Liberia

Goodbye to all that?

Aug 14th 2003 | MONROVIA
From The Economist print edition

Charles Taylor, Liberia's brutal president, has gone. Peace
might, conceivably, return to his devastated homeland

PERCHED on a velvet throne under a generator-powered
chandelier, Charles Taylor bade farewell to the country he
has done more than anyone else to wreck. During a sweaty,
cant-filled ceremony on August 11th, Mr Taylor repeatedly
drew parallels between himself and Jesus Christ. “I would
be the sacrificial lamb,” he thundered. He was stepping
down as president of Liberia, he said, in the interest of
peace, and because he was being forced to by the Americans.
“God willing,” he added, “I will be back.”

Most Liberians hope not. A clutch of supporters wept as Mr
Taylor and his well-fed wife, Jewel, boarded a jet for
Nigeria, where they have been granted sanctuary and a
sumptuous villa. But back in Monrovia, Liberia's shattered
capital, far larger crowds breathed a collective sigh of
relief. There was little sign of joy, however. Mr Taylor's
soldiers, many of them drug-addled teenagers sporting guns,
wigs and lipstick, were squared off against rebels across a
mid-city front line, as Nigerian peacekeepers started
nervous street patrols. Famished townsfolk have already
eaten their neighbours' dogs and are reduced to scrounging
for snails.

Such is Mr Taylor's legacy. He started a civil war in 1989,
with the stated aim of overthrowing the dictator Samuel
Doe. Doe was overthrown the next year, and tortured to
death on the orders of Prince Johnson, a former ally of Mr
Taylor's. (The death was captured on videotape by a
Palestinian journalist, who had been filming a hostile
documentary about Doe, whose regime recognised Israel. The
tape is still commercially available.) Despite Doe's
demise, the war continued, as rival warlords fought for
control.

Eventually, Mr Taylor emerged on top. He was elected
president of Liberia in 1997, having made it clear that, if
voters snubbed him, he would go back to war. “He killed my
ma, he killed my pa, I'll vote for him,” went his campaign
song. Although Mr Taylor's regime was crooked and thuggish,
life grew slightly better in the first years of his
presidency (see chart), mainly because people could at
least step outside without being shot.

Mr Taylor angered his neighbours, however, by sponsoring
revolts in Sierra Leone, Côte d'Ivoire and Guinea. He is
accused of profiting from the theft of Sierra Leonean
diamonds, and has been indicted in Sierra Leone for alleged
war crimes. His attempts to get the charges dropped before
he went into exile were rebuffed.

To retaliate for Mr Taylor's intrusions on their territory,
the Guinean and Ivorian governments backed two rebel groups
in Liberia, called LURD and MODEL. The rebels' military
success, aided by international trade sanctions and
American pressure, was what prompted Mr Taylor to stand
down. Had he not done so, he might have ended up like Doe.

African leaders rarely censure their brothers, but they
made an exception with Mr Taylor. Three fellow presidents,
including Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, flew to Monrovia
this week to make sure that the slippery despot, who once
escaped from an American jail, actually boarded that
aircraft. Mr Taylor surrendered power to his deputy, Moses
Blah, a quiet former comrade-in-arms, who called for peace
and offered the rebels a vice-presidency.

Will Mr Taylor's departure really end the war? There are
hopeful signs. On August 12th, LURD leaders promised to
pull back from central Monrovia to allow aid workers to
move food and medicine through the port. But they remain
hostile towards the rump of Mr Taylor's regime, and
unfriendly towards each other. An interim government is
supposed to be formed by October; the LURD chairman, Sekou
Conneh, says it should be done sooner, and he should be
president. Meanwhile, in Buchanan, Liberia's second city,
fresh fighting broke out between MODEL and the army.

Outsiders are poised to help. About 1,000 Nigerian
peacekeepers have been deployed: the vanguard of a proposed
West African force of more than 3,000. South Africa,
unexpectedly, has promised to send soldiers. And, after
much hesitation, President George Bush started to send in
some marines to secure the port, patrol the air and protect
aid deliveries. Three American warships are floating close
to the Liberian coast; the Pentagon said 200 of the 2,300
troops on board might soon come ashore.

To outsiders, Liberia can seem baffling. It is easy enough
to understand why so many of the fighters carry toys—many
are children. But why do they also dress up in wigs, masks
and looted bathrobes or wedding dresses? Asked, some reply
that it is to terrify their enemies. But others admit that
it is for mystical reasons.

In parts of Liberia, cross-dressing is a symbol of the
passage from boyhood to manhood, which is why some
adolescent soldiers wear dresses when going about the manly
business of war. Masks play a role in traditional religious
rites. Many Liberians have long believed that the spirit
within a sacred wooden mask can possess the wearer, and
imbue him with its power. Soldiers today make do with
anything that will change their appearance, from Halloween
masks to shower caps. This allows them to distance
themselves from responsibility for their actions, and also,
many believe, makes them immune to bullets.

In the past 23 years, Liberia has regressed almost beyond
measure. The flawed but fairly orderly society of the 1970s
was swept away, to be replaced by mayhem. Those who would
fix the country will need to understand why it broke down,
which requires some knowledge of its unusual history.

