The accidental rise (and crushing fall) of Africa’s youngest president

By Paulie Mugure Mugo

On the morning of Wednesday, April 29, 1992, residents of Freetown, Sierra Leone, woke up to the highly unusual spectacle of armed soldiers steering combat vehicles into the city, with heavy machine guns, anti-aircraft weapons, and rocket launchers on display.

The soldiers, fit young men from the 'Tiger' and 'Cobra' battalions, rolled determinedly into town, targeting both the State House, which housed the president’s offices, and the nearby presidential residence. By 8am, the soldiers were firmly installed at the president’s doorstep. They had come to demand better conditions at the war front and essential army supplies. Such as boots.

Among the 60 or so officers were about six men who had been serving together at the war front, and had formed a bond close enough to jointly instigate this fiery visit to the head of state. In their midst was a fresh-faced captain named Valentine Strasser. Young Strasser and his brothers-in-arms quickly stormed the presidential palace and successfully crushed their way into the president’s private rooms, finding him closeted in his bathroom, clothed in his dressing gown.

But later that April morning, as the soldiers engaged President Joseph Saidu Momoh in talks that were just about as warm as an iceberg, it became exceedingly clear that the president was not about to accede to their demands. Who, exactly, did this small band of junior officers imagine they were, showing up at State House with terse demands and a deadline?

By noon President Momoh had taken to the airwaves and heatedly informed the nation what was going on, calling the determined soldiers “misguided.” Big mistake. For the fighters, it was now do or, almost certainly, die. "Misguided” military officers had only one sure fate in the Africa of the early 1990’s. The militants thought fast. Before he knew it, President Momoh found himself bundled into a helicopter and deposited in neighboring Guinea. The youthful soldiers had overthrown his government.

No one was more surprised by the sudden power vacuum, it is said, than the mutineers themselves. All they had wanted when they had abandoned the war front 24 hours earlier were improved battle conditions. And as the anxious citizens waited to hear what was to follow, the soldiers speedily conferred among themselves.

One hour after Momoh’s career-ending proclamation, Captain Strasser, by dint of his superior English-speaking skills, was selected by his colleagues, most of whom were rural, less educated officers, to announce the overthrow of the government. A day later, presumably after what must have been fairly animated talks, another announcement was made. Captain Valentine Strasser was the new head of state. He was 25.

The country exploded. The citizens were ecstatic. After 24 years of sheer thievery by the former president’s party, the All People’s Congress (APC), the people were desperate for change. And the youthful new leaders seemed just about right. Posters bearing Strasser’s image quickly popped up in the streets and a catchy new tune, “Tiger Come Down to Town!”, hit the airwaves.

The new president and his team promptly set up the National Provisional Ruling Council (NPRC), with Captain Strasser as its chairman, and appointed 21 cabinet ministers, retaining only two from the former government. The young tigers rolled up their jungle-patterned sleeves and got to work. 

Corrupt public officials who had acquired wealth dubiously soon found their assets confiscated, with over USD 13 million reportedly recovered from private homes. Electricity supply, previously only reliable in military barracks and in the homes of government officials, was vastly improved. Fuel supply was restored. The price of rice, a favored staple, remained stable, and salaries were increased. Inflation was reportedly brought down from more than 90% to 16%. Work to reconstruct a vital road connecting Freetown and the rest of the country began. The new government promised to bring the ongoing war with Liberia-backed rebels to an end and, finally, return the country to civilian rule in due course.

There was a nationwide feeling of excitement; an electrifying spark of renewed hope for the struggling nation. A tough new tiger had come to town!

But trouble, too, began to surface, laying bare the soft dark underbelly of the amateur regime.

The NPRC “boys”, usually seen sporting jungle fatigues and dark, funky sunglasses, loved a good party. In the early days of the regime, it was rumored that they were frequent visitors at the dorms of a local university, enjoying fun times with their age mates. And beautiful young ladies in Freetown soon began bleaching their skins when it became known that the cool young leaders preferred lighter-skinned - uhm - companions.

