Stevens was sworn in as executive president. Opposition to the government
             was gradually eliminated; in elections held in May 1973, the APC was unopposed. In 1975 Sierra
             Leone signed a trade and aid agreement with the European Community (now the European Union)
             and helped form the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).
             In 1978 a new constitution made the country a one-party state, and Stevens was sworn in for a
             new seven year term in office. The APC was, thereafter, the only legal party. In the early 1980s
             Sierra Leone suffered an economic slowdown, as sagging export revenues left the government
             unable to pay for essential imports. In November 1985 Stevens retired, and Major General Joseph
             Saidu Momoh was sworn in as president the following January. A coup attempt was suppressed in
             March 1987, and in November the president declared a state of economic emergency. Early in
             1991 guerrillas spilling over from the Liberian civil war captured several towns near the Liberian
             border; Guinea and Nigeria supplied military aid to the Sierra Leone government to contain the
             threat. As government forces fought back the Liberian guerrillas, a Sierra Leonean rebel group,
             The Revolutionary United Front (RUF), Sprang up to take territory of its own, and a brutal civil
             war followed. A new constitution providing for a multiparty system was adopted in September. In
             April 1992, however, Momoh was ousted in a military coup and replaced by Captain Valentine
             Strasser. Strasser's government reduced street crime and lowered inflation from 115 percent to 15
             percent. This allowed the country to receive more than $300 million in global aid packages.
             Strasser was accused of restricting free press practices, having his political enemies executed, and
             for continuing the civil war. In 1994 he endorsed a two-year transition to multiparty democracy,
             with elections scheduled for 1996. (Conteh-Morgan, Dixon-Fyle pp....