FIVE

POSTWAR INSTITUTIONAL REFORMS

Human Security and Good Governance

INTRODUCTION

International statebuilding, which has become deeply rooted in new humanitarianism and people-centered liberalism, has three interconnected components: ending widespread violence and human rights violations through peacekeeping operations, mediation aimed at reaching a durable peace agreement and successful transitional democratic elections, and postwar reconstruction to consolidate peace, strengthen democracy, inculcate good governance, and promote sustainable human development.¹ In chapter 3, we discussed the peacekeeping and mediation dimensions of international statebuilding. Chapter 4 analyzed the dominant international development principles and policy framework for good governance and postwar reconstruction. In this chapter, we examine core postwar institutional reform programs geared toward enhancing human security and good governance.

The experiences of Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Côte d’Ivoire show that postwar reconstruction is a process of setting a vision of democracy and material prosperity for the state, defining the political, economic, and social parameters of the state, and undertaking concrete programs to improve the well-being of the people through the consolidation of democracy, good governance, and investment in human development. People-centered liberalism assumes that democracy imbued with good governance has the best chance of creating economic and social conditions for poverty reduction, enhancing the overall well-being of the citizenry, and ensuring human security. In this sense, postwar reconstruction is a visionary process of institutionalizing democracy and good governance and materializing human well-being. Postwar reconstruction agendas are often wrapped in lofty policies of good leadership, prosperity, and equalitarianism that require major institutional reforms to eliminate the corrupt and authoritarian practices that led to civil war. A key part of the postwar reconstruction processes in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Côte d’Ivoire is the institutional reforms that were undertaken to consolidate peace and democracy. Such reforms typically include major security-sector overhaul to ensure professionalism and civilian control over the military, human rights and judicial reforms, civil society enhancements, and public finance management revisions

Postwar institutional reforms typically begin toward the end of war and accelerate after a successful transitional democratic election. This was the case in both Sierra Leone and Liberia. In Côte d’Ivoire, however, fundamental institutional reforms were hampered by the problematic nature of the transitional 2010 presidential election, which ended in renewed fighting and a military conquest over Laurent Gbagbo. Given the military end to the 2010 presidential election, Côte d’Ivoire did not achieve a truly successful transitional democratic election. It was expected that the subsequent elections with the two-term limit for the presidency would rectify the stalemate. As the Group of Experts on Côte d’Ivoire stated in its April 2014 report, “The Presidential elections in 2015 and the acceptance of its results have to be considered as a benchmark for the political transition and peace process in Côte d’Ivoire.”² The 2015 presidential election went relatively smoothly, but that gain was shattered in 2020, when Alassane Ouattara violated the presidential limit via a dubious referendum forcing the opposition to boycott the election. As such, fundamental postwar institutional reforms have largely been complicated and half-hearted.³ Most reform efforts in Côte d’Ivoire have been weak, contested, and slow.

The ideals of democracy and good governance were at the core of the reforms in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Côte d’Ivoire. Consolidating democracy and enhancing good governance were seen as key to maintaining long-term peace and addressing the underlying roots of poverty. In addition to financial and logistical support for multiparty elections, the international statebuilding effort included numerous postwar programs to support security-sector reforms, the rule of law, civil society, and proper public finance management.⁴ The contributions of such programs to international statebuilding rest not only in their individual impacts but in their collective impacts on the governance and political environment of the state.

SECURITY-SECTOR REFORMS: HUMAN SECURITY AND CIVILIAN CONTROL

Security-sector reform, which typically centers on restructuring and retraining the military and police forces, is central to international statebuilding in war-torn countries. Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Côte d’Ivoire each had some form of postwar security-sector reforms, albeit to varying degrees. Such reform can be viewed from two interconnected angles of maintaining state security and ensuring effective law enforcement within the confines of human rights. The state security dimension rests on restructuring and rebuilding the military force, which is often in a state of collapse by the end of civil wars; the new military should not only be capable of defending the country against external threats but must also be trained to be a professional force that respects the principle of civilian control and operates in a manner devoid of sectarianism and human rights violations.⁵ State security assumes the existence of a democratic political system that is continuously working toward good governance and the enhancement of human development. The law enforcement dimension rests on rebuilding the police force and related civilian law enforcement apparatus, such as customs and prisons. However, the primary focus is on the national police. Rebuilding the police force largely centers on proper recruitment practices, appropriate training (including in human rights), gender inclusion, the adoption of community policing practices, and the provision of resources for the police. While military reforms are geared toward state security, police reforms are aimed at effective crime management and the delivery of justice within a system that is transparent and effective and ensures human rights. The new military and police forces were expected to gradually replace the United Nations (UN) military and police forces, which were responsible for overall national security and policing functions in the war-torn countries under their peacekeeping mandates.

Military Reforms

One of the most profound postwar security-sector reforms in West Africa took place in Sierra Leone under the International Military Assistance Training Team (IMATT) program initiated by the United Kingdom in 1999.⁶ IMATT, the state security component of the postwar security-sector reform in Sierra Leone, aimed to build the military into an effective force under democratic civilian control that will meet the security needs of Sierra Leone.⁷ The program was largely funded by Britain and implemented by the British military in partnership with Sierra Leone’s Ministry of Defense. In 2007, for example, Britain allocated twelve million pounds sterling to IMATT.⁸ IMATT was to build on the Military Reintegration Plan (MRP) envisioned under the Lomé Peace Agreement to integrate former Revolutionary United Front and Civil Defense Forces (RUF) and CDF combatants into a new and restructured army. The new force was to reach 9,500 troops by 2007 and eventually reach a full strength of 12,500 troops.⁹ The IMATT program assisted the Armed Forces Training Centre in Benguema with the training of the soldiers recruited under MRP.¹⁰ IMATT’s two key components were combat training and professional development. The program trained around 12,500 soldiers (including the air and maritime wings) in basic military skills and provided specialized training for a small group of elite soldiers in logistics, communications, command and control, and other techniques. In addition, IMATT aimed to inculcate professionalism within the new Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces (RSLAF). IMATT was to foster policies and practices aimed at eliminating corruption and enhancing military career paths, salaries, and benefits for soldiers. An essential element of the task was ending the corrupt practice of “ghost soldiers” on the payroll. In addition, IMATT was to promote institutional reforms to instill a culture of human rights, loyalty, service, and civilian oversight in the new RSLAF.¹¹

During the IMATT program period, British military officers assumed executive roles in Sierra Leone’s military affairs.¹² IMATT formally ended on March 31, 2013. It was succeeded by the British-sponsored International Security Advisory Team (ISAT) program, which formally began its mission on April 1, 2013.¹³ Overall, IMATT successfully restructured RSLAF, which contributed a battalion to the peacekeeping operations in Somalia. ISAT was scaled back to a general advisory role in the security of Sierra Leone and the surrounding region. Like IMATT, ISAT advised and supported the RSLAF, especially in the area of professional development. However, ISAT’s role included providing advice and support to other security agencies, most notably the Sierra Leone Police, the Office of National Security, the National Fire Force, the Prisons Department, the Immigration Office, and the Joint Maritime Committee. It also provided support to the justice sector within the framework of extant Department for International Development (DFID) and United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) programs.

In Liberia, too, security-sector reform entailed rebuilding the military. Like Sierra Leone, Liberia had no functioning national military force by the end of the war. Under the terms of the peace agreement, UNMIL was to disarm all combatants, ensure security for the country, and help with security-sector improvements. UNMIL successfully accomplished its mission of implementing the relevant terms of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), which culminated with the installment of an elected government in November 2005. In particular, it disarmed the combatants and ensured the proper conduct of elections. The first phase of the disarmament program, which mostly focused on Monrovia, began in December 2003. The program was extended to the areas close to Monrovia in April 2004. The final phase of disarmament began in July 2004 and targeted the remote areas of the country. By February 2005, 101,495 combatants had been disarmed and demobilized, including 8,523 boys and 2,440 girls. UNMIL collected over 61,000 weapons and nearly 6.5 million rounds of small arms ammunitions.¹⁴ After the disarmament phase, the next critical part was rebuilding the military that would gradually replace UNMIL.

The restructuring of the Liberian military was primarily financed and conducted by the United States. Though the Liberian government officially took responsibility for the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL) in 2010, international support for the rebuilding of the AFL continued. The new AFL was to be trained according to US military doctrine and reach its full operational strength of two thousand soldiers (146 officers and 1,854 enlisted soldiers) by 2012.¹⁵ The National Defense Strategy of 2014 aimed to increase the force to 2,500 soldiers by 2015.¹⁶ AFL was charged with protecting Liberian territorial integrity and helping in national emergences, including disaster response. The US pledged $210 million to support the rebuilding of the AFL. Other countries also made relatively smaller contributions to the rebuilding of the AFL. Nigeria, Britain, and China trained small groups of Liberian soldiers. China also agreed to construct a base at Tabmanbu to accommodate 780 soldiers.¹⁷ UNMIL trained the AFL on issues of human rights and military-civilian cooperation and on basic skills to operate radios and clear hidden unexploded ordnances from the war.¹⁸

The military component of security-sector reform in Liberia largely rested on the work of the two private security firms, DynCorp International and Pacific Architects and Engineers (PAE), contracted by the United States to rebuild the AFL. DynCorp was responsible for recruitment and basic training. PAE was in charge of advanced training, structuring the component units of the AFL, and infrastructure projects, such as the construction of barracks and military headquarters.¹⁹ A key part of the rebuilding of the AFL was the establishment of three military bases: Barclay Training Camp, Sandee S. Ware Military Barracks, and Edward B. Kessely Military Barracks.

The rebuilding of the AFL began with the demobilization of around 13,700 soldiers from the old AFL and the termination of a significant number of employees at the Ministry of National Defense.²⁰ The reformed Ministry of National Defense was staffed by approximately ninety trained civilians.²¹ The demobilization allowed for the recruitment of new soldiers vetted on the basis of age and medical fitness, literacy, human rights record, and regional diversity. In particular, the new members of the AFL were expected to have attained at least a twelfth-grade education, be free of drugs, HIV, and tuberculosis, and be between the ages of eighteen and forty-five. A key recruitment target was to get 20 percent of the new AFL to be women.²² Recruitment took place in all fifteen countries, especially Monrovia.

The training of the Liberian national army progressed, albeit slowly. Only 634 noncommissioned officers and 11 officers completed advanced training by October 2007.²³ Up to August 2007, women accounted for only 5 percent of the force.²⁴ By December 2009, two AFL battalions completed the US Army Training and Evaluation program, which brought the force to the level of around two thousand troops and marked the completion of the first phase of training for the new AFL.²⁵ However, the Liberian government was frequently unable to pay salaries on time, and the Ministry of Defense continuously suffered from poor management.²⁶ The AFL reached 2,040 soldiers after 134 recruits completed basic training in April 2014.²⁷

An essential part of the rebuilding of the AFL was providing advanced training and equipment. In January 2010, sixty-one US military personnel arrived in Liberia to conduct advanced training, which included instruction in the areas of infantry tactics, operational planning, logistics, engineering, communication, medicine, military justice, and administration.²⁸ By 2014, a total of thirty-two AFL engineers had received intermediate-level training in explosive ordnance disposal from the UN Mine Action Service. Two defender boats were also commissioned in February 2014. A Liberian platoon served at the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali.²⁹ In line with the pace of security-sector reform and political developments in Liberia, UNMIL was gradually reduced to 4,619 military personnel in 2014 from its peak of 15,250 troops in 2003.³⁰ Overall, the rebuilding of the AFL was completed, which paved the way for the termination of UNMIL. As the UN stated, “On 30 June, 2016, UNMIL completed the transfer of security responsibilities to Liberian authorities, in accordance with resolution 2239, adopted on 17 September 2015. UNMIL successfully completed its mandate on 30 March 2018.”³¹

The restructuring of the Ivoirian military was far more problematic than that of the military in Sierra Leone and Liberia. The main challenge for Côte d’Ivoire was the fragility of the peace. Because former President Gbagbo and current President Ouattara never peacefully resolved their differences, their supporters were often ready to fight. In 2011, Ouattara issued a decree unifying the National Armed Forces of Côte d’Ivoire and the Forces Nouvelles. However, the Front Populaire Ivoirien (FPI) called for the annulment of the decree and viewed the process as a mere takeover of the Ivoirian military by the former rebel Forces Républicaines de Côte d’Ivoire (FRCI)–cum–Forces Nouvelles de Côte d’Ivoire. This was compounded by the continued existence of former combatants, including the dozos, and new armed and militia groups operating in the southwest. On January 22, 2014, Ouattara promoted more than five hundred members of the “unified” FRCI, including several commanders of the Forces Nouvelles (FN).³²

Côte d’Ivoire struggled with Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR), which was a major step toward any postwar military restructuring. The DDR programmatic framework was only finalized in January 2014. The African Development Bank promised $30 million, while the EU committed to provide €14 million.³³ The DDR process moved very slowly. By the end of April 2014, only 22,590 former combatants (including 1,596 women) had been disarmed and demobilized. During that period, 6,939 weapons, 531,583 rounds of small arms ammunition, and 8,512 items of explosive ordnance were collected. About seventy operations to disarm and demobilize combatants were conducted at the DDR camp near Abidjan, mostly involving FRCI and FN members. Very few disbandment and demobilization operations took place in the center and southwest of the country. The participation of groups that supported Gbagbo was very low.³⁴ With respect to the reinsertion of former combatants, UNOCI launched eight community projects in February 2014. The Ivoirian Authority for Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration also conducted a resocialization program in March 2014. Around 30,455 people received some form of reinsertion support by the end of April 2014.³⁵