Liberia was colonised, not by Europeans, but by freed
American slaves, who declared an independent republic in
1847. Like other colonists, the Americo-Liberians believed
that they had a mission to civilise the natives. They
brought with them the manners and mores of the old American
south: top hats and tail-coats, despite the dizzying
humidity, and Christianity. They inflicted great harm,
notably, in the early 20th century, by enslaving the
locals. But they also brought roads, schools, written laws
and economic development. After the second world war, other
African independence movements saw Liberia as a model. By
the late 1960s, it was one of the continent's most
prosperous nations.

The settlers formed an aristocracy, but it was one which
educated indigenous people could join, by talent or by
marriage. Such aspirations were encouraged. The two
presidents who ruled from 1944 until 1980, William Tubman
and William Tolbert, tried to persuade their subjects that
they should not be content with being peasants, but should
strive to join the industrialised world.

Unfortunately, this raised unrealistic expectations and,
since the ruling class was ostentatiously corrupt,
resentment. Both Tubman and Tolbert ruled through
patronage, doling out jobs and favours in return for
support. Those who did not share in this largesse grew
bitter. In 1979, Tolbert caused a riot by announcing an
increase in the price of rice, from which his family stood
to benefit. The next year, a band of young soldiers broke
into his bedroom and disembowelled him. Their leader, a
semi-literate master-sergeant named Samuel Doe, moved out
of his tiny shack and into the palace, declaring himself
president.

The coup was greeted with elation: Doe promised to liberate
the indigenous people from the Americo-Liberian yoke. To
emphasise the point, he had 13 of Tolbert's inner circle
stripped, humiliated and shot by drunken firing squads.
Much of Liberia's educated class fled the country. Clinics,
factories and schools ceased to function. Despite half a
billion dollars of American aid, which Doe secured by
letting the CIA spy on Libya from Liberian soil, income per
head shrank by three-quarters during his decade in power.

Then came two partly tribal civil wars, one that brought Mr
Taylor to power, and one that toppled him. Perhaps 200,000
people died, and the UN estimates that there are now
450,000 internal refugees in Monrovia. No one has much clue
about conditions in the countryside, but the direction of
the refugee flow suggests that life there is even worse
than in the capital.

Liberia has rubber, timber and diamonds, but today the main
industry seems to be looting. Mr Taylor's men are thought
to be marginally worse, but the LURD are bad, too.
Warehouses in Monrovia were attacked by both sides, who
carried off food, liquor, building blocks, tubs of hair wax
and so on, sometimes pausing to shoot each other. Some
stolen bags of food aid have been distributed to hungry
civilians, but the Robin Hood spirit is rare. “Everyone is
chopping,” said a bearded Indian trader, huddled with
friends on a balcony overlooking the free-for-all.

The Congress building has been stripped to an echoing husk.
Debris litters the corridors. Offices have been cleaned
out, their carpets torn up. Clumps of electrical cables
hang from the ceiling. Last week, as the lawmakers who had
not fled the country met to rubber-stamp Mr Taylor's
resignation, a group of women walked off with the last
valuables: a pile of sofa cushions.

The mother of all clean-ups
In Ghana, representatives of the government, rebels and
civil-society groups are negotiating the form and
composition of Liberia's promised interim government, and a
timetable for elections. But the war may not yet be over
and, even if it is, rebuilding Liberia will be an awesome
task.

Unarmed Liberians all want peace, but the men and boys with
guns are less sure. To persuade them to disarm, they need
to be taught other ways of making a living. That will cost
money, which Liberia lacks. Various countries have started
to pledge funds for peacekeeping and reconstruction, but it
will require thousands of peacekeepers, and an aid
programme spanning several years.

This, in turn, will work only if there is a Liberian
government with which outsiders can work. Some Liberian
politicians, such as Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, a former
presidential candidate, make the right noises about
democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights.
Recent history, however, is not encouraging. Once in power,
all politicians face pressure to steal public money and
share it out among their supporters and kinfolk. A former
minister once wrote that even the Archangel Gabriel, if he
were president of Liberia, would “become totally and
irrevocably corrupted”. And most would-be politicians are
not angels.

Religion may have a part to play in healing Liberia. Prince
Johnson, Doe's killer, is now an evangelical preacher, and
General Butt-Naked, a warlord so called because his men
charged into battle naked, also claimed to have been born
again. Some former foot-soldiers have found, in
Christianity, a way of coping with their guilt. In a
country overrun by drugged, traumatised gunmen, every
crutch helps.

The long climb back to the level of development Liberia
enjoyed in the 1970s will require peace, hard work,
competent government and lots of foreign assistance. How
much aid Liberia receives may, and should, depend on what
efforts Liberians make to help themselves. Some seem
willing. Joseph Roberts, a member of Mr Taylor's
notoriously vicious “Anti-Terrorist Unit”, says his fondest
ambition is to go to school. “If you can learn, nobody can
play with your mind,” he said. Then, pointing to the AK-47
on his shoulder, he added: “You can learn to forget about
this


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