Governance and Conflict in the Mano River Union

Introduction and Research Context

Inability to implement effective governance arrangements has ignited violent conflicts in Sierra Leone. The conflicts originated from Liberia and triggered explosive violence in the Mano River Union in Sierra Leone. During the reign of Charles Taylor, former president of Liberia, the Mano River Union became the center of conflict that spread throughout the region. Although Sierra Leone has attempted to strengthen democracy and consolidate peace since 2002, the situation within the Mano River Union remains fragile due to the inability to implement effective governance and maintain lasting peace and security. Presently, Sierra Leone ranks among the world's poorest countries at 180th out of 187 countries on the Human Development Index. Over 60 percent of the Sierra Leonean population lives below $1.25 per day, and over 70 percent of youth are unemployed (UNDP, 2012). Bad governance that fails to create development has been the major factor leading to continued crisis within the Mano River Union.

The Mano River Union (MRU) is a formal political union between Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Liberia with its Secretariat based in Freetown, Sierra Leone. Since the 1990s, the MRU has become the center of armed conflict that engulfed Sierra Leone in civil war. The conflict within the MRU is highly complex, comprising a multitude of actors and interests with no easy resolution. Lack of governance has been the fundamental cause of continued instability in the region.

Research Problem and Gap

Despite Sierra Leone being blessed with abundant natural resources such as diamonds, the country lacks funds to restore peace within the MRU because warlords have used diamonds to amass ammunition. Moreover, Sierra Leone fails to restore peace because it lacks the funds to reintegrate ex-combatants. The primary cause of continued conflict within the MRU is bad governance that has translated into poverty and youth unemployment.

In 2000, the MRU adopted a 15-point protocol to enhance joint cooperation for security and defense, leading to recent improvement in peace and security in Sierra Leone. However, antagonistic relationships between the heads of state of the MRU member nations continue to fuel conflict within the region. For more than a decade, the Secretariat stopped functioning. The underlying cause has been the legacy of bad governance, structural corruption, and mismanagement.

While different literatures have documented bad governance in the Mano River Union as the root of continued crisis (Sawyer, 2014; Nelson, 2003), there remains a scarcity of comprehensive research studies providing solutions to these problems. This study attempts to fill that gap by recommending policies, evidence, and a way forward that will enhance comprehensive solutions to MRU conflicts. The research objective is to carry out a comprehensive investigation of governance and continuing crisis within the Mano River Union, using Sierra Leone as a case study, and to recommend policies, evidence, and pathways to resolve the problems.

Review of Previous Studies

Sawyer (2004) argues that the independence granted to West African former colonies did not lead to effective establishment of democracy. After independence, West African leaders were "preoccupied with a false sense of development" (p. 437), leading to false unity. Presently, African countries have achieved neither development nor unity. In Sierra Leone, a breakdown of governance has led to violent crisis in the Mano River basin. In many parts of West Africa, over-centralization of regimes is the major feature of governance, leading to predatory rule. Analysis of conflict at the Mano River reveals the aftermath of predatory and repressive rule, with the potential for repression and injustice throughout the state.

Uzoechina (2014) supports this argument by pointing out that many West African countries have experienced waves of insecurity since 1975, prompting intervention by external actors. In Sierra Leone, internal conflicts and civil war erupted because of competition to control the state apparatus. Typically, such conflict has been sustained through the predation of natural resources. After the civil war, the state failed to implement effective governance due to failures in disarmament, rehabilitation, demobilization, and reintegration, leading to poorly conceived implementation of security sector reform (SSR) for the Mano River Union.

Peacemaking and peacekeeping in Sierra Leone have been difficult. As Nelson (2003) documents, violations of the Lomé Agreement required a cease-fire agreement in Abuja in 2000. Continued action by the rebel group, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), and the government-allied Civil Defense Force (CDF) eventually resulted in intervention by British troops, who used deadly force against the RUF to rescue UNAMSIL hostages (p. 11).

Clapham (2009) traces the history of the Mano River conflict to leadership failures to integrate political structures since independence. When Sierra Leone gained independence in 1961, it was a unitary state, but multiparty arrangements were not sustained as various ethnic groups maneuvered for political power, resulting in centralized and polarized politics.

Diop (2005) contributes to this analysis by tracing the history of the Mano River Union, formed by Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Liberia in 1973 to enhance economic and customs union and promote economic integration among member states. The union also aimed to consolidate and revitalize a common market and prevent conflict within the region. However, the arrangement was frustrated following violent armed conflict and political instability in Sierra Leone and Liberia. Members of the Mano River Union have faced significant challenges in resolving persisting insecurity and political tension. The underlying instability, prolonged conflicts, and bad governance in Sierra Leone have led to continuing conflicts within the Mano River Union, affecting the livelihoods of thousands of civilians, especially children and women. Warlords deliberately targeted civilians, causing massive population displacement and creating refugees across Africa. Consequently, socio-economic factors in Sierra Leone deteriorated rapidly, leading to extreme widespread poverty.

