Additional Liberia

Liberia

Heads of State:
        Willaim V. S. Tubman
        William R. Tolbert
        Samuel K. Doe
        Charles Taylor

Consider Liberia, the only Western African country never colonized by European powers. Freed American slaves founded the colony in 1822. It
became an independent republic in 1847. Liberia was rich with water, mineral resources, forests, and agriculture.
Constitution modeled after U.S., with 4-year terms for president. English is official language. Population 3,240,000 (2004.) Half, age 15 and older,
can read and write. For the first 100 years after independence Liberia was peaceful.
1943        William V.S. Tubman elected president. Trained as a Methodist preacher, a lawyer and many years as a judge.
1960’s & 1970’s decline in world prices of iron and rubber causing economic problems.
1967        Tubman reelected. No one ran against him.
1971        Tubman died at age 76 during his seventh 4-year term, having been president for 28 years.
1971        Upon Tubman’s death, William R. Tolbert, a Baptist minister, who had been Vice President for 20 years, now becomes president.
Tolbert is reelected in 1975 and 1979. After 9 years as president Tolbert is assassinated in office, and his body thrown into a common grave.
During the 1970’s economic mismanagement, intolerance of political opposition, and rural poverty produced repeated food riots.
1980        In response to riots, a military coup is led by Master Sergeant Samuel K. Doe, age 30, who had been an army enlisted man since age 18,
with no training or experience in managing a country, or even any business.
1980        Doe becomes the Head of State and summarily kills 67 year old President Tolbert and his associates. Sergeant Doe suspends the
constitution and makes himself a “general.” Doe will now spend 10 years in power before being executed.
1980’s         Massive international debts ($3 billion by 1999) and unsolved economic problems continue.
1986        New constitution. 6-year term for president
1986        In a likely fraudulent election, Doe becomes president of the 2nd Republic. His regime is corrupt and brutal.
1989        Charles Taylor overthrows Doe’s government and executes 40 year-old President Doe. [No wonder incumbents fights to the death rather
than abdicate.]
President Taylor was educated in U.S. and then guerrilla trained in Libya. He will now spend thirteen years in power before being indicted for
genocide, and then escaping into exile in Nigeria.
1990’s        Civil war in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Rebels on both sides in neighboring Sierra Leone massacred and mutilated civilians including mass
amputations of arms and legs, cutting off of women’s breast so they can not nurse their babies, and abducting young girls as sex slaves. Children as
young as 5 are given guns and forced to become solders. The fighting was over the region’s wealth and diamond mines.
1997        Charles Taylor, using unfair tactics, is elected president. U.S. and Britain threaten to suspend further aid because Liberia is supporting
Sierra Leone’s militants with training and financial support.
2001        UN reimposes sanctions on diamonds, along with arms embargo and a travel ban on government officials for Liberia's support of the rebel
insurgency in Sierra Leone.
2002        Of three million citizens, 250,000, mostly civilians, were killed over the past decade, and 2,000,000 were displaced. Refugees fleeing the
armed conflicts, butchering and massacres were in refugee camps that were later deliberately attacked by the rebels. Humanitarian staff were attacked
and killed, and emergency aid and supplies were diverted from reaching the suffering masses. By now, 70% of entire population of Liberia is
unemployed and 80% below the poverty level. The peace attempts made to encourage President Taylor to resign and go into exile fail.

UN Special Court indicted Taylor and others “to hold national leaders accountable for atrocities.” U.S. committed $55 million to that court’s budget.
2003        U.S. marines quickly enter Liberia to protect America citizens. 4500 more U.S. marines are stationed offshore in 3 warships. Outraged
Liberians lined up bloodied, mangled bodies outside the U.S. embassy and demanded to know why the U.S. had not sent troops years sooner to end
the decade long massacres and atrocities of the blacks. The answer may be found in this news article:
“U.S. authorities … pledged to aid the country. The key issue, U.S. officials said, is whether the Nigerians can get the port open quickly enough to
avert a humanitarian crisis. … U.S. Marines could open the port, the critical conduit for food, medicine and equipment …, far faster than their more
poorly equipped Nigerian counterparts. Pentagon officials, however, are extremely hesitant to commit troops to Liberia, a place with strong historical
ties but not strategic importance to the U.S.” (emphasis added)—Wall Street Journal August 12, 2003.