In addition to the slow progress on DDR, there were major violations of the arms embargo on Côte d’Ivoire, especially by the Ouattara government. The Ivoirian government imported weapons without reporting them to UNOCI as required under paragraph 5 of UN Security Council Resolution 2101 (2013). This raised serious concerns, including from the Group of Experts on Côte d’Ivoire, that the Ivoirian government was importing weapons in preparation for eventual violence during the presidential elections.³⁶ The Group of Experts pointed to numerous instances of incompliance with the embargo through the failure to fully disclose the types and quantity of arms imports or the falsification of end-user certificates. Some of the instances included the November 2013 importation of 659 bulletproof jackets, only 200 of which were reported. Also, end-user certificates were not properly submitted for night-vision and observation equipment and fifteen hundred Jericho pistols (9mm). The Group of Experts also observed that vehicles imported by the government (Toyota Land Cruisers) were reconfigured into combat vehicles. These included vehicles produced by military vehicle manufacturer Ateliers de Construction Mécanique de L’Atlantique that had been fitted with heavy machine guns.³⁷ The group stated, “The reconfiguration of equipment for military purposes after notification to the Committee is a contravention of the sanctions regime, as any conversion to military use requires an exemption by the Committee. The Group would like to reiterate its concern about such cases, particularly those involving transport equipment. Vehicles may be converted for military purposes in order to circumvent the exemption procedures dictated by relevant Security Council resolutions.”³⁸

Gbagbo supporters also prepared for conflict. The Group of Experts identified a network of Gbagbo supporters who operated in Ghana and South Africa to finance armed groups loyal to Gbagbo through the sale of diamonds and gold, in contravention of the UN sanctions on Côte d’Ivoire. Some of the individuals named in the Group of Experts’ report included Abie Zogoé Hervé-Brice, who was a former Ivoirian ambassador to South Africa, and Stephane Kipré, Gbagbo’s son-in-law. The group stated: “The illicit diamond network had two main purposes. From one side, it was meant to finance the operations of individuals close to the former administration of Laurent Gbagbo to destabilize Côte d’Ivoire. . . . The other purpose of the network was to grant personal financial gains to its creators and middlemen through a series of lump sums or facilitation commissions on the value of the sales.”³⁹

On June 30, 2017, UNOCI’s mandate ended. At that time, the Ouattara government had won the fight against Gbagbo and his FPI supporters. Overall, violence had ended and the state was functional, but the reforms did not consolidate peace; rather, the victory of Ouattara only meant that Côte d’Ivoire was sliding back into the state of no war, no peace, and this situation has been further worsened by the prolongation of Ouattara’s rule into a third presidential term after the 2020 election, which the opposition boycotted.

Police Reforms

While most of the initial security-sector reforms focused on restructuring the military, police reform remained a critical step. All three countries had some form of police reform, albeit of varying levels of intensity. Sierra Leone and Liberia clearly needed more profound police reform because the states had collapsed, while in Côte d’Ivoire, such reforms were moderate.

Police reform in Sierra Leone began during the civil war period but did not progress until the war ended in 2001. The effort started with the introduction of the Sierra Leone Policing Charter in August 1998 by President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah; the charter established a commitment to upholding community policing practices, protecting human rights, maintaining a sense of professionalism, and ensuring equal opportunity in the police service. It stated: “Our aim is to see a reborn Sierra Leone Police, which will be a ‘Force for Good’ in our nation.”⁴⁰ In essence, police reform in Sierra Leone centered on enhancing the management of the police force, providing the necessary equipment to enable the police to do its work, and inculcating community policing practices.

One of the more notable police reform efforts in Sierra Leone was the British-sponsored Commonwealth Community Safety and Security Project (CCSSP), which aimed to make the Sierra Leone Police visible and capable of providing internal security. CCSSP was initiated in 1999, when the Sierra Leone Police had been rendered almost obsolete by the rebel RUF and the renegade military that overthrew the elected government. Police officers were killed, forcing many to abandon their posts and withdraw to the safest areas of Freetown. By the time the war ended, an estimated nine hundred police officers had been killed by the rebels, and the size of the police force fell from 9,317 to 6,600.⁴¹ The management component of the reform was led by Keith Biddle, a retired assistant chief constable from Manchester, UK, who was appointed inspector general of the Sierra Leone Police. Biddle led the police from 1999 to 2003. A key part of the reform was transforming the senior management team of the police and using merit, instead of seniority, as the basis for promotion. Biddle removed some of the old guards through forced retirement. This led to the recruitment and promotion of younger university graduates, who were later trained in Britain and given major leadership roles in the police force. The new management style deviated from orthodox bureaucratic practices and gravitated more toward corporate-style management. An executive management board was established, and emphasis was placed on institutional research and strategic planning.

In terms of reequipping and training the police, officers were furnished with new uniforms, vehicles, and communication equipment. Despite some of the management changes, reforms were hampered by the war. Though recruitment, training, and the construction of barracks went on, efforts to increase the police force to 9,500 and equip it were very slow. Until 2002, the police were barely present outside of Freetown. In 2004, the Sierra Leone force included six thousand officers and seven hundred vehicles. The police reached the target strength of 9,500 in 2005. The inculcation of community policing continued throughout the reform period. Training was based on the principle of Local Needs Policing. At the core of Local Needs Policing were the Local Policing Partnership Boards established to facilitate collaboration and engagement between the police and the communities they served. Each board was coordinated by the police local unit commander and comprised of reputable community members, such as paramount chiefs and religious and women’s group leaders. One of the best examples of the application of Local Needs Policing was the development of the Family Support Unit (FSU).

The police reform started under CCSSP was expanded to include more units in the security and justice sectors. In 2005, the Justice Sector Development Program (JSDP) replaced CCSSP. JSDP, which ended in 2011, received around £27.7 million from Britain.⁴² The overall goal of JSDP was “to support the development of an effective and accountable justice sector that is capable of meeting the needs and interests of poor, marginalised and vulnerable people.” ⁴³ A main objective of JSDP was to improve the quality of the police through effective community policing and enhancing relations between the officers and communities. JSDP was an integrated program that combined police reforms with efforts to better the judicial system, prisons, and civil society organizations. Some of the notable elements of the policing component of JSDP included the training of over 80 percent of senior and middle-ranking police offices in community policing practices, the development of FSUs, and the training of about three hundred community volunteers in community mediation practices.⁴⁴ In 2012, JSDP was replaced with the Access to Security and Justice Programme (ASJP), which was to end in 2015. While previous efforts to enhance policing largely centered on Freetown, the main focus of ASJP was to expand the new policing and management practices to the interior of the country. ASJP was launched in several places outside of the capital city, including Waterloo, Kenema, and Moyamba.⁴⁵

FSU was one of the most notable community policing elements of reform in Sierra Leone. It was set up to deal with issues of sexual and gender-based crimes and child abuse through community education and regular police investigation and prosecution practices. This aspect of community policing began in 1999 with the establishment of the Domestic Violence Unit (DVU) at the Kissy Police Station. In 2001, DVU was transformed into FSU and placed within the Criminal Investigation Department of the police. In 2004, the Ministry of Social Welfare, Gender and Children Affairs joined the FSU to provide social work expertise to victims of gender-based crimes. FSU was made an independent unit of the police in 2007, and its work expanded to include crimes committed by or against children. FSU’s work was enhanced by the passage of the Anti-Human Trafficking Act (2005), Domestic Violence Act (2007), Child Rights Act (2007), Devolution of Estates Act (2007), and Registration of Customary Marriages and Divorces Act (2009). Over forty-three FSU stations were established throughout the country.⁴⁶

Like military reform, police reform had positive effects on human security in Sierra Leone. The police became visible and operational throughout the country. Though Sierra Leone did not maintain the proper crime statistics to measure the effectiveness of police reforms, there were visible signs of progress in everyday security and human rights. A crime report issued by the police in 2012 indicated that the overall rate of crime decreased from 0.96 percent in 2011 to 0.82 percent in 2012.⁴⁷ Despite the reform, the Sierra Leone Police were still plagued by insufficient resources and abuses of power, most notably in the form of corruption. While the lack of resources and petty bribery involving traffic officers were not major threats to national security or the overall state of human rights, police reforms needed to continue to enhance professionalism through proper equipment and practices. Despite the remarkable improvement in security, incidents of armed robbery occurred more frequently. While armed robbery is a common phenomenon in major African cities, postwar countries are particularly challenged when the frequency of such incidents increases. In Freetown, the reality of armed robbery led to a huge private-security industry.⁴⁸ While the police force reached the target of 9,500 members, there were concerns that the force was still too small to effectively maintain law and order. There were growing calls to increase the size of the force to twelve thousand. Studies commissioned by the police correctly pointed to some public recognition of improvement in policing practices in Sierra Leone, but the perception that there was corruption continued to be troubling. The problem of petty bribery dovetailed with the poor salaries and inadequate resources for the police, especially in rural areas.⁴⁹

Sierra Leone witnessed a remarkable state of peace after the end of the civil war. Except for some isolated incidents of violence during the 2012 and 2017 elections and periodic cases of armed robbery in Freetown, Sierra Leone did not witness any significant threat to national security until the outbreak of the Ebola epidemic in late 2014 and the controversial sacking of the vice president by President Ernest Bai Koroma on March 18, 2015. However, the events leading to the 2023 elections and the elections themselves have tremendously undermined peace.⁵⁰ One of most significant examples of political violence was an attack on the 2012 opposition Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) presidential candidate, Julius Maada Bio. The attack took place in Bo in July 2011 during an election campaign event. The fighting left one person dead and twenty injured, and several buildings were burned down, including the local APC party office. Additionally, the minister of Internal Affairs, Musa Tarawali, was attacked in Kono by youths throwing stones. The attack, which allegedly led Tarawali to order his bodyguards to disperse the crowd with gunfire, was said to have been initiated by APC supporters who perceived him to be a potential presidential challenger to the sitting vice president, who is from Kono.⁵¹ More recently, the opposition APC has also been harassed by the current SLPP government led by Bio. Opposition figures have been arbitrarily jailed, and APC offices have also been attacked in what has now become a gradual escalation of conflict and violence between the opposition APC and ruling SLPP.⁵²

Though there was not major social unrest outside of the election periods during the immediate postwar period, the 2014 Ebola outbreak sparked tensions, as citizens resisted quarantine regulations or demanded more government action to provide appropriate services to Ebola-affected people. On October 21, 2014, for example, the government imposed a curfew in Koidu Town in Kono after clashes erupted between police and youths who were resisting the effort by police and medical officers to take a ninety-year-old grandmother for an Ebola test. Two people were reported to have been killed during the clash.⁵³ More recently, COVID-19 restrictions and skyrocketing food prices associated with the Ukraine have triggered violent social unrest.

Liberia’s police reform had similar goals of building a professional force capable of maintaining law and order and respecting human rights. By the end of the war, Liberia’s police force had been decimated.⁵⁴ Most of the efforts to rebuild the Liberian National Police (LNP) were supported by the United States and UN as stipulated in UN Security Council Resolution 1509 of September 19, 2003. In 2009, the United States promised to provide $19.75 million to help rebuild the LNP.⁵⁵ However, actual funding was limited, and expectations were that the Liberian government would take responsibility for rebuilding the force. While Liberia was rebuilding its police, United Nations Polic (UNPOL) performed a major policing role in Liberia. By June 2014, Liberian security agencies had assumed responsibility for “81 per cent of static guard duties and all road-bound cash escort functions.”⁵⁶ Moreover, they were serving as first-line responders. However, UNMIL provided backup to the Liberian security agencies and secured the international airports, two prisons, and the premises of the president of the country. As the UN secretary general noted, “the national security presence remains thin across the country” largely due to the financial and material constraints faced by the Liberian government.⁵⁷ According to UNMIL estimates, Liberia would need a police force of eight thousand officers by the time UN peacekeepers fully withdrew. By 2013, however, the LNP had only 4,417 officers. UNPOL was still deployed in thirty-two areas, including twenty-nine zones in Monrovia, providing support to LNP. UNPOL’s operational supports to LNP included joint patrols, advising, communication assistance, and crime analysis.⁵⁸ Leadership was a major challenge for LNP.

