Pres. Sirleaf's Imperial Politics Could Harm Her Legacy

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Tewroh-Wehtoe Sungbeh

     Before she fired Internal Affairs Minister and family member Ambullai Johnson recently for corruption, which has yet to be fully discussed nationally and turned over to a grand jury for a possible court trial (which will never happen), I participated in a panel discussion with two other notable Liberians on Gabriel Gworlekaju’s Running Africa Internet Radio Station, WRAR – 96, and injected into the discussion the much-overlooked undemocratic tendency of President Sirleaf often leaving Ambullai Johnson in charge of the nation whenever she traveled out of the country.

    Since I was unaware of the legal or constitutional precedent of a sitting Liberian president asking an unelected family member to run the country in his/her absence, when there is an elected Vice President and a Speaker of the House of Representatives to fill in; both of whom are part of the constitutional chain of command in terms of succession, I tossed my concerns over to Sam Ajavon, a member of the panel and columnist for Running Africa, to shed some light on this thorny issue as to whether President Sirleaf’s move was a wise one in that fragile democracy.

     Because I did not take notes during our panel discussion to quote Sam Ajavon verbatim, I remember him saying that he sees no problem with the president leaving her family member in charge of running the day-to-day affairs of the country in her absence, and that there’s nothing in the Liberian constitution that prohibits that mind-boggling practice.

Ambullai Johnson's Compound                                           Ambullai Johnson

     To his credit, however, Ajavon’s right there is no prohibition against the undemocratic practice of a constitutionally elected president - in this case President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf thrusting the nation’s day-to-day affairs in the hands of her family member, Ambullai Johnson, to serve as Acting President and Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL), during her absence out of the country.

      As Acting President of Liberia, Ambullai Johnson was not accountable to the electorates, but had enormous influence and power to act during an actual emergency. So powerful he was jokingly referred to by his many friends and acquaintances as “Prime Minister,” a role he enjoyed and cherished to the chagrin of most Liberians who did not know what to make of this potential constitutional crisis that loomed at the time. 

     What is so touching about this matter is the fact that while President Sirleaf always trusted her family member to manage the country while she was gone, he was allegedly engulfed in his own sea of corruption, which would later cost him his job. In the roughly three or four years he worked in the Johnson-Sirleaf government, it is now believed that Ambullai Johnson built a house in the metro Monrovia area worth half a million dollars from the monthly earnings of his meager government salary of roughly ten or fifteen U.S. dollars. 

     The 1986 Constitution, however, is crystal clear in Chapter VI, Articles 51, 63, and 64, in the way it laid out the role of the Vice President “who shall assist the President in the discharge of his functions.” And when the president dies, resigns, is incapable of carrying out the duties and functions of the office, or is impeached, the vice president “shall succeed to the office of the president to complete the unexpired term. And ”whenever the office of the President and of the Vice President shall become vacant by reason of removal, death, resignation, inability or other disability of the president and vice president, the Speaker of the House of Representatives shall be sworn in as Acting President until the holding of elections to fill the vacancies so created.”

     I want to disagree with Ajavon that there is something wrong in a democratic society when an elected president, who is supposed to be accountable to the voters leave a family member in charge of government to run the day-to-day affairs of government when he or she travels. The idea that there is not a single clause in the constitution prohibiting such practice does not gave a president a reason to do the unthinkable - by taking nepotism to the highest level at this fragile time when the nation and its war-weary citizens are still reeling from years of brutal and successive undemocratic governments.

     The idea that President Sirleaf often asked her family member, Ambullai Johnson, to run the country during her ubiquitous foreign travels is a jaw-dropping exercise that did not fit the narratives of a young and fledgling democracy striving to shake itself off the painful shackles of despotism, nepotism, corruption, abject poverty and oppression. However, since the practice is so Ellen-nesque, her condescending governing style did not surprise Liberians who followed her politics since she won the presidency in 2005.

     Even though some of us are not surprise by President Sirleaf’s imperial and condescending governing style that continues to show its many colors over the years, what is not so surprising also is the ineptitude, self-serving and sycophantic nature of the legislative branch of government – especially the spineless character of the so-called “progressives” who were elected to congress because of that label but are now only concerned with traveling abroad and collecting whatever financial incentives and vehicles members can get from government; than actually putting needed brakes on the Executive Branch and crafting sensible legislations that improves the country and the lives of the population they were elected to represent.

     The autocratic governing style of Liberian presidents is one that borders and thrives on the age-old Liberian political practice of a president caring very little about the opinions of those they govern, and because the individual is president and head of government can do anything at the detriment of the nation and its people by making life-changing decisions of a population unilaterally without being answerable to those they govern.

     That overwhelming belief of Liberian presidents having imperial powers has been counterproductive to the democratic aspirations of the citizenry, and might have pushed those leaders to result to dictatorship, which has not been helpful to the nation and the citizen’s long-term interests.

     Such overbearing attitudes are the reasons why there should be out of country voting for Liberians in the Diaspora, and voter’s education throughout the nation to educate voters whose poverty and obvious lack of political sophistication can be attributed to some of the electoral decay Liberia is experiencing today, simply because we have seen the damage an unsophisticated electorate can bring upon a nation.  

     A common example is the issue of rampant corruption in the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf administration, which has been very hard to curtail or eliminate because other than being president, she’s the grand jury, the justice minister, the defense and “prosecuting” officer, and the singular member of the pardons and parole board who can decide the fate of those allegedly accused of (economic) crimes against the Liberian nation. With the many government officials who have been fired for alleged corruption, nothing whatsoever (other than losing their jobs) has happened to them in terms of jail time or the confiscation of their stolen funds. So what's the purpose of this "crusade" or lip service against corruption in the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf administration?

     Another issue is her run for a second term amid a damaging TRC report that barred individuals who committed crimes against humanity (the Liberian people) during the civil war from vying for political office for 30 years. President Sirleaf's heavy handedness should have been grounds for massive street protests and nationwide calls for resignation and impeachment, but because of the objection in Liberia of out of country voting by Diasporan Liberians, abject poverty and the obvious lack of political sophistication, the electorates are often and easily fooled that President Sirleaf is the best Liberia has for now, and is "doing her best" to lead the Liberian nation.

     However, before she became President of Liberia, then-democracy activist, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf allegedly provided financial, material and logistical support to the war, and was also a staunch advocate of the civil war, which killed close to half a million innocent Liberians and destroyed the country. With such damaging charges hanging over her head, wouldn’t it be prudent for this president to answer completely to those charges other than answering to her own selfish and cowardly political aspirations without giving a damn about what Liberians feel or thinks?

     As a constitutional symbol of this fledgling democracy one would think President Sirleaf, whose political exploits elevated her to the highest office of the land will not attempt to shamelessly disassemble the same institution she campaigned so hard to build, but would work hard to build upon the good fortunes that elevated her to the presidency, cherishing the euphoria that greeted her by building lasting institutions that impacts the lives of the Liberian people in a positive way.

    President Sirleaf's undemocratic leadership style certainly exposed her daring and often contemptuous persona, constantly revealing her true self – the part of her that speaks hypocritically of advocating genuine rule of law, transparency and accountability; and building a democratic nation, but cannot resist the temptation of turning back the clock to the Apartheid-like draconian system that once oppressed a generation of Liberians for over a century. 

     President Sirleaf's imperial politics could harm her legacy.