|
Remove
Tubman and Weah's statues from street
Wednesday,
February 28, 2007
By Tewroh-Wehtoe Sungbeh
One of the characteristics of a dictator is an
obsession with raw power, plus the dictator would rather see his or
her country and people sink deep into despair and
destruction than doing what is right by giving up
control of power for the good of all.
Our longest-serving president, William V.S.
Tubman was good at that. His style was exploitation,
intimidation, a cult of personality and a powerful
presidency built around a patronage system and a
powerful public relations machine.
Mr. Tubman was a show man who was big on
pageantry but lacked any substance. And to stay
relevant, his likeness were printed on clothing worn
by Liberians, while his statues were erected in
strategic locations of a major intersection and the
campus of the University of Liberia.
Mr. Tubman seems to be the only former
president whose statues are all over the place. If his
predecessors had their way and were not preoccupied
with other issues, they probably would have erected
their own statues somewhere in Monrovia, they think
Liberians would stare at as they go about their
business trying to survive in that country.
However, the former military officer
turned-president, Samuel Kanyon Doe was the only one
among the bunch who came close to erecting a statue of
himself dubbed an “unknown soldier,” in reference
to the fatal odyssey of April 12, 1980, when he and
like-minded soldiers fatally overthrew a government
that changed the history and direction of Liberia.
The issue about statues and where to put one
was in the news months ago, when the statue of former
football star and presidential candidate, George
Manneh Oppong Weah was removed from its location in
the heart of the city, to make room for President’s
Sirleaf’s campaign to clean Monrovia of eyesores and
other haunting distractions that appears to undermine
the image of the nation’s capital.
The order to remove the statue of Mr. Weah
considered a national hero, according to his
supporters, was an insult to this self-made fellow who
inspired a nation with surplus of scandalous figures
than actual heroes and heroines, and exposed the
Sirleaf administration of hypocrisy, especially when
the government left untouched the statues of Mr.
Tubman who does not deserve one sanctioned by the
national government.
Statues are made and erected for great men and
women who contributed significantly and positively to
the character of a nation. Mr. Tubman was the
opposite. His was autocratic than democratic,
underdevelopment than development, and did not know
when to relinquish control of state power until death.
I kind of agree with those who are crying foul
regarding the government’s in-your-face double
standard and its unfair treatment of Weah concerning
the statue issue.
However, if the government of Ellen Johnson
Sirleaf wants to rid Monrovia of all statues in public
places, that’s fine. But a government cannot claim
renovation as a reason to remove the statue of a
sports icon from a public place, but reached a
decision not to remove the statue of a dictator in the
same public place.
Then again, statues belong in a public place
representative of the career of the person in question
or in a private location, and not in the street since
Liberia is not a North Korea-type communist country
where statues of its late “Great Leader” lined the
streets of its capital, Pyongyang.
Since George Oppong Manneh Weah is or was a
sports figure who played many of his games at the once
new stadium named in honor of the other dictator,
Samuel Kanyon Doe, Weah's statue would be better off
being erected in front of that stadium, and not on a
street.
Mr. Tubman’s statue
should be flown to Harper, Maryland County where he
hailed.
|