The first effort to rebuild the LNP started in 2004 with the registration of the remnant officers of the defunct LNP and the creation of the Operations Section of UNPOL. UNPOL began rebuilding the LPN by registering about five thousand people believed to be members of the defunct LNP. Most did not have uniforms or receive pay from the Liberian government at the time of their registration. Members of the defunct LPN were engaged in unlawful policing practices such as extorting bribes and operating without a clear command structure. UNPOL vetted and recruited about four hundred of those registered to help maintain law and order. The recruits were fitted with black T-shirts with a police label and given basic office supplies, which allowed them to operate as an ad hoc LNP. UNPOL both provided legitimacy and engaged in public education campaigns about the LNP and its role in the peacebuilding process. UNPOL’s Operations Section was tasked with supporting the ad hoc LNP as a way to maintain order and provide basic policing services at the end of the war.⁵⁹

A key step in the efforts to build a real postwar LNP was the establishment of the National Transitional Government of Liberia (NTGL)-UNMIL Rule of Law Implementation Committee, which was tasked with developing policy guidelines for the recruitment and selection of a new LNP. At the start of the recruitment phase, the United States provided $500,000 to support the effort to rebuild the LNP. Other donors, such as Norway, the Netherlands, and Belgium, also provided some support. The initial goal was to train 3,500 officers for the new LNP.⁶⁰ Recruiting was conducted by UNPOL based on criteria established by the NTGL-UNMIL Rule of Law Implementation Committee. The members of the new LNP had to be between the ages of eighteen and thirty-five and attain a twelfth-grade education. In addition, they could not hold a position in a political organization, have a criminal record, or have committed human rights violations.⁶¹ The other dimension of the police reform was the formal deactivation of members of the former LNP who failed to meet the eligibility criteria or simply had not applied to join the new LNP. In 2007, 2,351 members of the former LNP and 870 members of the former Special Security Service were deactivated with a one-time severance pay of around $1,200 per person.⁶²

Most of the training of the LNP took place in Liberia with a small group of officers trained in advanced firearms use and leadership outside of Liberia’s borders (in Nigeria and Ghana). In addition to meeting the numerical targets, reform measures aimed to enhance police performance, especially in community policing and human rights compliance. In 2004, UNPOL established the National Police Training Academy (NPTA). The NPTA was initially set to train 3,500 recruits in basic police training. A key part of the curriculum was human rights and democratic policing. By June 2007, 3,522 officers (including 203 females) had graduated from the NPTA. The academy was handed over to the LNP in 2007, after the completion of the initial training program. However, UNPOL continued to provide trainers and general support to NPTA. In terms of middle- and senior-level management, seventy-eight officers were trained at the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration by 2014. Another set of officers received management training in Liberia at the LNP training center in Harper.⁶³ Much of the effort to increase the size and quality of the LNP rested on improving the infrastructure by constructing dormitories for police recruits, barracks, stations, and regional headquarters.⁶⁴

The new LNP increased its performance but often received operational support from UNPOL. One of the notable operational achievements was the establishment of the emergency response system (a 355 phone number), which allowed LNP and UNPOL joint patrol officers to respond to law enforcement emergencies. However, the system was often under-resourced, which inhibited proper response. LNP also developed specialized elite police units to deal with major incidents of violence. In particular, the Police Support Unit (PSU) was formed to respond to riots and violent crimes. In 2013, the PSU had around 681 officers.⁶⁵ The Emergency Response Unit (ERU) was created to counter organized armed threats and major internal security breaches; it was to include five hundred officers trained in advanced weapons use by American contractor DynCorp. By 2003, ERU had around 321 active officers. The United States provided an initial $5 million in support to ERU, while the UN helped rebuild police stations.⁶⁶ Another important part of the reform was enhancing professionalism and addressing abuse of power and corruption. In 2006, the Police Board of Inquiry was replaced with the Professional Standards Division, which was established to enhance accountability within the LNP; it investigated internal and public complaints about police abuse of power and conducted internal audits.⁶⁷

While the rebuilding of the LNP progressed, there were major challenges in terms of size and operational capacity. For example, the LNP was very visible in Monrovia, but there were few officers deployed outside of Monrovia. In 2013, major counties such as Bong, Lofa, and Grand Gedeh had only between 90 and 120 officers each, and some small communities still had no police officers.⁶⁸ Not only was the overall size of the force small, but the recruitment and training processes were slow. The other major challenge was a lack of resources and professional capacity. Police officers often complained of low salaries. In 2013, the average salary of a patrol officer was only $135 per month.⁶⁹ The LNP did not have sufficient vehicles or essential supplies (e.g., fuel) to properly patrol and respond to crime situations. In many cases, victims of crimes were asked to cover the transportation cost of responding officers. Many police officers engaged in extortion and bribe taking, especially from motorists, petty traders, victims of crimes, and offenders.⁷⁰ Public trust in the ability of the police to deal with crimes was low, which further propelled vigilantism and mob justice. Even more troubling was the fact that the ERU and PSU were accused of misusing weapons and robbing citizens at night.⁷¹

Apart from the abuse of power by individual officers, the police were also involved in the improper use of force and human rights violations. In particular, officers were accused of beating and wounding students during the March 22, 2011, student protest. On November 11, 2011, the police also clashed with supporters of the opposition Congress for Democratic Change, leaving at least one person dead. Both incidents were investigated and led to the dismissal of Police Inspector General Marc Amblard.⁷²

Liberia’s security-sector reform lagged behind the country’s security needs. Though the civil war had ended and overall peace had been restored, there were still significant threats to security beyond regular policing challenges. In fact, the UN kept approximately 3,750 UNMIL troops in Liberia until mid-2015, as approved under UN Security Council resolutions 2066 (2012) and 2116 (2013). It was not until June 2016 that UNMIL completed the transfer of security responsibilities to Liberian authorities, in accordance with Resolution 2239, adopted on September 17, 2015. UNMIL stayed in Liberia until March 30, 2018.

Perhaps the biggest challenge to Liberia’s security was the inculcation of good governance to build some trust between the government and citizenry. In June 2014, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf was openly accused of nepotism and corruption by Christopher Neyor, president of the National Oil Company of Liberia and a candidate for the Montserrado Senate against Sirleaf’s son, Robert Sirleaf.⁷³ Sirleaf was also criticized for appointing her children to top government positions. Apart from political mistrust, there were periodic demonstrations based on economic and political grievances. In July 2014, for example, around five hundred people held a protest against ArcelorMittal Iron Ore Company in Nimba County for noncompliance with social commitments, which resulted in a violent clash with the police. There were also protests against other corporations, such as Golden Veroleum in Grand Kru County and BHP Billiton in Nimba County. The police clashed with supporters of the opposition Congress for Democratic Change. Even more disturbing were reports of plans to overthrow the government. In July 2007, George Koukou (former speaker of the National Transitional Legislative Assembly), Major Charles Julu (former army chief of staff), and Colonel Andrew Dorbor were arrested for an alleged coup plot.⁷⁴ Liberia’s borders with Côte d’Ivoire and Guinea also continued to be volatile, as refugees, pro-Gbagbo militants, and Liberian mercenaries in Côte d’Ivoire continuously crossed into Liberia. In 2011, over two hundred thousand Ivoirian and Guinean refugees entered the country.⁷⁵

In Côte d’Ivoire, there was minimal progress with police reform. Though the Ivoirian police and gendarmerie were in much better shape than the police in Sierra Leone and Liberia before and during the war, they, too, were in need of major reform. Even before the war, the Ivoirian police and gendarmes were notorious for impunity and plagued by a lack of proper training and equipment.⁷⁶ These forces virtually collapsed during the worst points of the Ivoirian war, but by July 2012, 85 percent of police officers and gendarmes had resumed duty. However, reform efforts were minimal and stalled by uncertainty over the peace. Most of the effort to rebuild the police and gendarmes forces centered on acquiring equipment and rebuilding stations. One of the first steps on this front was the effort to distribute weapons recovered by the UN to police officers and gendarmes. UNOCI assisted in the rehabilitation of police stations, gendarmeries, and municipal offices and the training of police officers and gendarmes for the December 2011 legislative elections. In November 2011, France delivered computers and thirty police vehicles following the resumption of security cooperation with Côte d’Ivoire.⁷⁷ Though the police and gendarmes forces were operational, Côte d’Ivoire needed fundamental reforms to rebuild trust between them and the citizenry, which would be essential for the inculcation of democracy and long-term peace. Such changes would require real reconciliation between the northern and southern political forces. However, reform of the police and gendarme forces practically stalled.

HUMAN RIGHTS AND JUSTICE

A major aspect of postwar institutional reform is addressing human rights violations committed during war and restoring the rule of law. In Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Côte d’Ivoire, this effort centered on the truth and reconciliation process, prosecutions of persons responsible for war crimes, rebuilding the justice sector, and promoting good governance. All three countries established truth and reconciliation commissions, though of varying quality. Sierra Leone completed its war crimes trials and undertook justice and good-governance reforms. Liberia did not pursue significant war crimes trials, but it engaged in justice and governance reforms. In Côte d’Ivoire, the ICC opened investigations and prosecuted some people. As with the security sector, justice and governance reforms in Côte d’Ivoire were minimal.

Truth and Reconciliation

Overall, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of Sierra Leone was successful in documenting the general nature of the crimes committed during the war, providing a forum for public discourses about the conditions that led to the civil war and the challenges of healing and articulating a vision for national rehabilitation based on social justice and good governance. As envisioned in Article VI(2) of the Lomé Peace Agreement, the TRC of Sierra Leone was established with the passage of the Truth and Reconciliation Act on February 22, 2000. The commission, chaired by Bishop Joseph Humper, was comprised of four Sierra Leoneans, one Canadian, a Gambian, and a South African. The seven commissioners were sworn in on July 5, 2002; at the ceremony, the president of Sierra Leone summed up the mandate of the commission:

The Commission will investigate and report on the causes, nature and extent of the violations and abuses of human rights and international humanitarian law during the conflict. Of course it will create an impartial historical record of the atrocities perpetrated against innocent civilians during a ten-year period of the war. However, it is absolutely necessary that we look beyond those functions, and see the work of the TRC as a therapeutic process. It was a brutal war. It caused grievous physical and emotional damage for thousands of our compatriots. It also created divisions between families, and among neighbours and friends. To a large extent the conflict also fractured the body politic of the nation. Well, the guns may be silent, but the trauma of the war lingers on. We have a great deal of healing to do. This is why the TRC is, and should also be seen, as an instrument of national reconciliation, and another means of strengthening the peace.⁷⁸

The commission took statements and held public hearings in all the districts of the country. It concluded the public hearings on Aguste 5, 2003, and issued a final report in 2004.

There were contentious debates about the Sierra Leone TRC process, both before the commission was established and after the report was released. Though a TRC process was called for in the Lomé Peace Agreement, many people saw it as a potentially problematic process that could impede reconciliation. Some argued that the TRC would just open up more wounds. Instead of the TRC process favored by NGOs and human rights activists, there was a strong popular desire for a “forgive-and-forget” approach.⁷⁹ At a pragmatic level, people were skeptical of the TRC for fear of it undermining the nascent peace, the potential for self-incrimination leading to prosecution by the Special Court for Sierra Leone, and retaliation, especially from ex-combatants and politically vested people. Beyond the practical consideration, forgive-and-forget has been a deeply rooted conflict resolution mechanism in many communities. As Rosalind Shaw observed, “The imperative to remember violence during the TRC was at odds with widespread local techniques of healing and reintegration, which are based on the social forgetting of violence.”⁸⁰ Social forgetting dovetails with the pragmatic considerations of the forgive-and-forget approach. Shaw rightly noted, “Social forgetting is a different process from individual forgetting, in that people still have personal memories of the violence. But speaking of the violence—especially in public—was (and is) viewed as encouraging its return, calling it forth when it is still very close and might at any moment erupt again.”⁸¹ Despite the fears, the TRC process passed without undermining the peace or leading to widespread retaliations or prosecutions. As others have contended regarding the experience in Sierra Leone, the “TRC was essentially for the healing of the nation.”⁸²

The more challenging debates are about the achievements of the TRC process and its impacts on the character of the postwar state. Though the TRC’s mandate was largely to impartially investigate and document what happened to persons and their communities during the war, in reality, the TRC was seen as a forum for “truth finding” and identifying durable solutions to the problems that led to the civil war. The expectation that it would not only record what happened to people but also diagnose the causes of the war and recommend solutions led to varying criticisms of the TRC. The TRC itself reified those expectations in its report, which provided both general and specific causes of the civil war and recommendations for building a country that would not be plagued by the corruption, oppression, and abuse of power that had led to the war: “How did a peace-loving nation become engulfed, seemingly overnight, in horror? What events occurred in the history of Sierra Leone to make this conflict possible? Explanations put forward have varied from ‘bad governance’ and ‘the history of the post-colonial period’ to ‘the urge to acquire the country’s diamond wealth’ and the roles of Libya or the Liberian faction leader Charles Taylor.”⁸³ Similarly, the report included sweeping recommendations for overhauling the state. These recommendations were grouped into the categories of human rights protection, establishing the rule of law, security services, good governance, fighting corruption, youth and women empowerment, protection and welfare of children, mineral resource management, and reparation.⁸⁴ As the commission argued, its recommendations were “designed to facilitate the building of a new Sierra Leone based on the values of human dignity, tolerance and respect for the rights of all persons. In particular, the recommendations are intended to help create an open and vibrant democracy in which all are treated as equal before the law.”⁸⁵ The commission believed that “the adoption of its recommendations would assist the people of Sierra Leone to rise above the bitter conflicts of the past, which caused unspeakable violations of human rights and left a legacy of dehumanisation, hatred and fear.”⁸⁶

