -------------- Comment -------------- ¶17. (C) There is no doubt that there are benefits to the ACC,s prevention activities, and it is probably true that convictions of low-level officials have some kind of deterrent effect (it has at the very least increased the number of reports from Sierra Leoneans who see that there is some action being taken against low-level corruption). There are also a number of things the donor community can do to help the ACC improve, like provide staff training in case management or assisting in the development of a database for case tracking. Until there is some fundamental change in the political landscape, however, progress against corruption will be limited. At its very heart, this is an abuse of power issue. Successful donor intervention may be impossible, given the strength of the UK's still-unsuccessful efforts after pouring in thousands of pounds' worth of money and technical expertise. Nevertheless, it is incumbent upon the international community to come up with new ways to help the government see that its current attitude towards fighting corruption is unacceptable. ¶18. (C) The GoSL's lack of will to fight corruption should be looked at with serious concern as we approach decisions regarding Millennium Challenge Account threshhold assistance and HIPC Completion Point eligibility. We must continually FREETOWN 00000755 005 OF 005 underscore our message that there is no tolerance for the use of public office for private gain. HULL