According to a government official on Tuesday, the attacks on Sierra Leone’s primary military installations and prisons were an attempt at a coup that failed, and 13 military officers were taken into custody.
At a press conference on Sunday, Information Minister Chernor Bah stated that the assailants sought to “overthrow the elected government of Sierra Leone.” The attacks occurred early in the morning, surprising both the security personnel and locals in the normally tranquil capital city of Freetown.
“Thirteen military officers are currently in custody and one other civilian … in this incident we are now calling a failed coup,” Bah said.
A coup attempt in Sierra Leone, which occurred months after President Julius Maada Bio was controversially reelected to a second term in June, exacerbates political unrest throughout West and Central Africa. Eight military takeovers have occurred in the region since 2020, including this year’s coups in Niger and Gabon.
Heavy gunshots woke up Freetown residents on Sunday morning as gunmen broke into the main armoury of the nation’s biggest military barracks, which is situated close to the presidential residence in a tightly guarded area of the city.
The assailants, numbering in the dozens, also targeted two prisons in the capital, Col. Sulaiman Massaquoi, acting head of the Sierra Leone Correctional Service, said. This included the central jail, where the majority of the over 2,000 detainees were released.
According to the information minister, over 100 of the released prisoners have returned to the jails amid a manhunt for evading suspects. A civilian was also detained in relation to the incident.
As security personnel attempted to apprehend one of the evading suspects on Tuesday, gunshots could be heard around the capital. The information ministry released a statement saying, “The person of interest has been arrested and is currently in custody of the security forces.”
Lt. Gen. Peter Lavahun, the Chief of Defense Staff, informed the conference that a large number of the assailants were either still at large or in hiding somewhere in the nation.
He stated that although there was no closed-circuit television (CCTV) in the armoury, officials were still verifying the quantity of weapons taken. “We were able to recover two vehicles containing arms and ammunition that were carted away,” Lavahun said.
Much of the population in Freetown and throughout the nation stayed indoors on Tuesday, over a day after the government converted a 24-hour curfew to an overnight lockdown.
Sierra Leone is still recovering from an 11-year civil war that ended more than two decades ago, and its population of 8 million people is among the poorest in the world. West Africa’s regional economic bloc of ECOWAS, of which Sierra Leone is a member, condemned the attacks and sent a delegation to “extend their support and solidarity” to the country’s president.
Political tensions have been present in Sierra Leone since Bio’s reelection, a vote that the opposition has claimed was rigged in his favor. Two months after Bio’s reelection, police said they arrested several people, including senior military officers planning to use protests “to undermine peace.” Meanwhile, neighboring Guinea remains politically unstable following a coup in 2021.