Tim Kelsall cast doubts on the validity of the report by questioning the truthfulness of the testimonies presented to the TRC. In the case of the hearings in the Tonkolili district, for example, Kelsall wrote, “the truth—a truth, that is, that was satisfactory to the participants—was not forthcoming. This was so obvious that on the penultimate day of the Commission’s hearings, members of the audience were incensed and the hearings appeared to be on the brink of failure, with the community possibly on the verge of renewed violence.”⁸⁷ Instead of being a truth-telling process, according to Kelsall, the TRC process was a healing ritual. As he further observed in Tonkolili:

But on the final day of the hearings the atmosphere changed. This was not because the perpetrators eventually told the truth; in fact the truth status of testimony only marginally improved. Rather, the change was due to the addition of a carefully staged reconciliation ceremony to the proceedings, a ritual that created an emotionally charged atmosphere that succeeded in moving many of the participants and spectators, not least the present author, and which arguably opened an avenue for reconciliation and lasting peace. Insofar as this was the case, it suggests that ritual may be more important to reconciliation than truth.⁸⁸

Testimonies at the TRC were often viewed as exaggerated, based on bad memory, or simply deceitful.⁸⁹ However, the fact that so many amputations had occurred during the civil war lent physical proof to some of the testimonies. Some of the people who testified were victims of amputation whose scars were visible. While the scars did not tell who committed the violations, where they occurred, or how they occurred, they told a general truth about the war, which was as important as the specific details of the violations. One such victim was Fatmata Kamara, who told the TRC: “The rebels beheaded my sister and took us to Seven Up garage. They killed two of my friends. At that time I was a virgin, I have done nothing wrong, they killed my sister, my mother and father. . . . After amputating my friend’s hand he called one of his boys and he raped me, they said they were still not satisfied, they tied us and chopped off our feet.”⁹⁰ Though the deficit of truth undermined the TRC’s mandate to document, the Sierra Leone TRC process was not too different from others in which the deliberative process and rituals of healing stood in contrast to the deficit of truth as it occurred in both South Africa and Rwanda.⁹¹ This healing and deliberative process was continued by various NGOs that undertook programs to educate the public about the TRC report and furthered the healing process through culturally grounded practices and symbols. One such effort was the work of Fambul Talk.⁹²

The recommendations of the TRC in Sierra Leone were widely praised by civil society and activists because of their sweeping calls for human rights, human development, and social justice. Most of the concerns about the report actually centered on the government’s implementation effort and the international donor support. As in South Africa, reparation was understood largely in terms of promoting human development, notwithstanding the thirty thousand rands recommended by the TRC for eligible victims.⁹³ Sierra Leone’s entire postwar reconstitution program was congruent with the social justice and human development recommendations of the TRC. While the government of Sierra Leone lacked a clearly defined and comprehensive framework for implementing the recommendations, most of the suggestions dovetailed with the PRSP and the overall postwar statebuilding effort. In particular, the good-governance and human development components of the recommendations were clearly evident in the PRSPs.⁹⁴ Two aspects of the TRC report stood out for special implementation outside of the overall national development plan embodied in the PRSR: reparation and human rights.

Reparation centered on both investment in communities devastated by the war and specific payments to people who suffered major abuses, especially amputations and rape. Investments in communities became part of the broader postwar poverty-reduction effort undertaken primarily by the National Commission for Social Action (NaCSA), which implemented small-scale community development projects. Payments to victims of abuse were small and slow, in part due to lack of sufficient donor support. However, some payments were made through the Victims’ Trust Fund that was launched in 2009. In 2009, for example, micro grants of around 300,000 leones were awarded to amputees and victims of sexual violence and funded through the $3 million earmarked for reparations under the UN Peacebuilding Grant to Sierra Leone.⁹⁵ By March 17, 2011, an estimated 20,107 victims were believed to have each received micro grants of around USD 100.⁹⁶ In 2013, NaCSA provided rehabilitation micro grants to 1,300 victims under the UN Multi-Partner Trust Fund (MPTF).⁹⁷

Based on the Lomé Peace Agreement and the TRC report, the Human Rights Commission of Sierra Leone (HRCSL) was established under Act l9 of 2004 and became operational in 2007. The mission of HRCSL was “to take the lead role in building a culture of human rights (including respect for individual responsibilities) which maintains human dignity for all in Sierra Leone in full compliance with the constitution, laws, international and regional instruments, through effective partnership and collaboration.”⁹⁸ The Human Rights Commission of Sierra Leone Act of 2004 empowered HRCSL to investigate and report allegations of violations, promote a culture of human rights, review existing laws, draft legislation, advise the government on compliance with domestic and international human rights laws, and publish an annual report on the state of human rights. The commission was given the powers and status of the High Court in matters relating to investigations of human rights issues. It could issue orders to enforce its decision and refer any person unduly refusing to comply to the High Court for contempt of court.⁹⁹ HRCSL issued annual human rights reports. It also engaged in public education campaigns. Most of HRCSL’s work dovetailed with the justice-sector reform aimed at enhancing the capacity of courts and the prison system to quickly adjudicate cases and treat inmates properly.

In Liberia, the TRC of Liberia, comprised of nine Liberians, was established under the 2005 Truth and Reconciliation Act in line with the 2003 CPA and launched on February 20, 2006. However, the TRC was marred by controversies surrounding the testimonies and its recommendations. Actual hearings began in January 2008, and the final report was released in 2009. The core of the mandate of the TRC was “investigating gross human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law as well as abuses that occurred, including massacres, sexual violations, murder, extra-judicial killings and economic crimes, such as the exploitation of natural or public resources to perpetuate armed conflicts, during the period January 1979 to October 14, 2003; determining whether these were isolated incidents or part of a systematic pattern; establishing the antecedents, circumstances factors and context of such violations and abuses; and determining those responsible for the commission of the violations and abuses and their motives as well as their impact on victims.”¹⁰⁰ However, the law allowed the TRC to address issues prior to 1979. According to the TRC, its report was based on “deliberate planning and engagement with all segments of our society centering on all 15 counties of Liberia and the Diaspora.”¹⁰¹ It collected over 22,000 written statements, conducted several dozen personal interviews, and held over five hundred live public testimonies. It also held consultations with national and local stakeholders and a national conference on reconciliation.¹⁰²

The TRC of Liberia attributed the Liberian civil war to a variety of factors related to poor governance, historic ethnic and social injustices, and ignorance.¹⁰³ It also issued recommendations to address poor governance, promote human development, and foster a national memory that provides community reconciliation and memorializes the victims. In particular, it called for a reparation program of approximately USD 500 million over a thirty-year implementation period.¹⁰⁴ It also recommended the formation of a National Palava Hut Forum to promote traditional dispute-resolution mechanisms, the erection of monuments, the issuance of death certificates to relatives of the victims of the war, and the establishment of a National Unification and Memorial Day and a national memorial ceremony for former President William R. Tolbert Jr., who was buried in a mass grave. In addition, it called on the government of Liberia to issue a public apology for the war.¹⁰⁵

Unlike Sierra Leone, however, the Liberian TRC made very specific recommendations to hold people (including specific individuals) accountable for war crimes. In particular, it called for the establishment of an Extraordinary Criminal Tribunal for Liberia “to try all persons recommended by the TRC for the commission of gross human rights violations including violations of international humanitarian law, international human rights law, war crimes and economic crimes including but not limited to, killing, gang rape, multiple rape, forced recruitment, sexual slavery, forced labor, exposure to deprivation, [the] missing, etc.”¹⁰⁶ It listed specific persons and entities to be tried or investigated for such crimes. In addition, it listed forty-nine prominent people, including sitting President Sirleaf, that were to be “barred from holding public office, elected or appointed, for a period of thirty (30) years as of July 1, 2009.”¹⁰⁷ According to the commission, those forty-nine people were “by their conduct, leadership, finances, and support, actions or inactions . . . responsible for the commission of gross human rights violations, international humanitarian law violations, international human rights law, war crimes, and egregious domestic law violations.”¹⁰⁸

Liberia’s TRC was far more controversial, in terms of both proceedings and recommendations. As with the hearings in Sierra Leone, the truthfulness of the testimonies given to the Liberian TRC were questionable. What was even more problematic with the Liberian TRC hearings was the lack of cooperation and the antagonism from key protagonists in the war. Major players such as Prince Yormie Johnson were reluctant to testify, and when they did, their testimonies and attitude toward the process seemed like a mere joke and an ethnic witch hunt. As Lansana Gberie observed, “I was to see this same attitude on display when I attended the hearings at the Centennial Pavilion. . . . None of the alleged perpetrators who appeared asked for amnesty before they gave their testimonies, and all of them behaved as though what they did—gang-raping women, disemboweling people, participating in mass killings, or leading gangs of fighters (on the orders of Taylor, many said) to invade neighbouring countries where they exported their brand of cruelty—was unusual but not particularly despicable.”¹⁰⁹ Given this lack of cooperation, the truthfulness of the TRC report had to be discerned more through the general story of the war than the specific atrocities.

The punitive recommendations of the Liberian TRC were even more controversial, in part due to the call for sweeping punishment directed at many people. One of the biggest blows was that the Liberian Supreme Court ruled in January 2011 that the ban on individuals from holding public office was unconstitutional.¹¹⁰ Moreover, there were not any meaningful prosecutions as recommended by the TRC. None of the leaders of the warring factions in the civil war were really tried. Taylor was tried and convicted, but only for crimes related to the Sierra Leone civil war. Unlike Sierra Leone’s TRC, the Liberian TRC became deeply politicized. Because Liberia did not have a war crimes tribunal, the TRC effectively assumed multiple contradictory roles as a forum for truth seeking, healing, and retribution. In contrast, Sierra Leone’s TRC was insulated from being a forum for retribution by the establishment of the Special Court for Sierra Leone, which was given the mandate “to prosecute persons who bear the greatest responsibility for serious violations of international humanitarian law and Sierra Leonean law committed in the territory of Sierra Leone since 30 November 1996.”¹¹¹ The Liberian government did not even embrace the report. In August 2008, the Liberian parliament stated that it would engage in a yearlong consultation with constituents before it could decide whether to implement the recommendations of the TRC, which became a cover for doing nothing. Similarly, the report’s call for reparation was essentially dismissed by the government. In a September 2010 report to parliament, President Sirleaf argued that all Liberian were victims of the war in one way or another, making it impractical to single out specific individuals for a defined payment.¹¹² Sirleaf took a broadly defined idea of reparation that was imbued in poverty reduction and the development agenda of the country. While such an approach could be appropriate, the government’s rejection of defined reparation repayments was also tied to its overall effort to discredit the TRC report.

The Côte d’Ivoire truth and reconciliation process began with the creation of the Commission Dialogue Vérité et Réconciliation (CDVR) by President Ouattara on July 13, 2011.¹¹³ CDVR was headed by Charles Konan Banny, commission president. Banny served as minister under Gbagbo from 2005 to 2007, after the Pretoria Peace Agreement, and as an adviser to Ouattara during the 2010 presidential elections. However, Banny was widely viewed as supportive of Ouattara’s presidential ambitions. CDVR also included three vice presidents and seven regular members, the latter of whom represented the Northern region, Southern region, Eastern region, Central region, Western region, Ivoirians in the diaspora, and the foreign residents in Côte d’Ivoire.¹¹⁴ The eleven commission members were installed on September 28, 2011.¹¹⁵ CDVR’s mandate was “to work independently toward reconciliation and the strengthening of social cohesion among all communities living in Côte d’Ivoire.”¹¹⁶ In particular, CDVR was charged with documenting violations, seeking the truth, identifying those responsible for the crimes associated with the war, and hearing testimonies from victims and perpetrators. The commission was asked to recommend ways to help victims, promote social cohesion and national unity, and combat social injustices such as tribalism and nepotism. In addition, CDVR was to educate the public on the virtues of dialogue and peaceful coexistence and promote diversity and democracy. CDVR was given two years to accomplish its broad mandate and issue a report. It issued a preliminary report in November 2013 and delivered the final report to President Ouattara on December 15, 2014. The report was based on expert testimonies and statements from 72,483 victims (including 28,064 women and 757 children) covering the entire period of the political crisis and war (1990 to 2011).¹¹⁷

In contrast to Liberia’s government, the government of Côte d’Ivoire embraced the CDVR report. However, this was partly due to the fact that the process was essentially controlled by the government. Under the ordinance creating the CDVR, the president of the republic (Ouattara) appointed the president of the CDVR. He also appointed the members of the commission upon the recommendation of the commission president. The report was essentially friendly to groups that supported Ouattara during the conflict. In his statement at the official release of the CDVR report, Ouattara announced the establishment of a victims compensation fund in 2015 with an initial contribution of ten billion CFA francs from the government of Côte d’Ivoire and requested international partners to contribute to the fund.¹¹⁸ In May 2015, the government announced that it would start making payments to the roughly 74,000 registered victims.¹¹⁹ In addition, Ouattara promised that twenty billion CFA francs would be dedicated toward justice-sector reform through funding from international partners. While the government’s acceptance of the CDRV report and the compensation payments to victims seemed to be appropriate, both further alienated Gbagbo supporters, who saw the report as biased in favor of Ouattara and his supporters and felt the compensation scheme was skewed in favor of northerners or would be used to influence the 2015 presidential election in favor of Ouattara, the incumbent. Côte d’Ivoire’s truth and reconciliation process was complicated by the no war, no peace state of the country. The failure to end the civil war through a peaceful political settlement created an imbalance in the TRC process and prosecution efforts, both of which were largely seen by Gbagbo supporters as a charade to reinforce Ouattara’s 2010 victory and pave the way for an unfair advantage in the 2015 presidential election.

