Background
Christian Alusine Kamara-Taylor was born on June 3, 1917 in the small rural town of Kafanta, Tonko Limba Chiefdom, Kambia District in the Northern Province of Sierra Leone to Limba parents.
Christian Alusine Kamara-Taylor was born on June 3, 1917 in the small rural town of Kafanta, Tonko Limba Chiefdom, Kambia District in the Northern Province of Sierra Leone to Limba parents.
He attended the thlocal primary school in Kambia and the Methodist Boys High School in Freetown. He attended the Accountancy Business school in London, where he obtained a diploma in Business Management.
On April 14, 1937, he joined the Sierra Leone Development Company, digging iron ore at Marampa. Here he rose from messenger in the telephone exchange to clerk and in 1937 first met his colleague, Siaka Stevens, when he took over from him as station master on the company railway.
In 1940, at the outbreak of the Second World War, he joined the first battalion of the Sierra Leone Regiment and served in Nigeria, Ghana, India and finally in the Burma campaign, ending with the rank of sergeant.
After a brief spell in the labour department of the civil service in 1945 he joined the United Africa Company as secretary to the general manager, working his way up to become the first public relations officer in 1958.
By 1960 he was in full-time politics back with his old friend Siaka Stevens on the April 1960 constitutional conference. They both insisted that fresh elections should be held before independence, refused to sign the conference report and formed a party which was to become the All Peoples’ Congress. Kamara Taylor became secretary-general of the party, a position he has held ever since.
He won the seat in Kambia East, his home area, in 1962, but the APC was defeated and became the opposition party. He won again with an increased majority in the elections of March 19'67, only to be prevented from taking his seat by the military coup. He followed
Siaka Stevens into exile in London and Guinea, being restored after the counter coup of April 1968. He was then made minister of Lands, Mines and Labour, later succeeding the Finance Minister, Sembu Foma, on May 19, 1971.
Bluff, friendly and very much a man of the people, politically dedicated, but with many of the values of an old soldier who fought for 402 democracy during the war. His appointment as Finance Minister was due mainly to his seniority in the party as secretary-general since 1960 and connections with the President.