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A
cover-up or genuine attempt to seek truth and
reconciliation?
Monday,
February 27, 2006
By Tewroh-Wehtoe Sungbeh
The young lawyer,
Jerome Verdier, I want to believe never dreamed of the
day he would be chosen by a president to lead a
seven-member Truth and Reconciliation Commission set
up to investigate crimes and human rights abuses
committed against the Liberian people from 1979 thru
2003.
It is a humongous task for the human rights
advocate and former head of the Catholic Justice and
Peace Commission (JPC), tapped by President Ellen
Johnson Sirleaf to lead the investigation she believes
will redeem the Liberian people, (in her own words)
from the “cowardice claws of violence,” when the
truth is told to humanity.
Pres. Ellen Johnson
Sirleaf
Mr. Jerome Verdier
Mr.
Verdier is a smart man who, I am sure means well for
Liberia, but is not experienced and seasoned enough to
lead an investigation of this magnitude that cuts deep
into the hearts and souls of a generation still crying
for justice, because of the callous acts of those
wicked individuals who killed and maimed so many
people, and raped so many women years ago.
Truth and Reconciliation, understandably so is
the safe route the president wants to take to insulate
herself from the explosive and embarrassing nature of a
national trial that would most definitely put Ellen
Johnson Sirleaf, Charles Taylor, Jucontee T. Woewiyu
and all the warlords on the witness stand to tell the
Liberian people and the world about their heinous
roles in the civil war.
Even though the inauguration of the South
African-style commission will not heal the wounds some
of us are still nursing today because of the obvious
lack of sincerity on the part of the president, it
would have been heart-warming and a confidence-booster
had the president chosen few elderly Liberian
tribal/community leaders with wisdom and understanding
– the individuals who felt the pain and lived the
ordeal to attempt to settle this lingering national
crisis from a traditional perspective.
President Johnson-Sirleaf also would have done
herself and her administration a favor had she chosen
leading clerics from Liberia’s two major religions
– respected Christian and Moslem leaders who
understands the pain and suffering of the Liberian
people to lend their spiritual, redemptive and healing
voices to this issue, since this is not about trying
cases as we have been told but to investigate gross
human rights violations.
Why is the truth and reconciliation Commission
not about trying cases but to investigate human rights
violations, anyway? And how can one not try a case to
get to the bottom of an issue, and yet wants to
investigate so as to heal the wounds that resulted
from such human rights violations?
And if it is really about seeking truth and
reconciliation, then why not start the investigation
from 1847 until 2003, those dark years when our
forefathers and countless indigenous Liberians were
enslaved by the Americo-Liberians, which is the actual
reason why we are where we are today?
As a matter of fact, though, this thing about
truth plus the added word, reconciliation cannot hold
until the individuals wishing for it are sincere about
it, and are genuinely prepared to allow the Liberian
people to decide whether there should be a need for a
trial that seeks justice or reconciliation.
And who’s supposed to call for this so-called
Truth and Reconciliation Theater instead of a civil
trial that attempts to prosecute those found guilty of
crimes against humanity?
Can a sitting president who is not neutral and
is alleged to have financed the war, Senators Prince
Johnson, Adolphus Dolo, “General Peanut Butter,”
and the many former leaders of the warring factions who
actually held guns and grenades, or the Liberian
people whose country was destroyed and relatives
slaughtered like four-legged beasts, decide this one?
How can there be a call for truth and
reconciliation when there is naked arrogance and
wanton disregard of public sentiments on the part of
President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who, in the wake of
the inauguration of her commission sued another
Liberian, Jucontee Thomas Woewiyu for linking her to
the civil war?
Is this the same president who refuses to put
Charles Taylor on trial, and continues to resist
pressure from Liberian human rights activists,
international peace and human rights advocates and
foreign governments to seek the immediate extradition
of the disgraced former president?
This is not about seeking truth and
reconciliation, I want to believe. This is about
protecting the president and her friends who wants to
cover-up what happened, how it happened, who did what, why
it happened in the first place, and how can those
implicated be held accountable for their reckless
actions?
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