The continuity of conflict has been attributed to the unwillingness of ex-combatants to disarm, as many lack opportunities to become productive citizens. Additionally, infiltration of rebels and increasing arms trade within the region have contributed to conflict persistence. The physical border between Liberia and Sierra Leone is largely artificial, facilitating frequent arms trading across the boundary.

A 2002 United Nations report shows that the Mano River Union remains inherently unstable due to the fragility of peace-building in Sierra Leone, which threatens regional stability. The constant flow of refugees between member countries perpetuates insecurity. While linkage exists between peace-building and governance, Sierra Leone lacks sufficient funds to sustain effective peace-building efforts.

Proposed Research Methodology

Nelson (2003) argues that peace remains far from being achieved in the Mano River Union conflict because armed conflict in Liberia spreads to Sierra Leone. Despite significant intervention by peacekeeping missions, occasional armed conflict continues in the region. Weak governance—translating into political instability, unstable economic performance, and low human development—poses high risks to regional stability.

Sawyer (2003) points out that Sierra Leone has faced daunting tasks in rebuilding governmental institutions and managing the psychological trauma of war. Efforts to heal the social and psychological effects of brutal warfare remain challenging. Lack of control over the diamond sector is another critical problem. The diamond fields are essentially open-access, serving as sources of wealth for exploitative actors. The government has struggled to control these fields, which are critical elements of conflict. Illegal diamond exports were estimated at 90 percent in 2002, subsequently leading to corruption and criminal activity (Uzoechina, 2014).

The UNDP (2012) highlights that youth in Sierra Leone are a critical demographic concern. More than 40 percent of the population is under 15 and has experienced nothing but war or displacement caused by civil conflict.

This study will employ qualitative research to collect data enhancing understanding of the continuing crisis in the Mano River Union and strategies to bring lasting peace. Sofare (2012) notes that qualitative research provides quality reporting. Qualitative research is a scientific approach seeking to answer research questions through interviews, focus groups, document analysis, and case study. The strength of qualitative research lies in its ability to deliver complex textual descriptions of research problems. Unlike quantitative research, which assigns numerical values to responses, this study deliberately avoids quantitative methods because of their inability to assist the researcher in immersing in the research phenomenon. The strength of qualitative research is its capacity to immerse in the phenomenon to find solutions. The problems arising at the Mano River Union require researchers to engage deeply with the phenomenon to arrive at workable solutions.

This research will use in-depth interviews to collect data. The benefits of in-depth interviews include the researcher's ability to immerse in the phenomenon and gain rich understanding of social and political problems in the Mano River Union. Flexibility is another advantage of qualitative research. Unlike quantitative research, which is fairly inflexible, qualitative research allows the researcher to provide meaningful comparisons of responses given by participants.

The researcher will select a small number of participants for in-depth interviews. Some participants will consist of experts in West African regions. Additionally, the researcher will collect data from local people in Sierra Leone who witnessed the civil war.

Apart from collecting primary data through in-depth interviews, the study will also collect secondary data through document analysis. Document analysis will supplement data collected through in-depth interviews. The combination of primary and secondary research will enable triangulation to enhance the validity and reliability of the study. Triangulation compares data collected from different sources; such comparison assists the researcher in achieving research objectives.

Conclusion and Implementation Timeline

The study will adhere to institutional policies respecting ethical considerations during data collection. To ensure ethical compliance, the researcher will protect the private information of participants from external parties. All collected data will be stored on the researcher's private computer and protected with a strong password to prevent unauthorized access.

This proposal provides the methodology and data collection framework that will enhance understanding of the problems and identify solutions to governance failures in the Mano River Union. The research will be completed within three years according to the following timeline: Chapter 1 (Introduction) from April 2015 to December 2015; Chapter 2 (Literature Review) from January 2016 to June 2016; Chapter 3 (Research Methodology) from July 2016 to March 2017; Chapter 4 (Data Analysis) from April 2017 to September 2017; Chapter 5 (Results) from October 2017 to January 2018; and Chapter 6 (Recommendations and Conclusion) from February 2018 to March 2018. Through systematic qualitative investigation and rigorous analysis, this study will contribute evidence-based recommendations for institutional and governance reform that can support sustainable peace and security in the Mano River region.