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Liberia: Can 'Mama' Ellen fix it?
IN defining an agenda for Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, it is important to first break from the mould of Eurocentric historiography which has painted Liberia as a country founded in 1822 by freed American slaves who were resettled in Christopolis (now Monrovia) as part of the effort of the American Colonisation Society (ACS). This flows from the perverted racist thesis that Africans have no history and that their history revolves around colonial conquests. It is distasteful that in spite of the works of distinguished scholars like Ade Ajayi, Kenneth Dike and Cheik Anta Diop, this pervading Eurocentric view of the history of Liberia still persists.
In understanding the contention for power and the struggle for the resources of Liberia, account must be taken of a more Afrocentric view flowing from the purview of the African Liberians who constitute 95 per cent of the population. We need therefore to discard this Mungo Park discovered the River Niger approach to the country's history.
The Liberian crisis is usually perceived as a backlash of the 1980 putsch by Samuel Doe and the plunging of the country into the reign of militia lords since 1989 when the Charles Taylor-led National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) started a rebellion from Nimba County. This appears too simplistic. The crisis actually had its roots from 1822 when the American freed slaves who cornered choice lands began sidelining the indigenous population from the country's golden eggs. This forcible take-over by the Americo Liberians and the Congos who had the advantage of early start in education became the albatross for this country. To stabilise their hold on the indigenous African population and rein in the control of the economy and politics, the Americo Liberians relied heavily on small militia groups. This marked the advent of the militarisation of Liberian society.
Doe's coup was an attempt by the African Liberians to reassert themselves, after the strings of control by the Americo Liberian dominated True Whig Party government from Joseph Jenkins Roberts to William Tolbert, failed to propel any meaningful development amongst the indigenous community. A large chunk of the indigenous population remained uneducated and disconnected from the economy. Poverty was also very high, stoking the atmosphere of discontent.
Unfortunately Doe departed completely from the popular wave that threw up his regime, became oppressive, dictatorial, corrupt and inept. Nepotism was the order of the day as the Army became peopled largely by his Krahn ethnic group. The ruthlessness with which Doe decimated political elite of Americo Liberian extraction particularly after the 1985 abortive coup of General Thomas Quiwonkpa, bankrolled as part of the attempt to regain power from the indigenous Liberians could be explained in this context.
Although 'Mama' Ellen was cautious in raising the hopes of her war-weary citizens on inauguration day, many seem to expect so much from this Harvard trained and former World Bank technocrat who was also finance minister under Tolbert to fix a country heavily ravaged by war.
We have seen the bile of the World Bank/IMF inspired structural adjustment policies of the 80s and 90s which have not only sapped the economies of many African countries and pauperised their citizenry but underpinned the circumstances that drove them to war. From Congo DR, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Somalia, Cote d' Ivoire and Liberia itself, the story is the same. Even in countries which are close to the brink of a failed state like Nigeria, Ghana, Uganda, Kenya, the effects of SAP in impoverishing the people is visible.
These neo-liberal policies have merely egg on poverty stricken sub Saharan Africa to service a debt overhang of $250 billion. That we can still expect a former World Bank technocrat to fix Liberia, move it on the road to prosperity and assuage the gloom amongst its people is intriguing. In Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone and many other countries in Africa, officials from World Bank/IMF are in charge of the finance ministries and Central Bank, yet those countries continue to glide perilously on the verge of the precipice.
Equally preposterous is the hope of hinging the development of Liberia on the benevolence of the international community and international finance agencies which played ostrich while Liberia burns leaving Nigeria and other poor African countries to bear the brunt. President Olusegun Obasanjo says promoting peace in the West African sub-region has cost his country more than $12 billion. How do we quantify the contributions of many slain Nigerian soldiers survived by hapless widows? Even the U.S. which perceives Liberia as its baby in Africa merely stationed its 2000 marines offshore without getting them involved in direct peace enforcement.
The international community which was eager to spend $5million a day in Bosnia and Herzegovina suddenly went dump when asked for a sum representing 10-15 days of that bill to help Liberia. Perhaps we need to save the frightening comparison between the financial commitment to resolving the carnage in Kosovo and crisis ridden DRC which is 200 times the size of Kosovo and where 3.8 million have died from a war that have refused to ebb. While ECOMOG had been involved in peace enforcement in Liberia since 1990, the Security Council only gave life to the United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) via Resolution 1509 on September 19, 2003. In February 2004, only a paltry $522 million was raised by the international community in New York to support the reconstruction of Liberia. No one is sure whether all the pledges have been met.
One must be circumspect of the renewed American romance with an old ally as evinced by the ubiquitous secret service personnel that chaperoned security during the inauguration day. It is hard to conjecture whether it was an outpouring of altruistic love or inspired by the lure of cornering the country's newly found oil resources in the Atlantic coast as part of the strategy of pushing U.S. import from Africa to 25 per cent.
The United Nations later rose to the occasion by spearheading and funding the Disarmament, Demobilisation and Re-integration (DDR) processes in Liberia. By November 1, 2004, the United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) had disarmed and demobilised over 103,000 individuals characterised as ex-combatants. But there are fears like in others before it that funding for the more fundamental Re-integration process may soon dry up and the international donors may just move on. This has prompted the view that what we may have in Liberia is the DD plus a miserable R. This is frightful making real the possibility of a relapse to war
Conducting a proper re-integration programme in Liberia, where 15,000 child soldiers not only participated in the war but a country whose youthful population have seen nothing but war and the reign of militia war lords in the last 25 years, can be knotty. Other challenges confronting this war ridden country massed by war torn neighbours - Sierra Leone, Cote d'Ivoire and Guinea - is enough to put the nose of 'Mama' Ellen to the grindstone.
How can a semblance of governance be maintained in a country now worse than Banana Island? How can bread be made cheaper than arms on the streets? Beyond Monrovia, the capital, how can security be maintained in the other counties? How can electricity, water, roads and other socio-infrastructure that are either absent or in decrepit state be restored? It is an enigma whether the macro-economic policies of the World Bank and IMF which has seen many Africa countries reeling from despair can drive the economy and development of Liberia.
Re-integration must take a global view of cleansing the Mano River region which provides not only a platform for the criss cross of arms and militia groups but bears the burden of the refugee crisis. It is commonplace to see young boys and girls from Liberia and Sierra Leone everywhere in Guinea said to be having for more than one million refugees. Apart from this Guinea also faces the burden of rehabilitating the volunteers who supported its Army in repelling the rebels that invaded from across the borders.
The collaboration between the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Mano River Women Peace Network (MARWOPNET) to re-integrate the Guinean volunteers is commendable. Since armed conflict impact negatively on all sectors of society, a more inclusive approach like was the case with the peace effort in Wajir District in northeastern Kenya in the 1990s is necessary. But a grand move towards a sustained peace in Liberia would involve committing more resources to supporting the re-integration processes in the entire Mano River region.
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