War Crimes Trials

The war crimes trials were another component of the postwar effort to promote the rule of law. Like the TRC, these trials were contentious. Prosecutions for war crimes were very limited in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Côte d’Ivoire. In fact, only Sierra Leone established a war crimes tribunal. Liberia did not conduct war crimes trials; Taylor, however, was tried at the Special Court for Sierra Leone for his role in the Sierra Leone civil war. In Côte d’Ivoire, the ICC prosecuted Gbagbo and some of his supporters, but none of the Ouattara supporters who fought against Gbagbo were arrested or charged.

Liberia did not pursue a war crimes trial largely because major players in the Liberian civil war were in positions of political power, including President Sirleaf and former warlords Prince Johnson and Alhaji Kromah. The debate about war crimes in Liberia stalled between calls for amnesty as suggested in the CPA and demands for trials as recommended by the TRC. Article XXXIV of the CPA stated, “The NTGL shall give consideration to a recommendation for general amnesty to all persons and parties engaged or involved in military activities during the Liberian civil conflict that is the subject of this Agreement.”¹²⁰ However, no comprehensive amnesty law was passed. Instead, there were contradictory statements of amnesty and references to extant laws that proponents of war crimes saw as efforts to declare self-amnesty. The Liberian government expressed no interest in pursuing war crimes trials and failed to accept the recommendation of the TRC for war crimes prosecution. The fact that Taylor, the central figure in the Liberian civil war, was sentenced to fifty years in prison for war crimes in Sierra Leone and that the key players in the Liberian civil war were entrenched within the government and political opposition made it practically impossible to establish a war crimes tribunal. Though Liberia ratified the Rome Statute on September 22, 2004, it was not very likely that the ICC would prosecute cases related to the country’s civil war, in part because the Rome Statute came into force on July 1, 2002, which was toward the end of the war. Article 11 of the Rome Statute states: “The Court has jurisdiction only with respect to crimes committed after the entry into force of this Statute. If a State becomes a Party to this Statute after its entry into force, the Court may exercise its jurisdiction only with respect to crimes committed after the entry into force of this Statute for that State, unless that State has made a declaration under article 12, paragraph 3.”¹²¹ By the time Liberia ratified the Rome Statute in 2004, the war had already ended. Liberia did not make a declaration “accepting the exercise of the jurisdiction of the Court pursuant to Article 12, paragraph 3 of the Rome Statute.” As such, there is no clear legal basis for ICC prosecution of war crimes committed during the Liberian civil war.

In Côte d’Ivoire, too, the issue of war crimes was complicated. Unlike in Liberia, however, war crimes trials in Côte d’Ivoire were complicated by the no war, no peace situation of the country and the application of a victor’s justice by the government. Côte d’Ivoire’s CDVR did recommended war crimes trials. There were domestic and international prosecutions for crimes committed during the Ivoirian conflict. While some of these crimes were covered by amnesty, there was room for prosecution. The 2007 Ouagadougou Accord states: “In order to promote forgiveness and national reconciliation and to restore social cohesion and solidarity among Ivoirians, the two Parties to the direct dialogue agree to extend the scope of the amnesty law passed in 2003. To this end, they have decided to adopt, by ordinance, a new amnesty law covering crimes and offences related to national security and arising from the conflict that shook Côte d’Ivoire and which were committed between 17 September 2000 and the date of entry into force of the present Agreement, with the exception of economic crimes, war crimes and crimes against humanity.”¹²² The amnesty agreed to under the Ouagadougou Accord did not include economic crimes, war crimes, or crimes against humanity and would cover only crimes committed between September 17, 2000, and March 4, 2007, when the accord was signed. Because the Ivoirian civil war erupted again after the 2010 presidential election, resulting in the death of over three thousand people, there were many war crimes that could be prosecuted under Ivoirian and international law. Côte d’Ivoire signed the Rome Statute on November 30, 1998, and ratified it in February 2013. In addition, Côte d’Ivoire accepted Article 12, paragraph 3 of the Rome Statute, which gave the ICC jurisdiction to prosecute crimes dating back to July 1, 2002.¹²³ Since Ouattara came to power in 2011, Gbagbo and many of his supporters have been arrested, prosecuted, or transferred to the ICC for crimes related to the civil war. Gbagbo and Charles Blé Goudé were acquitted by the ICC in 2019.

The problem with Côte d’Ivoire’s effort to deliver justice for crimes related to the civil war was not the absence of arrests or prosecutions but the selective application of justice against Gbagbo supporters. As Doudou Diène stated in his January 2014 expert report to the UN:

The Independent Expert remains concerned about the calendar for trials currently under way. Seeking truth and combating impunity must be the core priorities for the courts. Ensuring equitable justice means that the justice system must be able to complete the judicial procedures now under way and to initiate cases against both sides, as recommended by the International Conference on Impunity and Equitable Justice in Côte d’Ivoire, held in Yamoussoukro in February 2013. On 10 July 2013 the indictment division issued a decision concerning 84 defendants associated with the former President, Laurent Gbagbo, but no one close to the current Government has been prosecuted for acts committed during the post-election crisis, although according to the report of the National Commission of Inquiry, such persons were allegedly responsible for the deaths of over 500 people. The authorities present only the arrest of Amadé Ouérémi, for the events at Mount Péko, in Duékoué as a sign of balance in the current list of prosecutions. The investigating judge responsible for that case has been transferred to a position as a temporary prosecutor in Bouaké.¹²⁴

Both Gbagbo and his ally Goude, the minister of youth and employment and leader of the Young Patriots, were tried at the ICC after being handed over by the Ivoirian government. In 2019, both men were acquitted. The ICC also issued a warrant of arrest for former first lady Simone Gbagbo, who was held under house arrest by the government of Côte d’Ivoire. In addition, the Ivoirian government detained over a hundred Gbagbo allies in Côte d’Ivoire. By July 2011, the government had charged fifteen pro-Gbagbo associates for crimes related to the civil war and issued international arrest warrants for several others. Another fifteen senior staff members from the Gbagbo government were held under house arrest without charges.¹²⁵ However, the arrests fell short of delivering justice. Instead of arresting people suspected of crimes on both sides of the conflict and giving them a free and fair trial, the Ivoirian government pursued a strategy of pacification against the pro-Gbagbo opposition FPI. In particular, the government used prisoners as an instrument of negotiation with the pro-Gbagbo FPI opposition party. One such case was that of Simone Gbagbo, whom the government refused to transfer to the ICC, despite its pledge to cooperate. Simone Gbagbo, who was arrested in April 2011, was sentenced to twenty years for undermining state security by an Ivoirian court on March 10, 2015.¹²⁶ In 2018, Ouattara released her as an amnesty. This move was widely seen as part of the political manipulation leading to the 2020 election in which Ouattara violated the two-term limit. In other cases, the government released prisoners as a concession to the opposition FPI, which refused to participate in any dialogue with the Ouattara administration. In August 2013, fourteen pro-Gbagbo top officials, including Michel Gbagbo, were released on bail.¹²⁷ Another set of fifty Gbagbo supporters were released in June 2014 with a promise to release 150 more people when the FPI resumed dialogue with the government.¹²⁸ Given the precarious nature of the Ivoirian peace, prosecutions for the civil war only fuel the conflict.

The issue of justice in the Ivoirian civil war can only be settled after peace is consolidated. Côte d’Ivoire essentially followed the path of Liberia, where there was no meaningful justice. Unlike in Liberia, the ICC in Côte d’Ivoire can potentially play a major role in delivering justice because it can prosecute any person for war-related crimes that date as far back as July 2002. However, the ICC faces two key challenges. First, it is perceived to be biased because it has only indicted Gbagbo and his supporters. There are no indications that further indictments would include Ouattara or his allies. The other problem is that the ICC is increasingly losing credibility in Africa because it has become a court that is trying only Africans. In fact, the AU has urged member countries not to cooperate with the ICC in prosecuting sitting African presidents.¹²⁹ In Kenya, for example, the ICC struggled to try President Uhuru Kenyatta, whom it indicted in 2012. In 2014, the ICC was compelled to drop all charges against him because it was not able to collect enough evidence.¹³⁰ Given the growing African resistance to the ICC and the unsettled nature of the Ivoirian conflict, it is highly unlikely that the ICC would prosecute more people for crimes related to the civil war.

Sierra Leone stands out as one of the few African countries that have prosecuted war crimes, even though the Abidjan Peace Accord and the Lomé Peace Agreement provided amnesty. In particular, the Lomé Peace Agreement gave blanket amnesty to Foday Sankoh and members of the RUF, Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), ex-Sierra Leone Army (SLA), and CDF for crimes committed from March 1991 to the signing of the Lomé agreement on July 7, 1999. Article IX of the agreement stated:

1. . . . the Government of Sierra Leone shall take appropriate legal steps to grant Corporal Foday Sankoh absolute and free pardon.

2. After the signing of the present Agreement, the Government of Sierra Leone shall also grant absolute and free pardon and reprieve to all combatants and collaborators in respect of anything done by them in pursuit of their objectives, up to the time of the signing of the present Agreement.

3. . . . the Government of Sierra Leone shall ensure that no official or judicial action is taken against any member of the RUF/SL, ex-AFRC, ex-SLA or CDF in respect of anything done by them in pursuit of their objectives as members of those organisations, since March 1991, up to the time of the signing of the present Agreement. In addition, legislative and other measures necessary to guarantee immunity to former combatants, exiles and other persons, currently outside the country for reasons related to the armed conflict shall be adopted ensuring the full exercise of their civil and political rights, with a view to their reintegration within a framework of full legality.¹³¹

However, this blanket amnesty was undermined by two factors that allowed for war crimes prosecutions. The first setback was the fact that the UN delegate at the Lomé peace talks opted out of the amnesty clause in the agreement. As the UN secretary general stated, “I instructed my Special Representative to sign the agreement with the explicit proviso that the United Nations holds the understanding that the amnesty and pardon in article IX of the agreement shall not apply to international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and other serious violations of international humanitarian law.”¹³² The second setback was that the war continued after the signing of the Lomé Peace Agreement, which meant that war crimes committed after July 7, 1999, were not covered under the amnesty. These two factors allowed for the prosecution of war crimes in Sierra Leone. In fact, the Special Court for Sierra Leone was given the mandate to prosecute crimes dating as far back as November 30, 1996. The only recognized amnesty was the one stipulated under Article 14 of the 1996 Abidjan Peace Accord:

To consolidate the peace and promote the cause of national reconciliation, the Government of Sierra Leone shall ensure that no official or judicial action is taken against any member of the RUF/SL in respect of anything done by them in pursuit of their objectives as members of that organization up to the time of the signing of this Agreement. In addition, legislative and other measures necessary to guarantee former RUF/SL combatants, exiles and other persons, currently outside the country for reasons related to the armed conflict shall be adopted ensuring the full exercise of their civil and political rights, with a view to their reintegration within a framework of full legality.¹³³

The Special Court for Sierra Leone (SCSL) was established in January 2002 under an agreement between the UN and the government of Sierra Leone. The court, which sat in Sierra Leone and operated under international and Sierra Leonean laws, was given a mandate “to prosecute persons who bear the greatest responsibility for serious violations of international humanitarian law and Sierra Leonean law committed in the territory of Sierra Leone since 30 November 1996.”¹³⁴ The court indicted thirteen people; nine were tried and convicted, and four died before the process was completed. Sankoh, RUF leader, died in custody before his trial began, while Samuel Hinga Norman, CDF leader, died in February 2007 during the course of his trial. RUF Battlefield Commander Sam Bockarie died before he could be arrested, while AFRC Chairman Johnny Paul Koroma fled Sierra Leone shortly before he was indicted. Koroma is officially considered to be at large, though unconfirmed reports indicate that he is dead.

The Sierra Leone trials process began in March 2003 with the indictment of several RUF, AFRC, and DCF members for war crimes and crimes against humanity by the SCSL. The indicted RUF members were Sankoh, Bockarie, Issa Hassan Sesay, Morris Kallon, and Augustine Gbao.¹³⁵ Three CDF members (Sam Hinga Norman, Moinina Fofana, and Allieu Kondewa) were also indicted. On the AFRC side, those indicted were Koroma, Alex Tamba Brima, Santigie Borbor Kanu, and Brima Bazzy Kamara. In 2003, the court also indicted Taylor, the former president of Liberia. All nine people tried by the court were found guilty on several or all of the charges and sentenced to prison terms ranging from fifteen to fifty-two years.¹³⁶ Taylor was taken to the United Kingdom in October 2013 to serve his prison time, while the other eight people were sent to Mpanga Prison in Rwanda in October 2009.

