Liberia: US$4.17M Illegal Logs Slip Through Gov’t Fingers

When Renaissance Group Inc. illegally harvested over 14,000 cubic meters of logs in Compound Number Two, Grand Bassa County, over a year ago, many in the forestry sector had hoped that the government would have moved in immediately and had the stolen logs confiscated with other appropriate actions taken.

Rather, the Forestry Development Authority, which has the statutory responsibility to govern the sector, imposed a paltry fine of US$105K on the logs valued at an estimated US$4.17 million. The FDA later seized the logs, and denied RGI from exporting.

The decision however to have the company fined came back to haunt the country, eventually paving the way for RGI, which had earlier sued the government, to have its ownership restored when the Supreme Court mandated the FDA to allow the company to export its harvests.

The court, which threatened FDA’s officials with contempt charges and imprisonment, said disallowing the company from shipping the logs after it paid the US$105,000 fine would have amounted to a double punishment or double jeopardy — a defense in Liberian law that prevents a person from being tried more than once for the same offense.

The Court said the company was free to export the products since it had paid an administrative penalty, and that the FDA should have appropriately referred the case to the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) for prosecution because the offense significantly harms the interest of local communities and resulted in damage to forest resources exceeding US$10K.

However, the FDA’s decision to fine the RGI, and high court’s decision to allow the company export the illegally harvested logs were greeted with barrage of criticisms as many believes that these “blunders” undermine serious efforts that are being made in the forestry sector of the country, especially in the area of forest governance.

The Independent Forest Monitoring Coordinating Mechanism (IFMCM), a conglomeration of Liberian CSOs in the sector, condemned the processes leading to the harvesting and the subsequent exportation of timber products by RGI outside of the country’s forestry legal and regulatory framework.

IFMCM, described the exporting of illegally sourced timber as a failure of the rule of law and undermines Liberia’s efforts towards attaining higher marks in forest governance globally, a trajectory it has been heading steadily.

The mechanism is a collection of seven Liberian CSOs working together to strengthen Civil Society-led Independent Forest Monitoring (CS-IFM) in line with Forestry Development Authority Regulation 108-07 (Part 7) and Annex VIII of the Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA).

At a press conference over the weekend, the group frowned at the fact that the court was enforcing its January 13, 2022, ruling in favor of RGI instead of holding the company criminally liable.

Jonathan Yiah, a member of the group who read the press statement, said that the single action by the court has set a bad precedent, encouraged impunity, and undermined Liberia’s sustainable forest management. 

“The IFMCM is therefore encouraging the Government of Liberia to ensure that the laws of Liberia, especially, forestry laws should be respected and enforced at all times,”

“At the moment there are unconfirmed reports that RGI, without a forest resource license, is making plans to process the remaining logs, scattered in the illegal logging area in Doe Clan, District #1, Grand Bassa County,” Yiah said. “As long as the illegal logging connected to TSC-A2 remains unresolved, sustainable forest management is being undermined, including issuance of FLEGT license under Liberia’s VPA. It clearly validates statements that Liberia’s forest sector is replete with illegalities.”

The high court decision to allow RGI to export the logs also angered more than a dozen international NGOs who called on the FDA in a joint statement to remain firm in its decision not to allow the logs to be exported.

“We are encouraged by the FDA taking action to stop illegally sourced timber being exported, and strongly support its staffs’ actions,” the organizations, which came from the United States, European Union countries, the United Kingdom, and China and others, said.

“We are extremely disturbed that the Liberian courts, instigated by logging company Renaissance, seem intent to punish FDA staff for doing their duty,” the statement added.

While the IFMCM respects the court’s ruling, Yiah noted, “we believe the FDA’s action to impose fine on RGI rather than revoking its license and prosecuting it for harvesting logs outside a forest resource license area provided the court concrete reason for its ruling in favor of RGI.”

The group said it is commendable the fact that SGS, a system that monitors and verifies all legal logging operations in Liberia, refused to enroll the logs in question into Liberia’s chain of custody system, thereby categorizing them as illegal logs under Liberia’s forestry legal requirements.

In 2018-19 RGI and Freedom Group Liberia (FGL) illegally logged at least 14,000 m³ of timber worth an estimated US$4.4 million at the time on the international market.

An IFMCM briefing and the MoJ-FDA’s investigation confirmed that RGI illegally logged valuable Ekki species in Grand Bassa County, six kilometers outside TSC-A2 concession. 9,000 m³ of the illegally logged timber were exported already in 2019 at an estimated value of US$2.8 million at the international market value during the export period (Jan-Jul 2019).

RGI is now in the process of completing export of the remaining logs now that the lower court has instructed the FDA to authorize exporting these logs, followed by an order of the Supreme Court.

During an April NMSMC meeting, which was held on May 9, 2023, the TSC A2 illegally harvested logs was a center of discussion after CSOs raised concerns to provide an update on progress by the FDA in bringing closure to this illegal logging saga.

One of FDA’s managers, Gertrude K. Nyalay, disclosed that RGI has made two shipments representing 81 of 125 logs processed by RGI outside of Liberia’s Chain of Custody system.