As with The USA and Liberia, Great Britain tried to take extra care with the freed slave state of Sierra Leone. Sometimes, you can’t save people from themselves. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take tour first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
Is it always a bad sign when a President shows up on a current stamp? It does seem to imply a ruler rather than elected representative. He looks to be a friendly enough sort on the stamp, but where was he when the lights went out.
Todays stamp is issue A55, a 15 cent stamp issued by independent Sierra Leone in 1972. It was a 14 stamp issue in various denominations showing then President Siaka Stevens. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents.
Sierra Leone got it’s independence in 1961. A deal had been struck with native but English trained doctor and head of government Milton Margai. Dr. Margai had gained some respect internationally by bringing modern health knowledge to African tribal midwives, which had a positive effect on infant mortality. The deal that was struck was that Sierra Leone would stay in the Commonwealth and the Army would retain a British commander. The British system of handing out spoils to the various tribes was continued. There was some argument about this, Future President Stevens believed elections had to be held before independence to be fair and that the defense forces should cut ties to Britain. He broke away from Dr. Margai’s party and started a new one with money from East Germany and China.
The Royal Sierra Leone Army had begun as the Sierra Leone Regiment of the Royal West Africa Frontier Force. The force had British Officers and local black soldiers. It fought in Burma in World War II. Around 1960, the force disbanded and the country based forces became the nucleus of the newly independent armies.
In 1964, Dr. Margai died and was replaced by his half brother Albert. The wheels started to come off. Albert began promoting only people of his Mende tribe. The army lost it’s British officers so Albert could give the posts as spoils. Albert’s attempt to make a one party state failed and Albert was not reelected in 1968 as former labor leader Siaka Stevens won.
Not so fast though. Minutes after taking the oath of office there was a coup that left Prime Minister Stevens under house arrest. The army, no longer Royal, now had many ambitious leaders and there were a total of three coups before Stevens was allowed to take office. Even after there were many further coup plots and many Generals were tried and hung for treason, including the General that handed power belatedly to Stevens. Prime Minister Stevens, surprising only those who didn’t expect him to be a hypocrite, then passed a new constitution making him President in a one party state. Remember this was what he was fighting before independence. He had since come to the feeling that a one political party state was traditionally African.
Stevens ruled ever more despotically for 17 years until 1985. Late in his term the public education system shut and Freetown suffered a months long electricity blackout because nobody had bothered to import any fuel oil. Somehow such incompetence did not stop President Stevens to be named the Chairman of the Organization of African Unity. In terms of African unity he did manage to form an economic union with Liberia, and later Guinea and the Ivory Coast. This was called the group of total losers, excuse me, the Manu River Union. In 2016 the group announced a multi nation parliament to coordinate law making. Watch out EU!
Well my drink is empty and I think I will have another to celebrate that I live nowhere near the Manu River. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting