Sierra Leone, 2023 — military coup attempt

Event Summary

On 26 November 2023 armed men attacked military barracks, a prison, and other sites in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone, in coordinated Sunday assaults that the government described as a failed coup attempt against President Julius Maada Bio. The West African country, which had emerged from a brutal 1991 to 2002 civil war and more recently from a tense, disputed June 2023 election that returned Bio to power amid opposition claims of fraud, was thrown into alarm as gunmen raided the main military barracks and armory at Wilberforce, broke into prisons freeing around 2,000 inmates, and clashed with security forces across the city. The government imposed a nationwide curfew, and after hours of fighting that killed about 20 people, mostly soldiers and attackers, security forces regained control and said the situation was contained.

Officials characterized the assault as an attempt to seize power and undermine constitutional order, and authorities subsequently arrested numerous suspects, including military officers and associates of the former president Ernest Bai Koroma, who was later charged in connection with the plot. Bio survived and remained in office, though the episode underscored Sierra Leone's fragile post election tensions.