Editorial: Go Beyond Samoa Bar, Mary!

On Monday, October 20, 2010, the New Dawn-Liberia published a front page lead story headlined: Samoa Bar In Trouble Again.

In that front page lead story, we reported that Samoa Bar, the most talked-about entertainment center in town, was shut down by the Acting City Major of Monrovia, Mary Broh located in the Sinkor suburb of Monrovia.

We also quoted sources close to the office of Madam Broh as attributing the closure of the bar to sanitation reasons.  According to them, consideration may be given to the management of Samoa Bar for reopening, if the sanitation conditions were improved.

But the New Dawn was informed by some workers of the bar that their work place was closed because it was the center of child trafficking.

City mayor Mary Broh, along with her team is reported to have visited the bar, suggesting to the management that “little girls” were being brought from Sierra Leone for the sole purpose of prostitution.

While do agree that Samoa Bar serves as an important meeting point for people of all walks of life, including public officials for the purposes of brain-storming, socializing and  relaxing their mental tensions, it is also  an established fact there have been some unwholesome and indecent practices there.

While we may not want to be in the business of confirming or denying the issue of child trafficking, we are also aware of the various kinds of immorality, including teenage prostitution at Samoa Bar.

Perhaps during her visit to Samoa Bar, Lord Mayor Mary Broh chose to exercise diplomacy about this. But we think, the management of the bar should have been made to understand the position of the city government on all of these immoralities taking place at the entertainment center, as well as institute measures aimed at restoring its decency.

We also think that Mary Broh was not even wrong for applying such diplomacy about the situation at the bar and engaging its management on the sanitary situation there.

We believe the City mayor did justice not only to the management of Samoa, but also its hundreds of customers by drawing the management’s attention to those worst social practices which take place after midnight.

The management of Somoa Bar must consider the action of the city mayor as challenge and discourage the prevailing indecency at the center, other than engaging in acts that would retard the progress of Samoa.

While we welcome the present face-lift being given to the club, it is also our hope that its management will work collaboratively with the Monrovia City Corporation and its police to drastically deal female teenagers and others found in such unwholesome practices.

It is also our ardent hope that Mayor Broh and her city corporation will extend such move to Gurley Street, the ELWA and GSA Junctions, as well as Gardnersville where similar practices occur at the same time just as Samoa bar.

Upon the discovery or observation of any indecent and deviant social behavior, the must be similar action, and that written commitment guarantees must be given for recurrences of such.

We see this as a matter of urgency before things fall apart. We must all understand that our country‘s growth and development must also be accompanied by a respectable and decent social life.