Sierra Leone: Rebels Raid a Town in Tupac T-Shirts

Two years after his death, Tupac’s face surfaced in a war with which he had nothing to do. The Inter Press Service news agency reported from Freetown on October 1, 1998: More than 100 fighters from the RUF rebel movement and their allies had raided the town of Kukuna in northern Sierra Leone on the border with Guinea that week, many in T-shirts featuring Tupac’s image. Houses burned, people were killed and mutilated.

A Shirt as a Uniform

A farmer recounted that people initially thought of a rap concert. In Kukuna, the shirt was subsequently regarded as an identifying mark of the rebels; anyone wearing it had to expect interrogations or punishments. The government asked residents not to take the law into their own hands: The shirts cost three dollars and were available for purchase in every major city. An officer explained the choice soberly, stating that a genuine combat uniform cost more than ten dollars.

Already in the first years of the war, according to IPS, wearers of Bob Marley shirts had faced a similar situation. How Tupac’s image lives on worldwide is described in Tupac in pop culture.