Three Years in Lunsar - Sierra Leone

For a while 33 Portland Place London felt like my second home.  

Like the country it represented, it exuded a rumpled old world charm clearly in need of a makeover. Downstairs across a well-worn counter I accumulated numerous visas as I travelled to and from Sierra Leone. Sadly 33 Portland Place  was later acquired by another leaseholder under very questionable circumstances and as a High Commission it is no more.

Lunsar in the early 1990’s had already taken a battering from the fighting. Buildings still standing showed signs of gunfire.



Outside the town lay the rusting machinery that had once chipped away at Massaboin Hill, a mountain of iron ore which in the local dialect gave the town its name.

Lunsar was the base for a swamp rice rehabilitation programme in the surrounding countryside. Security could best be described as fluid as the fighting ebbed and flowed to and from the south and east of the country.

It was hard to believe that the Queen made a State visit here in 1961. Back then some up country towns had street lighting. 
One day I paid a visit to an old Paramount Chief, reduced to tears as he showed a framed black and white photo of his introduction to the Queen during her tour. Outside few buildings were left standing and the street lights had long since ceased to shine.

What makes Sierra Leone special are the people. They are some of the nicest you will find anywhere, despite one of the world’s worst mortality rates and the horrors of what the RUF rebels perpetrated.

The local blacksmith using hand bellows

By 1995 the RUF had reached close to Lunsar and in places were only 20 km from Freetown. This was the time of Executive Outcomes and their highly efficient campaign to secure the Freetown perimeter and push back the rebels. When their funding was stopped in 1997, the RUF inevitably overran the capital with appalling consequences, leading eventually to the intervention of  British Forces.

Now finally Freetown is again buzzing with new investment. A return visit to River Number Two and Lumley beach, the sad remains of Freetown's Cotton Tree and the road to Lunsar are long overdue.

Boarding the Lungi ferry at Freetown

Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone is home to one of the nicest peoples on earth.

The welcome and the humanity are breathtaking. They have the greatest beaches in West Africa and without doubt  the best snapper and chips anywhere.

Sierra Leone also had one of the worst  mortality rate in the world - dead before  40 was not uncommon and that was before the arrival of the RUF .

Almost every  time I collected my team up to go to the field someone has died. It was simply tragic, These were really bright people of graduate standard with huge potential and it was all over for them before they really got into their stride.

 village blacksmith using hand bellows

I was based around Lunsar on a swamp rice programme with  Liberia busily arming the RUF near the border in return for the wretched diamonds.

Diamonds are the curse of this country because of their alluvial deposition. In other places you simply fence off an area, guard it and dig a hole. Here they can be found across river beds, often near the surface - anyone can find a diamond, although only a few of the well connected will really benefit.


The British army did the most outstanding job to stabilise the horrors of what the RUF did to this country

Today everything has changed, which is a mixed blessing. There are  construction programmes which are great for the economy but concerning for the environment especially the beaches. Sierra Leone needs to quickly get a grip before it ends up with similar problems to Cox's Bazaar in Bangladesh.