Sierra Leone Essay

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Sierra Leone is a very small nation in West Africa with a population of 6.205 Million and a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of $4.892 billion in 2014 according to the World Bank. The country is blessed with abundant of natural resources, fertile soil and good climate, despite all the plenty natural resources; it is still one of the poorest countries in the world. The irony is that, its people are very poor and the country is very rich. The economy is mainly dominated by agriculture and mining. The Gross National Income (GNI) per capita is not that much due to bad governance, 11 years of brutal civil war, poverty and regionalism. Below is the data analysis.

The Gross National Income (GNI) per capita during the 60s and 70s were indeed low because …show more content…

Hirsch (2001:25) and Davies (2000:345) have both argued that, “Sierra Leone produced US$ 300-US$450 million worth of diamonds annually in the 1980s and 1990s which were apparently smuggled from the country through Liberia and Ivory Coast leaving majority of Sierra Leoneans in extreme poverty.” Which lead to an 11 year of brutal civil war. The country was in a state of collapse during the 80s when President Stevens hosted the African Union (AU) Summit which was very expensive and uncalled for, the aftermath was very severe on the economy, since then the economy has never been the same. People were devastated and angry as unemployment and poverty rate became very high which led to the formation of the “lumpen youths”-a disgruntled anti-social movement of drug addicts, thieves and gamblers that are unemployed and unemployable. A term coined by Abdulla in his book “Democracy and Terror: The Sierra Leone Civil War.” The Revolutionary United Front (RUF) gained momentum as they started controlling the diamond areas such as Koidu. Diamonds financed the rebellion or war which prolonged the civil war. The Rebels exported bunch of diamonds during the civil war it was estimated that, they annually export $20-70 million worth of diamonds a year for some years which finally shattered the economy as diamond was the main economic resources, the GNI per capita drastically declined due to the civil

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