Liberia: Walk the Morality Talk

 

My most recent commentary is called Walk The Talk. Now, I am doing a follow-up focusing on morality. Why focus on Morality? We should focus on the issue because the practice of morality by anyone tells us whether or not the person is credible. 

If the person's practice were to be immoral, then the person would not be credible. But if the person's practice were to be moral, then the person would be credible. The immoral person is dishonest while the moral person is honest  Let us observe the practice of morality from the Church. At an ushers' day program in a big church, a rich married man was invited to be a collection lifter. After the married man lifted the collection, he took one of the ushers, his girlfriend, and the rest of the ushers to lunch.

In terms of the Mosque, there is a Mosque in Monrovia, where some renovation materials were stolen by some members. One of the members got tired of seeing this continuous stealing. So, he used his own money and took over the renovation of the mosque.

We can observe a lot of immorality elsewhere in our society. Here are some examples of immorality. In the newspapers, on the radio, and on television, we can read, hear and see attacks on Morality every day and every night pointing out that liquor drinking is good for making babies; liquor drinking is good for scoring goals in the game of football, and liquor drinking is good at workplaces, including government workplaces. There is a television view showing a man taking a woman by force to some hidden place to rape her. 

We must not forget about the many rape stories of children being raped. Then, of course, there are the factual stories about money being given by some rich people to girls to take them to bed, not forgetting the sex for grades scandal in schools, including universities.  Talking about universities, there is the situation of teachers who do not want to see good libraries because they, the teachers, make money from photocopying thousands of teaching materials and distributing them to students for fees, resulting in the teachers getting their one month's salary in one week, respectively. 

Even look at the materials being photocopied, some of which are about the landing of freed slaves in Liberia in 1822 to begin teaching the natives to be Christians. These stories also tell about how one woman called Matilda Newport used her pipe to light a cannon and killed thousands of natives in the Battle of Fort Hill in 1822. But this story about Matilda Newport is false because the only recorded history of the Battle of Fort Hill did not mention the name of Matilda Newport. 

The name of Matilda Newport first appears in the 1830s as Matilda Spencer and she, later, married a man, a freedman, bearing the surname Newport. The false story about Matilda Newport is being used to dehumanize indigenous people. Patriotic scholars at the University of Liberia published true stories about the Battle of Fort Hill, resulting in pressuring the government of Liberia to stop the observance of Matilda Newport Day on December 1. But the Matilda Newport monument, the Matilda Newport school, and the Matilda Newport street still exist!! Wonders Shall Never Cease!!! 

This false story that seeks to dehumanize indigenous Liberians has led some people to think that Americo-Liberian rule is bad and Indigenous Liberian rule would be good when, in fact, the correct historical record shows that both Americo-Liberian rule and Indigenous Liberian rule are bad but there are good and bad people on each side of the societal divide, The Way Forward for the Better Calls for the Working Together of The Good People, who can be found on each side of the societal divide!!!

No wonder, the veteran journalist Stanton Peabody wrote his Classic Article called The Re-Americanization of Liberia to raise mass awareness about the continuous domination of Liberia by thinking based on American values. No wonder these American values continue to be used by the State managers in Liberia to promote the production of raw materials for export without the prioritization of value addition.

It is this system of the production of raw materials for export that has led to the creation of the problem of poverty generation, thereby preventing poverty alleviation. Poverty generation has become the pretext for violence, including coup d'etat and civil war, as seen in the Liberian Civil War that took the lives of some 300,000 people damaged infrastructure irreparably, and left the Liberian economy unrecovered to its pre-war level.

Yet, the government just sent a high-level delegation to the United States of America (USA) and this delegation met with Senator Lindsey Graham, the racist supporter of former US President Donald Trump who supported January 6, 2021, attempted coup d'etat to overthrow the government of the USA. The government of Liberia continues to look up to the USA for grants, loans, and budget support from USAID, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which are given as public relations gestures to sustain their respective profit-oriented objectives through the production of raw materials for export without the prioritization of value addition.

 With this clear and correct evidence about poverty generation in Liberia, the newly elected officers of the Union of Liberian Associations in the Americas (ULAA), formed to prevent the societal ills in Liberia, are now bent on promoting the societal ills in Liberia.

The pursuance of profit-oriented objects transnationally led to the penetration and the eventual dissolution of the Union of Socialist Socialist Republics (USSR) and Russia is now using the hard measure of war instead of some soft measures to reclaim parts of the USSR, like Ukraine. This is why I wrote my Commentary on The Rain On Ukraine to raise consciousness about the fact that what happens locally can spread globally, an example of which is seen in the current petroleum-related price crisis that leads to the worsening of the prevailing poverty generation situation, thereby increasing the propensity for violence.

In efforts directed at preventing the violence, I took Jerome Korkoya, then Chairperson of the National Elections Commission (NEC) of Liberia to the Supreme Court of Liberia (SCL) in the Tipoteh versus  Korkoya Case to show that Mr. Korkoya was a citizen of the USA and that it is in violation of the Constitution of Liberia for Mr. Korkoya to serve as an NEC Commissioner.  

But up to date, the SCL continues to say that it is not prepared to rule on the Tipoteh versus Korkoya Case. This case remains most important for the transformation of the NEC from an institution that violates the Constitution of Liberia to promote the Constitution. It is only through a constitutionally operational NEC that good persons can be elected to take actions that lead to the good governance of Liberia, where there is Justice for All, the only ingredient for sustainable Peace and Progress in Liberia.