Taking Care Of Us

The Liberian people have been in the civilization-business for many, many years. History books tell us that civilization began in Africa. Our own history books tell us that a lot of our people were taken as slaves to far away lands and treated worst than animals by people whose skin color was different than ours.

Our history books tell us that there was a time when those who took our people away and used them as slaves decided that those slaves that had gotten their freedom could go back to the land from where their ancestors were taken.

Our history books continue to say that those free slaves who decided to go back to the land of their ancestors were put on ships and sent to Africa to a place that is today called Liberia. That was in the 1820s.

Resettlement in Africa was not easy for our people whose parents had been slaves. Those who came back to Africa had to negotiate with those they met on the land for a place to live We learn from our history books that some of the negotiations for land did not go well. Every Liberian who went to school in Liberia knows the joke we have on the the people of Grand Bassa County.

Who has not heard that the people of Grand Bassa County sold their country for smoked fish? Who can not remember "I will cut your heads off your shoulder as I did old King George....?" How can we in Liberia ever forget these incidents; whether we graduated from Harvard in the United States or from Tubman Technical College in Cape Palmas, Maryland County, Liberia? No matter what school we went to, we cannot pretend to not know our history. Liberians cannot continue to be oblivious and insensitive to the history of their own country.

According to Proverbs 22:6 in the Bible, parents are supposed to train their children so that what is imparted will forever remain with the children who will later become parents themselves. A. Doris Banks-Henries, the Liberian Historian, mentioned the inconsistent land deals so that Liberians, no matter which county they come from, would never again allow land dealers to dupe them. I literally take Proverbs 22:6 and the lessons from our history to mean just that: Liberians should never, ever sell their birth rights for "smoked fish."

The news coming from the Liberian Agriculture Company (LAC) in Grand Bassa County is a serious National Security issue for the country. The Liberian people have suffered a lot. 14 years of a brutal and barbaric civil war did a lot to our people. As I write this, I am still traumatized and have become psychologically deficient from the war that has so many of us scattered around the world. After such a mentally-draining time for all Liberians, the thinking is that those who have been given the responsibility to wake up our people to a new and better future will do things that will not remind us of the dirty and inconsistent deals of the past that eventually plunged the country into 14 years of hell.

We would think that those that the President has picked to help her change the mindset of our people would themselves have changed their mindset and are now in the vanguard of giving our people a sense of belonging, as President Siaka Stevens of Sierra Leone told President Tolbert after the 1979 Rice Riot. We would think that these Ministers and Representatives would be very sensitive to and mindful of the feelings of our people.

The majority of our people may look stupid and ignorant. That notion is so far from reality. My father never set foot in a classroom. He did not read much. But I can put my head on the chopping board, screaming at the top of my lungs, and telling my executioner that my father was never an idiot. Those he worked with at the Firestone Rubber Company, again in part of Bassa Country, can attest to the sagaciousness and Solomonic-behavior of a man who never got a first-grade education.

If our people were considered dumb in the 1800s, we should all admit by now that after more than 186 years and especially after 14 years of eye-opening civil war, the 60% or 70% of Liberians the world considers illiterate are not ignorant.

In Gio and Mano country, there is a saying, the interpretation of which is: I am not educated but I know myself; or, we are not educated but we know ourselves. The less-fortunate people of Liberia know themselves. They know what is good for them. The people of Liberia know good from bad, fake from real; they know when you are just showing off your teeth and when a real smile is emitted; the Liberian people know for sure when a deal will benefit a few and when a deal will benefit the majority.

It is a shame that since 1847 when Liberia declared her independence, we are still talking about a new-found democracy. I live in a place in America where traffic jam is an every-day headache.The authorities want to build or extend a road that would ease the traffic jam. The people who live in the areas where this proposed road is to pass are vehemently against the idea. Even though these people also suffer the traffic jam, they have refused over many years to allow the government to extend the new road through their areas. I have not heard that the people being offered more seeds to plant corn or a reduction in their taxes as tokens of appeasement.

Right now, the authorities are sending people to find out whether the animals presently living in the areas that the proposed road would one day pass, will not be affected by this new road-extension. The authorities want to even make sure that turtles that might want to cross to the other side of the road in the future will not be harmed!

Most of the Ministers in the Liberian government have lived in America. They know exactly what the democratic process is when a development proposal is put on the table. Dr Toe from the Ministry of Agriculture knows this to his finger tip. As President of Strayer University, he knows what he went through to get some of his proposals through the Board of Regents. Like President Doe used to say to General Smith who used to be my ROTC Instructor at LU: Go to Nimba County and show those rebels some of your Fort-Benning tactics. Why did Dr Toe not show some of his Strayer-University tactics during the negotiations with LAC? Why did Minister Johnson not show some of his Internal Affairs tactics during at negotiations. Why didn't they remember the land-for-smoke fish deal that has haunted the people of Grand Bassa County for more than a century and a half?

Don't tell me, Ministers and negotiators, that I know more than you know. Don't even go there by impressing upon the people of Liberia that you have forgotten your own history. Don't try to make our people fell good by allowing rubber stumps to be issued to some of them by LAC or Firestone or any other rubber company.

It takes seven years before a rubber tree begins to produce latex. I wonder how many years does old man Zoegar have to wait before he starts to dig up the cassava he planted sometime in July? I wonder how long Sherporo Kerkula has to wait to harvest the rice he is preparing to plant this year. I wonder and I keep wondering how long will Uncle Nyema Toe in Pleebo wait to sell the peanuts he and his family planted a few months ago? And, I wonder whether Firestone has finally agreed to allow employee Yahkpawolo to plant sugar cane in one of the swampy areas on Division 7.

One thing I have learned from the American people: They take care of their own. When I heard President Clinton saying that America should never allow her people to fend for themselves, and that America takes care of its own, I said to myself: Oh, I see. From that day in the 90s when I heard this, I began to further question the unbelievable, unpatriotic acts and numerous missteps our government continues to shower upon our country and our people.

I was in class at LU with some smart people. We used to compete to be on that Honor Roll List. Many of those I sat with at the College of Agriculture and Forestry went on to get advanced degrees in various specialties in Agriculture and Forestry. One of the smartest guys I ever sat with is Dr Roland Massaquoi. The man had a photographic memory. Who can beat a guy who has a PhD in Plant Genetics and Physiology?

Liberia has many of its citizens living in Liberia who have advanced degrees in Agronomy, Wood Science, Agricultural Engineering, Forest Management, etc, etc.

Liberians need to take care of their own.