By Alfred P.B. Kiadii
In the wake of the geometrical progression of the exchange rate, compounded by the worsening living standards in the homeland, a looming crisis is on the horizon in Liberia. However, our friends on the campus in the geographic propinquity of Bernard Beach are either on “jolly jolly” or watching television soap opera, or in the state of denial. At least the ordinary people, who learn from experience, are seeing through the scheme and thus disassociating themselves from the so-called pro-poor chorus. The once duped people now agree with this writer and other progressive nationalists that the Weah presidency is sliding the homeland into political sclerosis and social disintegration.
Today, reality has slapped elements of the Coalition for Democratic Change (CDC). There is a looming tragedy. And the regime is on life support. There is a rising disillusionment in the people. As days pass, there is a huge influx of people who are getting disillusioned. The revolutionary potency of the people is getting clearer by the day. In the once traditional bases of the CDC, the deafening grumbling of the people might just metamorphose into a massive revolt. In this state of sclerosis, uncertainty and paralysis, the Weah government is exhibiting symptom of paranoia.
Well, we were told to pray for President Weah. We were told to keep quiet. We were told it is too soon. Before we started praying for him, he didn’t break his three houses to build new ones. As soon as we started praying for him, he broke three of his houses and is simultaneously building three palaces. Again, we were told to pray for his officials. Before we could pray, Nathaniel McGill didn’t get loan from LBDI to pay for his house. As soon as we started praying for him, he got a loan and purchased a house. The masses, on the other hand, have been heavily encroached on by poverty and mystery.
Additionally, when we didn’t pray the wage bill of the government was US$296 million. As soon as we started to pray for the government, the wage bill ballooned to US$ 310 million, and civil servants increased from 40,000 to 70, 000—no salient public administrative reason for such increment but has more to do with patronage and political accommodation with root in the inundation of the bureaucracy with pliant stooges to protect parochial interests. Before we could pray for President Weah, he didn’t employ fourteen of his girlfriends, a list which we circulated previously. Now, he has appointed 14 of them in critical sectors of the bureaucracy.
How is it a regime which basks with self-righteousness about liberating the people have not only held on to the value, taste and appetite of the people they democratically overthrew but have become bad imitators and ridiculous copy cats of said values. How can a liberating regime consciously choose to do business with fraudulent business establishments and give careerist deplorables places of pride in the current arrangement? It is only a regime which is conceived in fraud that will bleed the republic like the way Weah and his coterie of economic henchmen are doing.
Herein unveils the Weah government and its political leaning. It is essentially a regime which promotes black fascism. Unlike its Western variant which emphasizes racial superiority and centralized autocratic leadership, Black fascism is based on no social category but ruthless violence and force. Thus, it is in this context that the rise of police repression in Liberia that has its genesis in repressing critical voices, the independent media and the radicalized student community must be placed.
In addition, this ideology is heavily associated with intellectually dwarfish leaders in Africa like Idi Amin, Jean Bedel Bokassa and Mobutu Sese Seko type. It is from this tradition that President Weah emerges. On first site the regime will trade lies and prevarications in order to conceal its inadequacies. However, the time is coming when it will run out of lies and excuses, then open oppression will be the last weapon in its arsenal as the mass of people will begin to clamor against the untold hardship and poverty.
A bruised people, pitiful marketers, hungry students, lumpen masses, poor peasantry, frustrated professionals vacillating the homeland in search of livelihood. While elements of the government on the other hand, display vulgar wealth and gaudy costumes in the scandalous of factions. Here, there is a paradox which depicts the polarization of class society and the wholesale farce of bourgeois democracy. The collective wealth which is owned by all the people— is exploited by foreign capital which haunts for surplus profit. Since the national bourgeoisie is the office boy of foreign capital, it is then given crumbs. While the whole people, are left to eke out the soil for survival.
Our people are beginning to realize what we articulated during the height of the 2017 presidential election. The moment of epiphany will hit them and the naked reality will set in that the CDC-led government is not only driven by that irrational impulse—greed—it is a ridiculous fraud perpetrated on them.
Well, we have prayed; we have kept quiet; we have lavished the President with an honorary degree, and we have even closed our eyes on egregious excesses of the regime. Our prayers have not produced a single result; our quietude has exacerbated the worsening living conditions; our praises of President Weah has led to him disregarding the sacred Constitution that regulate our conducts; and we have been labelled as “enemies of the state” and told to “shut up.” Must we indulge this hardship and play indifference to the imminent danger that hovers over our country? Must we play lethargy and allow this man to transform the homeland into a gambling casino? If we do so, we are accomplices in the act of plunder. If we do so, we have chosen to let ourselves down and our country. We have two options: we can choose to accept this nightmare without doing anything—this path makes us candidate for victimization; we can choose to fight to oppose this national scandal and win over our country—this path guarantees a future for our country and it affords us another opportunity to create a nation in this space with a new nationalism and itinerary to unleash social transformation.
It is either we struggle or perish—there is no third way. Silence, in this current situation is a luxury. To remain silent in this cobweb of corruption will not insulate you when the disaster comes. It is better to fight to redeem the homeland than to sit idle and perish in poverty.
Kiadii studies Political Science with emphasis in Public Administration at the University of Liberia. He is the Secretary General of the Movement for Social Democratic Alternative (MOSODA). You can reach him through bokiadii@gmail.com.
https://www.africaprimenews.com/2018/07/03/news/why-the-masses-boycotted-the-so-called-pro-poor-day-of-the-cdc/
