“Ben Urey’s First Step”: A response

In the article under this headline, FPA Staff reports that “. . . Liberians who fought (former President) Mr. Taylor such as Grand Gedeans and some Muslims would have to be placated.”

This statement implies (1) that Liberian Muslims and their fellow Grand Gedeans took up arms and attacked Mr. Charles Taylor and (2), that they (Muslims and Grand Gedeans) must be pacified, appeased by Mr. Urey because he, Mr. Urey, was a member of Mr. Taylor’s cabinet as Commissioner of Maritime Affairs.

We write to set the record straight, as citizen of Grand Gedeh County, as follows:

1. Indeed, it was Mr. Charles Taylor and his illegal insurgency, the NPFL,NOT the Muslims and Grand Gedeans, that planned, organized and launched the military-styled, coordinated attack on the Nation on December 24, 1989, designed to seize political power by force of arms, announced on BBC Focus, with particular emphasis on Grand Gedeh County. The Taylor insurgency captured and occupied the County, with announcement to annex the County to its Northeast neighbor, Nimbacounty.

There was massive looting, plunder, destruction, including massacres and summary executions in the County, such that men, women and children fled their homes into the Konobo and Putu forests and across the Cavalla River into the Ivory Coast. Thousands of others fled to Guinea and Sierra Leone, but the NPFL pursued the fleeing refugees into Sierra Leone, inflicted death and destruction upon them in a foreign country. This incident gave rise to the formation of the Resistance Movements – ULIMO & LPC. Their leaders decided that “we have had enough of ‘Charles Taylor’ and that we will run nor more”.Hence the response to Taylor. They did not pick up arms and ammunitions and attacked a peaceful, Charles Taylor.

2. The argument, implicit in the statement, that Mr. Urey owes some explanation, must be held accountable and “placate” the Muslims, Grand Gedeans and related “politicians-individuals” because he, Mr. Urey, was a member of Taylor’s government, is without foundation and cannot stand reasonable, legal scrutiny, because:

a) Mr. Urey was not the President, informed decision-maker. Hedid not develop nor prescribe policy, but simply implemented approved policy, in so far as maritime affairs were concerned.

b) Mr. Urey and Mr. Taylor are not, obviously, one and the same person. To hold Mr. Urey accountable for the acts of Mr. Taylor is tantamount to “guilt-by-association”. This notion has been debunked, discredited and out-lawed since the Nuremburg, WWII trials.

The challenges to Mr. “Urey’s first step” of his trip to the Executive Mansion, it seems to us, consists of the following:

• Comprehensive, policy and campaign literature, the Party Manifesto,which spells out, in detail, the party’s political beliefs, plans and programs of action designed to achieve pre-determined goals or objectives, if elected. Clear, unambiguous position on domestic and foreign policy:enforcement & obedience of law; population movement – rural to urban; production of rice, etc., our staple food; production of goods & services for export; national transport-communications; education; congestion, traffic jams & streets in the Nation’s capital; land disputes & crime; most importantly, the nation’s image with respect to the Judiciary; public dishonesty or corruption; and the century-old Unitary structure of government. For no other reason, one would think, that any reasonable public administrator or democratic politician answerable to the citizens, would seek change in the light of doing the same thing for more than a century with disastrous results. Throughout 168 years,successive administrations held on to the unitary structure, while the nation became and becomes a “failed State”.

Now, we are told that “Liberia shall remain a unitary state with a system of local government and administration which shall be decentralized with the county as the principal focus of the devolution of power and authority” (Section 1.0, page 2, National Policy on Decentralization & Local Governance, January 2011). Mr. Urey must address this critical issue; for this reason, we provide, hereunder, the difference between the two, main, systems of government – Federal and Unitary. For, according to the announced contenders for 2017, the Liberian nation will or may have to wait for another 168 years or more for change, reforms or “transformation”.

Decentralization – Federal & Unitary

Both Federal and Unitary systems refer to or define “devolution”as decentralizationof power. But there are distinct, important differences and conditions, critical to successful democratic practice, particularly, in the light of Liberia’s turbulent past. In the Federal system, devolution-decentralization is guaranteed by written constitution, with terms and conditions binding upon the central, federal government and its regional, semi-autonomous constituents; whereas, in the Unitary system,devolution-decentralizationis non-constitutional and that the central, unitary government reserves the right to alter, re-arrange or abolish the devolved-decentralized powers without consultation and/or consent of the regional constituents, because, unlike federal system, the regional constituents lack constitutional right to exist, in the first place.

This approach, devolution-decentralization under the Unitary system, is planned, apparently, to safeguard, continue to hold and monopolize Power – socio-cultural, economic, administrative and political – rigidly centralized and held here in the Republic of Monrovia, through and under this outdated and obsolete unitary structure of government, written and enshrined in the nation’s Constitution throughout these 168 years of nationhood.

With Bai M. Gbala, Sr.