With the conclusions of the trials and appeals, the SCSL was terminated in 2013. Under a 2010 agreement between the government of Sierra Leone and the UN, the Residual Special Court for Sierra Leone was established to carry out remaining functions relating to the legal and practical obligations of the SCSL. These included ongoing and ad hoc functions such as prisoner supervision, witness protection, preservation and management of the records, the trial of Koroma in the unlikely event that he was arrested, the review of convictions and acquittals, and the prevention of double jeopardy.¹³⁷

In some ways, the SCSL was considered to be a success. First, the trials and convictions affirmed the rule of law. The conviction and imprisonment of Taylor in particular served as a vivid reminder to warlords about the real potential of prosecution and imprisonment. Others have also noted the educational and outreach role of the court in promoting the rule of law and the peace-consolidation process. As Rachel Kerr and Jessica Lincoln noted, “The Special Court’s Outreach program is far more extensive and ambitious than anything that has previously been undertaken, and marks a significant departure from the ad hoc tribunals, which were criticized for having made inadequate efforts to reach their target populations.”¹³⁸ However, others point to the shortcomings of the court. There was a general belief that the court prosecuted too few people, and some were angered by the prosecution of Norman, whom they considered a hero and defender of civilians against the brutality of the RUF at a time when government and international forces were not able to properly protect civilians. Charles Jalloh provides a rich analysis of the SCSL that captures both the merits and shortcomings of the war crimes trials in Sierra Leone. As he argued, “The Court has ensured that punishment is meted out to some of those deemed to bear the greatest responsibility for the serious atrocities committed in Sierra Leone.”¹³⁹ However, Jalloh points to a wide range of concerns that undermine the achievement of the court. These include concerns about the extremely small number of trails due to a narrow interpretation of the court’s mandate that left important Sierra Leoneans and non–Sierra Leonean actors free from prosecution and about the prosecution of Norman, “who sacrificed so much to stop rebel atrocities,” and Sesay, “who helped to usher peace.”¹⁴⁰ The total cost of the court was around $300 million,¹⁴¹ which many people saw as disproportionately too much spent on the court at the expense of the TRC, strengthening the legal system, and promoting development in general. Friederike Mieth captured a common sentiment about the disconnection between the work of the court and the experience of the vast majority of people in Sierra Leone: “In contrast to the claims by Court officials, many Sierra Leoneans I spoke to describe the work of the Court as irrelevant for them and stated that it has not brought justice to them. Their reasons can be loosely grouped into two categories: that their concept of justice differed from that of the Court, and that their everyday circumstances made the work of the Court less relevant for them.”¹⁴²

The shortcomings of the Sierra Leone war crimes process were not unique. Similar problems about prosecutorial decisions and the disproportionate expenditure on war crimes courts as compared to on reparations and human development have been noted in other postwar countries. Rwanda, for example, faced the issue of limited prosecutions and debates about who was most responsible. In the end, a very small proportion of perpetrators were tried. Rwanda sought to make up for this deficit by instituting the Gacaca courts.¹⁴³ In South Africa, too, the truth and justice process was criticized. Though South Africa rejected a blanket amnesty and opted for individual amnesty, very few people were prosecuted. The Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act (no. 34 of 1995, July 26, 1995) empowered the TRC to grant “amnesty to persons who make full disclosure of all the relevant facts relating to acts associated with a political objective committed in the course of the conflicts of the past.”¹⁴⁴ The TRC granted 849 amnesties and rejected 5,392 applications for amnesty.¹⁴⁵ However, very few cases have been prosecuted. Moreover, the ANC government granted pardons, further reducing the likelihood of prosecution.¹⁴⁶ In the end, South Africa’s truth and justice processes have been strongly criticized for failing to deliver justice. As Mahmood Mamdani argued, “To the extent that the TRC did not acknowledge the full truth, the amnesty intended to be individual turned into a group amnesty. For any perpetrator who was not so identified was a perpetrator who enjoyed impunity.”¹⁴⁷ In terms of the cost of war crimes and reparations, Sierra Leone’s experience is not too different from that of Rwanda and South Africa. Despite the huge postwar development aid to Rwanda, meaningful reparations did not reach too many of the victims, in large part due to organizational and policy priorities problems.¹⁴⁸ In South Africa, the TRC recommended a one-time payment of thirty thousand rands to eligible victims, which was criticized as inadequate.¹⁴⁹ Sierra Leone’s war crimes trial was an important, albeit inadequate, part of the postwar reconstruction program. Yet, the value of the court has to be viewed from the perspective of both what it delivered and what facts and accountability could have been missed out in the absence of war crimes trials that occurred through the SCSL. While a lot more was spent on the court than on other elements of the postwar reconstructions, the court did not necessarily take away money from other programs, as those funds may not have even been available in the absence of a trial. In the end, SCSL has to be accepted for what it achieved and used as a lesson for Sierra Leone.

GOOD GOVERNANCE: CIVIL SOCIETY AND PUBLIC FINANCE MANAGEMENT

The final component of the postwar institutional reform centers on enhancing good-governance practices. While a multiparty election is an indispensable element for good governance, democratic elections alone are not sufficient. The peace agreements and the TRC report as well as studies of the Sierra Leone civil war recognized and identified bad governance, especially corruption, as the key cause of the civil war. Given that fact, enhancing good governance was a critical challenge for postwar reconstruction and the consolidation of peace, and achieving this rested not only on holding regular free and fair multiparty elections but also on strengthening civil society and establishing proper public finance management processes.

Strengthening Civil Society

Civil society has been a key element in the struggles for democracy in Africa that began in the 1990s. In Sierra Leone, civil society organizations, such as Campaign for Good Governance and Fifty-Fifty, were at the forefront to end military rule during the 1996 multiparty election.¹⁵⁰ Organizations like Mano River Women’s Peace Network (MAWOPNET) and the Inter-Religious Council continued to campaign against the war and became key actors in the peace process leading to the Lomé Peace Agreement and the eventual end of the civil war.¹⁵¹ In Liberia, civil society was central to the campaign to end the civil war. Women’s organizations and interfaith religious bodies were critical in the peace process.¹⁵² In Côte d’Ivoire, civil society was at the forefront in the democratization process, which forced long-term ruler Felix Houphouët-Boigny to open the country to multiparty elections.¹⁵³ While civil society was instrumental in the effort to end one-party rule and oust the military from power, its role in the civil war also became divisive as the conflict increasingly took a regional and ethnic character. Because the Ivoirian conflict was not peacefully ended, the role of civil society continued to be muddled, as different organizations harbored strong pro-government or pro-Gbagbo positions. Due to their critical role, civil society organizations received support in the form of contracts and grants from both the national and foreign governments and international organizations. As such, these organizations have become important actors in the delivery of programs aimed at promoting civic awareness on national issues, including human rights, governance, natural resources, and human development, and empowering citizens to hold government accountable.¹⁵⁴

Civil society organizations handled a plethora of programs, and some were aimed directly at helping key players, such as the media, improve their capacity to promote good governance. In 2004, for example, the Partnership for Media and Conflict Prevention in West Africa (which included the UN and UNESCO) and the Press Union of Liberia started the Liberia Media Center (LCM) to enhance civil society and the role of media in Liberia. LCM, which received around $85,100 in startup costs, focused on providing media workers with professional skills on how to investigate and report on crime, corruption, human rights violations, and HIV/AIDS.¹⁵⁵ It also provided resources (e.g., IT services, office space, information sources) for journalists and monitored the state of freedom of expression in the major cities of Liberia.

In Sierra Leone, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) provided around $4.5 million in 2005 and nearly $4 million in 2006 for the Strengthening Democracy program,¹⁵⁶ which aimed to broaden community-based political participation and combat corruption. At the grassroots level, it supported community radio programs promoting public discourse on good governance. In terms of leadership development, it organized training and mentoring programs for parliamentarians and local leaders to promote informed dialogues, transparency, and strong community participation in governance.

As often happens during conflict, politicians and other elites in Côte d’Ivoire used the media as a tool to mobilize and consolidate support, in turn aggravating intergroup divisions and contributing to the violence. In the aftermath of the civil war and the divisive and destructive 2010 presidential elections, donor partners of Côte d’Ivoire provided resources in an attempt to use the media to reduce the potential of violent conflict and promote a responsive state and an inclusive civil society. In one clear example, USAID’s Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI) funded a series of activities known as the Côte d’Ivoire Transition Initiative program (CITI).¹⁵⁷ OTI launched CITI in September 2011, four months after the end of the postelection violence in the country. The short-term transition CITI program ended five years later, in March 2016, after having sponsored 345 separate activities valued at 10.8 billion CFA francs ($18 million), reaching over five hundred thousand beneficiaries.¹⁵⁸ According to the US Embassy in Abidjan, the 2016 closing of the CITI office demonstrated “the confidence of the United States Government that Côte d’Ivoire has definitively turned the page after a long period of conflict.”¹⁵⁹

CITI was designed to help push forward reconciliation and the peacebuilding process in Côte d’Ivoire and to discourage a repeat of violence in the lead-up to the 2015 presidential elections, which had the potential to exacerbate enduring tensions around the issues of nationality and identity.¹⁶⁰ The various CITI activities focused on building state capacity and encouraged community engagement. OTI worked with the Ivoirian government and local groups to identify and respond to community-prioritized needs and encourage a peaceful transition. Radio and television were considered critical tools for facilitating postconflict peace and reconciliation, with a television series promoting women’s participation in the 2015 elections being seen as a particular success.¹⁶¹ CITI programs “mobilized actors as diverse as women, transporters, youth, traditional leaders, religious leaders, victims and those affected by the war, radio station owners and radio animators, community and civic organizations, and many others.”¹⁶² Overall, OTI’s CITI program tried to help increase cohesion among local communities affected by the decade-long conflict in Côte d’Ivoire and support a peaceful, inclusive, transparent, and credible 2015 presidential election.

Public Finance Management Reform

At the heart of good governance is proper public finance management. In Liberia and Sierra Leone, where corruption was a major factor leading to the civil war, major programs have been launched to ensure proper management of revenues from minerals and overall public finances. In 2005, the UNDP established the Diamonds for Development program in Liberia “to facilitate the establishment of a transparent and accountable revenue management system based on a fair and equitable distribution of revenues.”¹⁶³ The program was in line with the terms of UN Security Council Resolution 1343 of 2001, which established an embargo on Liberian rough diamonds and required compliance with the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme. The program, which cost around $6,898,200 (2005 to 2010), centered on making changes in the mining laws to enhance revenue management and local control over mineral resources (especially diamonds, gold, iron ore, bauxite, timber, and rubber). The new laws that were passed aimed to decrease bureaucratic inefficiencies and decentralize national resource management while increasing independent oversight so as to enhance transparency and accountability in the way revenues from mineral resources were generated.¹⁶⁴ With respect to local development, the program sought to ensure that up to 25 percent of profits, taxes, or incomes from minerals was directed to the local governments where the natural resources were extracted. In addition, the program called for the formation of local development funds and microfinanced mining cooperatives to benefit local communities.

In Sierra Leone, the World Bank provided $4 million for the Mining Technical Assistance Project (MTAP) in 2010. MTAP was renamed the Extractive Industries Technical Assistance Project (EITAP) in 2011.¹⁶⁵ MTAP was initiated against the backdrop of the resumption of large-scale mining in Sierra Leone after its collapse during the civil war. After the UN embargo on rough diamonds from Sierra Leone was lifted in June 2003, diamond exports increased to $126.65 million in 2004, a 67 percent increase from 2003. Additionally, Sierra Rutile Limited resumed its operations in 2006 with a twenty-five-million-euro credit from the EU. Also, Sierra Mineral Limited opened its bauxite operation. MTAP sought to promote overarching legal and regulatory reform of the mining sector to ensure sustainable development.¹⁶⁶ In particular, it called for mechanisms to monitor the environmental and social impacts of mines and adoption of the Environment and Social Management Framework (ESMF). ESMF outlined procedures for environmental and social screenings and assessments to measure and mitigate the potential negative impacts of mining. MTAP called for the establishment of a resettlement policy, regulations for underground mining, and trading and licensing rules in line with the Kimberley Process. MTAP also provided material and technical assistance to the National Minerals Agency in areas such as geodata management and geochemical surveys and support for pilot studies on land rehabilitation and the identification of alternative livelihoods for people affected by mining. While MTAP focused more on environmental issues, EITAP’s core objective was to “build the capacity of the Government to manage and regulate the extractive industries sector.”¹⁶⁷ One key indicator of progress toward proper management was admission to and compliance with the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), for which Sierra Leone became a candidate country in 2007. Unfortunately, Sierra Leone was suspended from EITI in 2013 and asked to undertake remedial steps for it to be reinstated.¹⁶⁸ The country was readmitted into EITTI in 2014.