There was the sticky matter, too, of state-led “confiscations”. Upon seizing power, Strasser had taken over a palatial mansion built in the 1970’s by the nation’s first president, Siaka Stevens, and made it his official residence, reasoning that the lodge had been built using state funds. Likewise, some members of the NPRC moved into luxurious homes previously occupied by corrupt government officials. They drove the former oppressors' expensive cars and emulated their opulent lifestyles, benefiting from the very assets they had confiscated.

Within a year, a severely damaging story surfaced, claiming that the president and some of his “boys” had stashed away diamonds worth tens of millions of dollars and secretly flown to Europe in a scandalous plan to sell the precious stones privately. They had reportedly used some of the proceeds to buy arms, but had also pocketed some of the cash themselves. The article had been published by a Swedish newspaper. When a local paper carried the story, its editor found himself arrested and charged with sedition.

There was much hidden, it seemed, in that dark underbelly. But perhaps even more damaging was the regime’s sometimes dangerously clumsy handling of crucial matters of state.

Just eight months after the NPRC took power, on December 29th 1992, twenty-six “coup-plotters”, were summarily executed by firing squad on a beach outside Freetown, causing immediate international uproar. Shortly thereafter, the government appeared to have a change of heart and declared a period of national mourning. But the incident generated sustained criticism internationally and remained a persistent thorn in the flesh for NPRC in the months to come.

Later, in an effort to end the ongoing border war, the NPRC recruited thousands of new soldiers, deploying them to the violent battlefront at the eastern border of the country. But most recruits were young and untrained, some having barely entered their teens. The juvenile fighters, disillusioned by insufficient provisions and low pay, soon developed a proclivity for narcotic drugs and looting sprees - soldiers by day, rebels by night. They were nicknamed “so-bels” by the hapless populace.

As Strasser’s time in office wore on, doubts regarding his capabilities as the head of state grew.  Rumors began to emerge that the young commander-in-chief was barely in control of the military. And his cabinet. Who knew - perhaps the president’s malleability was the very reason the mutineers’ communique had been thrust into his hands on the day of the coup?

Strasser also seemingly had difficulties executing his role as the country's diplomat-in-chief. It was rumored, for instance, that during a Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting, the president had been unable to muster the courage to meet with senior personages such as the Queen.

Increasingly, Strasser retreated from the public eye and refused to speak to the press. Reports that he had begun abusing alcohol and narcotic drugs began to circulate. And that his second-in-command, Julius Maada Wonie Bio, barely in his thirties himself, was now chairing cabinet meetings.

The initial euphoria began to fade. The acronym NPRC was transliterated into an unflattering slogan by the tired populace: “Na Pikin Running the Country”; meaning, “It’s the children running the country”.

We may never know why on Tuesday 16th January 1996, Strasser chose to attend a meeting without his customary presidential guard. What we do know is that while in the meeting room with Bio, his second-in-command, a pistol was suddenly drawn and pointed at a startled Strasser. The instantly-former president was hastily escorted to a waiting helicopter and deposited in neighboring Guinea, precisely as had been done to his predecessor.  It was the end of a tumultuous four-year experiment.

In the next three months, Bio, now in control, paved the way for the promised return to civilian rule. Presidential elections were held in March 1996, after which Bio handed power to the winning candidate, and tendered his resignation from the military. Twenty-two years later, at the age of 54, he successfully contested and won the country’s presidential elections. Julius Bio currently serves as the nation’s president and head of state.

“We have attempted to liberate Sierra Leone from shame and restore the vision of what our country should be,” President Strasser had said in an address to the UN, shortly after taking power in 1992. “In spite of our youth, we believe we have demonstrated capacity for leadership and concern for our nation's welfare, which previous governments had failed to provide for our country in the last 24 years. The youthfulness of the NPRC government, therefore, should not be held against us.…”

[Paulie Mugure Mugo is a published author and a co-founder of Eagles Leadership Network (ELN), an initiative that trains and equips upcoming leaders in the area of ethical governance.]