It must seem to citizens of the “Dark Continent” that the U.S. deliberately waits until the demagogues have killed hundreds of thousands and robbed
and devastated their already undeveloped countries. Finally, after enough poor black people have been massacred, U.S. demonstrates it had the
ability to quickly end such genocide. Why must the U.S. wait until hatred is generated against it? That hatred produces emotional individuals who are
willing to sacrifice their own lives by way of suicide to get even with the U.S. for remaining idle while their families and hundreds of friends are
tortured and killed. They can’t accept that a nation that can send men to the moon and back can’t devise a way to prevent such devastation by
tyrants. Why does the U.S. wait? Isn’t it more logical, more economical and certainly more humane to devise a universal plan that all nations will
agree to remove all Heads of State after six years?

2003 President Taylor fled into exile to a jungle palace in the rainforest of Nigeria. Swiss authorities then froze the bank accounts, in millions of
dollars, in Zurich and Geneva of Taylor and “members of Taylor’s regime.” The U.S. Congress offered a $2 million bounty for the apprehension and
imprisonment of Taylor. Nigeria said it did the world a service by taking in Taylor to end the suffering of the Liberian people; therefore, Nigeria
would resist any attempt to capture a man under its protection.

What do the citizens of Africa read about this conduct of the United States? Here is an editorial from the Nigerian newspaper, Vanguard, dated
November 25, 2003:
“Nigeria has reiterated her resolve to protect the former Liberian leader with all her might and described the universal offer by the United States as
tantamount to state-sponsor terrorism. President Bush encouraged Nigeria to take Taylor. The sudden U-turn of United States from that rational
decision taken in the interest of peace in Liberia can not be understood. The United States, which acts as the number-one policeman of the world,
should not through her ransom provoke Taylor's loyalists, (who are still armed.) This might exacerbate the conflict in Liberia. The peace initiative
that is yielding some positive results in Liberia must not be stalled by the kidnapping of the central figure in the crisis, Charles Taylor. The United
States should not be a catalyst to another resurgence of war in Liberia.”
Another editorial, in the Ugandan newspaper The New Vision, dated 14 August 2003, warned that even in exile, Taylor is capable of fomenting
trouble.
“Nigeria is best advised to handle Taylor the way Saudi Arabia treated Idi Amin—no statements, no press interviews, few visitors, restricted travel.
Consequently, Uganda has not had to contend with what could have been the long shadow of the most despotic of them all.”
In March 2006 Taylor is captured while fleeing Nigeria to avoid arrest. He was carrying two 110-pound sacks full of dollars and euros. He is then
imprisoned in Sierra Leone for the war crimes tribunal.
Aftermath: during the decade long civil war, the infrastructure of the county was destroyed. What wasn’t wrecked by mortar bombardment or fires
was ravaged by looters, terrorist and rioters. Destroyed are schools, hospitals, utilities, courts, roads and bridges. Even the two railroads were
dismantled to sell the iron track for scrap. We witnessed similar destruction during the U.S. led war in Iraq in 2003. During the decade, many
businessmen fled the country, taking capital and expertise with them. The complete destruction of the legal system means there is no certainty of
contract that is needed for a climate to induce investors, and that Liberia may very likely become another breeding ground for criminals and terrorists.
Whoever becomes the new leader will have an insurmountable task in trying to restore the country to a normal prospering country. Additional
outside aid and mammoth loans must now be directed to the country.

2004 A World Bank and UN study said $487 million in aid was now needed to try to stabilize the country, including rehabilitating thousands of child
soldiers, and also girls who had been conscripted as sexual slaves. U.S. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell pledged $200 million.

[If the world had a universal six-year limitation, Taylor would have been out of power in 1995 instead of 2003.]
[Instead of waiting until a country is completely devastated, is it not more logical, more economical and more humane to devise a UN plan to remove
all Heads of State after six years? How many times must the world keep seeing the same pattern before calling a halt?]






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