Much of the effort to promote good governance was focused on broader public finance management reforms beyond the mining sector. In Sierra Leone, this began in 2006 with the Institutional Support Project to Strengthen the Public Financial Management and the Energy Sectors (ISPSPFMES), which received UAC 2,790,000 (note: UA 1 = SDR 1; UA 1 = 3,954.06 leones; UA 1 = USD 1.45183) from the African Development Bank (AfDB) to help the government implement its National Strategy for Good Governance (NSGG). The government of Sierra Leone contributed UAC 150,000, which brought the project total to UAC 2,940,000.¹⁶⁹ The cornerstone of NSGG was public finance management reform. ISPSPFMES aimed to assist in building the required capacity to strengthen Public Financial Management at the Ministry of Finance, especially in the Debt Management Unit, the Office of the Auditor Genera, the Office of Accountant General, and the National Revenue Authority¹⁷⁰

In 2009, Sierra Leone received $15 million from AfDB under the Economic Governance Reform Program (EGRP).¹⁷¹ EGRP II, which was launched in 2011, received UA 58.2 million in grants and USD 6.2 million in credit for 2011–2012.¹⁷² The funding was to be provided by AfDB’s Fragile States Facility, World Bank, European Commission (EC), and DFID.¹⁷³ EGRP was aimed at enhancing public finance management reforms. In particular, it focused on strengthening public expenditure management and improving revenue governance in the mining and energy sectors. In terms of public expenditure management, the program called for effective payroll control through the use of biometric verification of public employee payrolls to eliminate the fraud and inaccurate record costs associated with ghost employees. EGRP I introduced biometric verification to the payroll of civil servants and health-sector employees. The biometric system reduced the civil service payroll from 16,000 to 12,000, and associated salary savings of SLE500 million per month were realized. EGRP II extended the biometric to teachers, who constituted about 50 percent of public employees. It was to establish a physical verification of all teachers and ensure accurate employment records were maintained by the Human Resources Management Office and with the Integrated Financial Management and Information System (IFMIS). The program also called for the establishment of a Teachers Commission to maintain teacher records and ensure effective management of the workforce and payroll control. The other component of public expenditure management was proper auditing and oversight, especially by Audit Service Sierra Leone, the Accountant General Department, and Parliament.

With respect to revenue governance in the mining and energy sectors, EGRP II focused on enhancing transparency and accountability. It built on the 2009 Mines and Mineral Act and the efforts to review mining contracts, restructure the Ministry of Mines and Mineral Resources, and comply with the EITI to ensure that the mining sector contributed to socioeconomic development. EGRP focused on ensuring implementation of the 2010 EITI reconciliation and validation reports on Sierra Leone, implementing reforms at the Ministry of Mines and Mineral Resources, and ensuring proper disclosure of mining revenues by the Minister of Finance and Economic Development. In the energy sector, EGRP II concentrated on restructuring the National Power Authority (NPA) and other utility companies through parliamentary and other regulatory mechanisms, undertaking an electricity tariff study, implementing a new electricity tariff system, formalizing power sales from the Bumbuna hydro dam to NPA through a legally binding power purchase agreement, and expanding the use of prepaid electricity meters to enhance revenue-collection transparency.

Similarly, the World Bank provided Sierra Leone a grant of SDR 2.7 million in 2009 to implement the Sierra Leone Integrated Public Financial Management Reform Project (PFMRP).¹⁷⁴ Sierra Leone was to also contribute $2 million, which it received from AfDB, toward PFMRP. PFMRP was aimed at helping Sierra Leone sustainably improve the credibility, control, and transparency of its fiscal management.¹⁷⁵ In particular, it sought to reduce variance in expenditures, reduce payment arrears, increase the share of actual-to-budgeted spending on pro-poor expenditure priorities, and increase compliance with procurement regulations. PFMRP had four main components: strengthening macrofiscal coordination and budget management, reinforcing the control system for improved service delivery, strengthening central finance functions, and assisting nonstate actors (NSAs) with oversight over public finances.

The first component, macrofiscal coordination and budget management, focused on budget formulation and execution and debt management practices. It called for developing a macroeconomic and fiscal framework incorporating realistic aggregate fiscal estimates, improving procedures for revenue forecasting, establishing expenditure ceilings through the medium-term expenditure framework, strengthening the strategic planning capacity, aid policy, and management processes, and streamlining and implementing control procedures for all central government expenditures. With respect to debt management, PFMRP called for the development of a policy on the criteria and limits of public debts and guarantees, the adoption and implementation of a plan to reduce domestic debts and expenditure arrears, the strengthening of the debt database, and the regular analysis of the fiscal position of state-owned enterprises.¹⁷⁶

The second component of PFMRP, reinforcing control systems, centered on legal reforms and improving procurement, accounting, payroll, and auditing practices. PFMRP called for revision of the Government Budgeting and Accountability Act of 2005 and the Financial Management Regulations of 2007 statutory instruments, completion of the necessary local government financial administration regulations, and the strengthening of parliamentary oversight. It also called for the introduction of processes that were in line with the IFMIS and the improvement of standards for financial reporting by various public agencies.

The third component of PFMRP focused on technology and capacity building to enhance public finance management. PFMRP called for the creation of a disaster recovery plan for the IFMIS, the implementation of the budgeting, asset, and stock management modules of the system, the provision of accounting software to local government authorities, and the establishment of ICT support structures within the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development (MOFED) and other ministries, departments, and agencies (MDAs) and an up-to-date website for MOFED. PFMRP also sought to build the human resources capacity of MOFED and the National Public Procurement Authority through personnel training and improved salaries.

The final component of PFMRP was to increase citizens’ oversight over the budget and develop a procitizen public finance management system. PFMRP specifically called for effective information sharing with NSAs (including the media), the dissemination of public finance management information at the national and local levels, and enhancement of the public finance management capacity of NSAs. In addition, NSAs were to be provided grants to help them monitor national and local government budgets and engage in public finance advocacy. The NSAs Secretariat was established within the Ministry of Finance to increase civil society oversight over public finances as called for in PFMRP. NSAs Secretariat undertook public information workshops and issued reports on the annual budgets, primarily focusing on the notion of citizens budgets, which rested on the principles of public participation in defining spending priorities and transparency in the ways revenues were spent.¹⁷⁷

Another important project in Sierra Leone was Public Financial Management Improvement and Consolidation (PFMIC), which was approved on November 27, 2013, for a four-year period (March 31, 2014, to March 31, 2018). The total cost of PFMIC was $28.5 million credit, funded by the World Bank and other international agencies. The World Bank itself provided $12 million toward the project, and the other contributors were the UK Department of International Development ($11.19 million), AfDB ($3.5 million), and EU ($1.81 million). PFMIC, which was aligned with pillar seven of Sierra Leone’s PRSP III (Agenda for Prosperity, 2013–2018), expanded on the previous public finance reform programs. PFMIC had five components: enhancing budget planning and credibility; financial control, accountability, and oversight; supporting the strengthening of revenue mobilization and administration systems; strengthening the local governance, financial management, and accountability systems component; and public financial management reform coordination and project management. The project’s activities were mostly centered on providing equipment to the Ministry of Finance and related agencies in Sierra Leone, training for staff (budget experts, auditors, legislator, civil society actors, etc.), and developing manuals and protocols for the proper management of public finance. PFMIC allocated $1.52 million toward enhancing budget planning and credibility. The activities under this component included improving the forecasting of mineral resources revenues, fiscal-risk stocktaking, establishing a database of identified risks, designing reporting formats for risks, and helping the Budget Bureau adopt a Government Finance Statistics 2001 compliant budget classification.¹⁷⁸

The financial control, accountability, and oversight component was allocated $15.28 million. Its activities extended the IFMIS to forty-three government ministries, departments, and agencies (MDAs). IFMIS was also extended to on-budget donor-funded projects. IFMIS interfaced with the Bank of Sierra Leone debt management system and the customs and tax system. Other key systems created included a treasury single account, a document management system, and an electronic fund transfer system. The financial control, accountability, and oversight component also included the development of internal audit mechanisms to MDAs. Various manuals were to be developed and staff trained to ensure the proper management of debts and funds and enhanced auditing practices. In addition, the operational capacity of civil society/nonstate actors and legislative oversight bodies (the Public Accounts Committee, the Public Finance Committee, and the Transparency and Accountability Committee) were to be improved.

Another $4.56 million was allocated for supporting the strengthening of revenue mobilization and administration systems component.¹⁷⁹ This included providing expert technical assistance to the Reform and Tax Policy Unit and the acquisition and implementation of a robust off-the-shelf tax administration system that would address the limitations of the Domestic Tax Information System and facilitate the transition to ASYCUDA World (Customs Automated System). Other activities included providing technical assistance to facilitate IPSAS compliance of local councils’ financial reports, establishing mechanisms to enhance revenue mobilization, auditing local governments, providing energy-supply equipment to facilitate the work of local councils, and holding training workshops for stakeholders at the local council level.

In Liberia, too, public finance management reform was a key part of the postwar reconstruction. In 2008, the World Bank started the Economic Governance and Institutional Reform Project (EGIR) in Liberia, which sought to “improve the efficiency and transparency in managing public financial and human resources, focusing on revenue administration, public procurement, budget execution and payroll management.”¹⁸⁰ EGIR was funded through an $11 million loan ($8.5 million for public financial management and $2.5 million for civil service reform) and implemented by the Public Financial Management Unit of the Liberian Ministry of Finance in partnership with the World Bank.¹⁸¹ EGIR had two components: public financial management reform and civil service reform. The public financial management reform focused on assisting Liberia’s Ministry of Finance by providing technical expertise and IT resources and updating public financial management laws and auditing and reporting practices. EGIR brought in expatriates and provided funding to the University of Liberia’s public financial management training school to increase local expertise. With respect to IT resources, EGIR introduced Magnetic Ink Character Recognition technology and upgraded computer networks and accounting software to help the Ministry of Finance streamline banking and accounting procedures and reduce the gap between balances and outstanding payments. Additionally, EGIR sought to promote comprehensive tax reforms, increase taxpayer compliance, and enlarge the tax base. Special attention was directed at helping Liberian agencies establish transparent systems for collecting and reporting mining revenues and payments. EGIR also directed resources to help the General Auditing Commission improve its efficiency by providing additional training to its auditors and recruiting more auditors. EGIR included similar initiatives with respect to civil service reform. It installed a computerized human resource management information system to ameliorate fraud in payroll and pension systems and provided funding to the Liberian Institute of Public Administration to train future Liberian civil servants.¹⁸²

Liberia’s EGIR was complemented with other public finance reform projects, most notably the IFMIS, which became the Integrated Public Financial Management Reform (IPFMR) project in December 2011. In 2008, Liberia was granted $3.7 million from the World Bank for IFMIS. The project was to last from 2009 to February 2012. IFMIS aimed to “to improve the efficiency of the Government’s accounting system through the provision and installation of a computerized financial management information system in the Ministry of Finance and through strengthening manual accounting systems in line ministries and counties.”¹⁸³ Most of the funds were for the procurement of basic equipment, software programs, and office materials for rebuilding the capacity of the ministry to perform its core functions.

IPFMR was approved on December 15, 2011; it continued and expanded IFMIS. IPFMR, which Liberia received a $28.55 million loan for, was very similar to Sierra Leone’s PFMIC. The Swedish International Development Cooperation provided $15.10 million. The other contributors were the World Bank ($5 million), AfDB ($4.6 million), and USAID ($3.85 million). The overall objective of IPFMR was to improve “budget coverage, fiscal policy management, financial control, and oversight of government finances of Liberia.”¹⁸⁴ Anchored in Liberia’s “Agenda for Transformation, Liberia Rising 2030” vision, IPFMR was based on the idea that “through strengthened institutional capacity for the delivery of effective PFM and oversight, the government will be able to expand and deepen the scope of reforms in support of reduced corruption and improved service delivery, particularly to vulnerable groups, thereby reducing poverty.”¹⁸⁵ The five components of IPFMR were the improvement of budget-planning systems, coverage, and credibility; the strengthening of PFM legal framework, budget execution, accounting, and reporting; revenue mobilization and administration; the enhancement of transparency and accountability; and program governance and project management. IPFMR was to provide a wide range of training and technical assistance to finance experts, auditors, legislators, and civil society organizations. It was also intended to develop systems to enhance revenue collection and management at the national and local levels, and it helped to procure appropriate materials (computers, software, vehicles, etc.), refurbish offices, and boost the overall capacity of critical agencies.

Another important effort in Liberia was the Public Sector Modernization Project (PSMP), approved on February 10, 2014, for a five-year period (2014 to 2019) at a total cost of $10.71 million in credit provided by USAID ($5.04 million), Swedish International Development Cooperation ($3.67 million), and the World Bank ($2 million).¹⁸⁶ PSMP, which aligned with Liberia’s PRSP, sought “to improve pay and performance management in participating ministries, and strengthen payroll management in the civil service in Liberia.”¹⁸⁷ PSMS focused on key ministries (Education, Finance, Health and Social Welfare, Internal Affairs, Justice, Information and Tourism, and Foreign Affairs), which had around 26,000 civil servants, accounting for nearly 75 percent of the entire Liberian civil service. PSMP was designed to complement other reforms in Liberia, most notably pay-scale improvements, payroll cleaning to eliminate ineligible names, and revisions to the mandates and functions of ministries and agencies, and decentralization. PSMP was expected to boost transparency and predictability in hiring, salaries, and promotion, which would benefit civil servants and Liberia as a whole. Moreover, it would provide a well-structured compensation regime and improve the management of the government wage bill. PSMP had four components: improved pay management ($3.18 million), strengthened payroll management ($3.05 million), improved performance ($3.38 million), and project and program management ($1.1 million). As with the other projects, PSMP largely centered on providing training, research, recruitment, and technical assistance, and help with the procurement of essential materials and facilities for effective payroll management.

The first component (improved pay management) centered on two key problems: how to attract and retain competent managerial and professional staff and how to handle low motivation and engagement among civil servants. To address these problems, PSMP would map out civil servants into grades, conduct remuneration surveys, revise HR policy manuals, develop a pay strategy, and train civil servants for key HR functions. A main goal was getting civil service agencies to submit a pay strategy to the Liberian government for cabinet approval. The second component (strengthened payroll management) was a response to the lack of effective payroll discipline and the weak institutional control, which facilitated corruption in the government payroll. To address these problems, PSMP would prepare and disseminate HR planning procedures, identify staffing requirements, strengthen personnel records, decentralize the Human Resource Information Management System to civil service outreach centers, help the General Auditing Commission conduct independent payroll and HR systems audits, train staff in payroll management, and update personnel files. A major goal was reducing the discrepancy between salaries paid and the personnel roster to no more than 5 percent. The improved performance component sought to increase civil servant accountability and ensure that they delivered on their duties. These problems were addressed by mapping and redesigning existing organizational structures, reviewing the mandates and functions of ministries, preparing draft legislation to amend the structures and functions of ministries, implementing performance management in the civil service, and developing policy frameworks for the establishment of a civil service commission and the appointment of principal administrative officers. The key target for this component was to ensure that each ministry would complete three annual cycles of performance appraisal for grade P and grade E grade civil servants.

In Côte d’Ivoire, promoting good governance was also a crucial part of the rebuilding process, but a lot of the programs lagged due to the intermittent relapses into violence. In 2001, the AfDB initiated the National Good Governance and Capacity Building Programme (PNBGRC) in Côte d’Ivoire to strengthen the rule of law, promote sound public resources management, and reduce poverty.¹⁸⁸ PNBGRC had four components. The first was to support the legal system by boosting the capacity of the office of Inspection Générale des Services Juridictionnels et Pénitentiaires and other judicial bodies through training and IT resources. The second was to provide technical assistance and IT to improve the human resources capacities for decentralization. The third was to enhance public resource management by providing direct capacity-building support to core financial management agencies, namely the General Directorate of the Treasury, the Directorate of Public Debt, the Judicial Agency of the Treasury, the General Directorate of the Economy, the Directorate of Economic Analysis and Projection, the General Inspectorate of Finance, and the Chamber of Accounts of the Supreme Court. The final component was to support the National Capacity Building Secretariat (SNRC), which would coordinate the other three components. Training for SNRC included civil society and private sector involvement. The overriding goal of the PNBGRC was to restore the confidence of the citizenry in state institutions. AfDB provided UA 3.79 million through its Technical Assistance Fund, which covered 95 percent of the program cost.

An important public finance management program in Côte d’Ivoire was the World Bank–supported Economic Governance and Recovery Grant (EGRG), which was approved on April 1, 2008. EGRG I was largely a grant package to help Côte d’Ivoire clear its arrears to the World Bank dating back to 2004 and thereby restore normal relations with lenders. Under EGRG I, Côte d’Ivoire received $308 million to help repay its loans and $35 million in budget support from the World Bank.¹⁸⁹ EGRG I also concentrated on “supporting government-owned reforms to improve governance, transparency and efficiency in public expenditure management as well as advance structural reforms aimed at strengthening governance and transparency in the key sectors of the economy (energy, cocoa and financial sector).”¹⁹⁰ EGRG I focused on policy reforms aimed at enhancing fiscal sustainability, private-sector confidence, and transparency of state institutions.

EGRG II, which was approved on March 31, 2009, coincided with significant progress in Côte d’Ivoire toward the adoption of its first PRSP and qualification for debt relief under Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC). EGRG II was a $150 million grant from the World Bank to expand on the public finance reforms that were started under EGRG I. Though the public finance management and good-governance challenges of Côte d’Ivoire had long been identified and were starting to be addressed, the reality was that the country’s failure to fully resolve the conflict hampered progress. In fact, the World Bank recognized this problem and classified Côte d’Ivoire as a high-risk country for lending. The main source of risk was the nation’s failure to peacefully resolve the conflict. As the World Bank stated, “The proposed operation is of high risk. The principal risks are: (i) political risk stemming from the fragility of the peace process, the upcoming presidential elections, delays in disarmament, demobilization and reintegration, and possible changes of reform-minded ministers after the presidential elections; (ii) macroeconomic risk . . . and (iii) governance and fiduciary risk, arising from vested interests and political intervention, notably in the cocoa, energy and finance sectors, which remain strong and could stall reforms.”¹⁹¹

Ensuring proper public finance management was critical to meeting the development goals set in Côte d’Ivoire’s PRSP. As the World Bank noted, achieving the strategic goals of the PRSP would require “improving governance, transparency and economic efficiency and strengthening the basic functions of government, based on accountability and the rule of law. This will involve: (i) continued and deeper reforms to strengthen public financial management to improve efficiency and effectiveness in public resources and hold the Government accountable for the appropriate use of public funds; and (ii) enhancing transparency, accountability and efficiency of state institutions and processes in the cocoa, energy and financial sectors, which are the two key generators of exports and public revenues.”¹⁹² In addition to the political crisis it faced, Côte d’Ivoire continued to deal with public finance management challenges, most notably in the critical sectors of energy, cocoa, and banking. Some of the challenges included distorted budget cycles, a lack of transparency, expenditure execution problems, inadequate budget nomenclature and classification, a lack of clear rules for budget transfers to local governments, and inadequate controls to prevent corruption. EGRG II specifically sought to address such problems. As the World Bank stated, “The key objective of the proposed EGRG II is to support government-owned reforms to improve governance, transparency and efficiency in public expenditure management as well as advance structural reforms aimed at strengthening governance and transparency in key sectors of the economy. Specifically, it would focus on supporting the Government’s efforts to restore the normal budget cycle and strengthen budget preparation, execution, controls and accountability. In addition, it would contribute to enhancing private sector confidence, investment and growth recovery through improved governance and transparency in the energy, cocoa, and financial sectors.”¹⁹³ EGRG II focused on a range of public finance management problems in four specific areas: public expenditure management, the energy sector, the cocoa sector, and the financial sector.

According to the World Bank, “Public expenditure management has suffered from a distorted budget cycle, worsening transparency, and expenditure execution problems.”¹⁹⁴ EGRG therefore supported reforms and the development of new mechanisms that would improve governance, transparency, and efficiency. The key targets were getting approval of the 2008 budget by presidential ordinance and a cabinet decision on the budget published in the official gazette and major newspapers; ensuring that the Ministry of Economy and Finance submitted draft budget execution bills for fiscal years 2005 and 2006 to the Chamber of Accounts; ensuring that less than 15 percent of cumulative expenses (excluding wages and salaries, debt servicing, and expenditures) in 2008 were executed through treasury advances, instead of the revolving-fund cash account mechanism or external resources mechanism; and ensuring adoption by the Ministry of Economy and Finance of a time-bound road map to separate policy functions from execution and control functions in public procurement.¹⁹⁵

In the energy sector, one key problem was the huge financial deficit, which drained 60 billion CFA francs from the government budget in 2008. The poor financial state of the energy sector was largely due to rising fuel costs, a greater reliance on thermal power, low power tariffs, and a low rate of bill collection, especially from government customers and northern clients. As such, EGRG supported the completion of a full audit of the electricity sector. The audit was to produce recommendations for improving efficiency and financial viability. EGRG also expected improvements to be made regarding the natural resources aspect of the energy sector, such as oil and gas production. The full adoption of EITI regulations was essential. As such, EGRG supported the effort to make the National Committee for EITI operational. In particular, EGRG required the Ministry of Economy and Finance to adopt a work program and budget for the committee for 2008–2009.¹⁹⁶

The World Bank noted that the cocoa sector “has long been saddled with excessive taxation and significant governance problems and has been in need of a thorough reform and improvement in governance and transparency.”¹⁹⁷ Because cocoa generated around 17 percent of public revenues in Côte d’Ivoire, addressing the problems was critical to the country’s ability to achieve the development goals outlined in its PRSP. As the world’s largest cocoa producer, accounting for about 40 percent of total world production, Côte d’Ivoire had huge potentials that were impeded by poor governance and inefficiencies in the cocoa sector. EGRG II focused on three key actions. The first was to reduce levies on cocoa in 2008/2009 by 15 CFA francs per kilogram from the 2007/2008 rates. The other two actions centered on accountability and transparency reforms. In particular, the government was required to submit to the World Bank quarterly reports on investment projects and the implementation status for 2008 projects approved under the Fonds d’Investissement en Milieu Rural (Rural Investment Funds), Fonds de Développement et de Promotion des Activités des Producteurs du Café et du Cacao (Development Fund for the Promotion of Coffee and Cocoa Producers’ Activities, FDPCC), and Fonds de Régulation et de Contrôle du Café et du Cacao (Fund for the Regulation and Control of Coffee and Cocoa, FRC). EGRG II also required steps to be taken toward the proper auditing and restructuring of the cocoa sector. In particular, internal audit reports were required for Autorité de Régulation du Café et du Cacao (Coffee and Cocoa Regulatory Agency), Bourse du Cacao et du Café (Cocoa and Coffee Exchange), FRC, and FDPCC. A committee was to be established to manage the restructuring, and the government was required to adopt a cocoa-sector policy that was satisfactory to the World Bank.¹⁹⁸

The objective of the Third Economic Governance and Recovery Grant Program (EGRG III) for Côte d’Ivoire was to support government-owned reforms to improve governance, transparency, and efficiency in public expenditure management and to deepen structural reforms aimed at strengthening governance and transparency in key sectors. The focus was on supporting the government’s efforts to improve budget preparation, execution, controls, and accountability and enhancing governance, transparency, and efficiency in the energy, cocoa, and financial sectors. The operation provided financial support to the government in light of the unfavorable global economic environment and the fact that Côte d’Ivoire’s annual debt service to the World Bank would remain considerable until attainment of the HIPC completion point. A rapid improvement in public financial management and governance and transparency in the energy, cocoa, and financial sectors was critical to sustain the peace process and financially recover. Specifically, the government needed to ensure that scarce public resources were utilized efficiently and transparently to provide essential public services, that resources raised in the cocoa sector were effectively used to rebuild the sector, and that the overall tax burden was reduced to ensure that the farmers obtained a higher share of the world price.

CONCLUSION: INSTITUTIONAL REFORMS, GOOD GOVERNANCE, AND DEMOCRATIC CONSOLIDATION

This chapter examined a number of postwar institutional reform programs aimed at enhancing human security and promoting good governance across the three cases. Central to the post–civil war reconstruction processes in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Côte d’Ivoire were a number of institutional reform programs undertaken in order to consolidate peace and democracy. These international efforts are deeply rooted in new humanitarianism and people-centered liberalism. The concept of people-centered liberalism holds that democracy needs to be built solidly on good governance. This, in turn, provides the best opportunity for creating the necessary economic and social conditions to reduce poverty, enhance the overall well-being of the population, and ensure human security. Accordingly, the foundation of post–civil war rebuilding lies on institutionalizing democracy around the practices of good governance while enhancing human well-being at the same time. Three interconnected components are at the core of these ideas and their manifestations in postconflict realities.¹⁹⁹ The first is ending the war-related violence and protecting at-risk populations with the deployment of international peacekeepers. Next is mediating the achievement of a durable peace agreement and the proper timing of transitional democratic elections. The third is gaining the support of the international donor community for postwar reconstruction to consolidate peace, strengthen democracy, instill good governance, and promote sustainable human development.

The experiences of Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Côte d’Ivoire show that postwar reconstruction based on the ideals of new humanitarianism and people-centered liberalism—including peacebuilding and statebuilding efforts—is a long, complicated process. Rebuilding after war involves, among other things, setting forth a vision for democratic governance and defining the parameters of state reach into the political, economic, and social spheres, not to mention putting into action programs aimed at ameliorating the overall well-being of the citizenry. In general, postwar institutional reconstruction frequently includes a number of activities, including security-sector reforms of the military and police, the amelioration of human rights and justice through TRCs and war crimes trials, and the strengthening of good governance by supporting civil society and improving public finance management. All of these were examined in detail in this chapter.

Postwar reconstruction agendas are often couched in language referring to the lofty principles of good leadership, shared prosperity, equalitarianism, and so on. These highly theoretical concepts, when correctly applied, can help create deep institutional reforms and changes in overall political behavior that are designed to root out the corrupt and authoritarian practices that led to war in the first place. That said, the promotion of democracy and good governance was central to the reforms in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Côte d’Ivoire. Their consolidation was seen as the critical element to achieving long-term peace and addressing the underlying roots of poverty. As explored in this chapter, the international peace-building and statebuilding efforts included a number of postwar programs aimed at supporting security-sector reforms, human rights, justice, good governance, civil society, and proper public finance management. It is true that in these three cases, the contributions of such programs to peacebuilding and statebuilding processes and outcomes did vary. Nonetheless, these reforms frequently went far, not only in their individual impact but also in their ability to create substantial change in the respective states and the given societies as a whole.