Amos Sawyer's 2009 Revelation (Decades Later), About 1986 Revised Constitution, Questionable and Troubling       1             1940 - 11112008f- Two- Soccer Legends

  Sunday, April 26, 2009             

Tewroh-Wehtoe Sungbeh

     President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf was either out of the country, or still in Liberia preparing to travel to her next favorite city around the globe as she has done repeatedly over the years, when S. Byron Tarr, the former Finance Minister came out of the wilderness to warn the Liberian people about a nation that is slipping back into civil war, “unless political power is decentralized.”

     Mr. Tarr acknowledged that “elements of bad governance” that plunged the country into the 14-year civil war are still around, but fell short of calling out the names of those elements only to turn his attention to the flawed 1986 revised Liberian Constitution, decentralization of political power, and the belief that “guarantors of Liberia’s peace made a fundamental error by not putting in place measures that would secure the country’s future.”

     Byron Tarr is right on the ball about his observation – an observation others have not been shy to point out during these shaky and fragile times when Liberians are desperately holding on to hope and patriotism to live the next day.

                                                          Amos Sawyer

     Unfortunately, uncertainty about the obvious lack of jobs, rampant corruption in government, a powerful presidency, a centralized government that is out of touch with the aspirations of the citizenry, an arrogant and incompetent Legislative branch of government, corruption and deception, and the perceived flaws in the Liberian Constitution are favorite targets of our cynicism.

     It has been a while since I heard S. Byron Tarr said anything political of this magnitude, and a long time since he and Amos Sawyer ever came close to saying the same thing – back-to-back that targeted the same audience about the Liberian Constitution, as if both men are racing to the finished line trying to impress voters about a future political campaign.

      Perhaps a coincidence but the gentlemen got my attention and the attention of the media, and the Liberian people when they referenced the obvious flaws in the constitution speech after speech the way they did, and the Liberian people are also genuinely concerned about the flaws in the current constitution, decentralization of government, and reducing the power of the presidency. And the way to get the attention of the politicians is to sound the alarm by constantly invoking those flaws with the hopes of effecting change.

     Amos Sawyer, who chaired the 1986 constitutional committee was quoted as saying that the draft Constitution was altered by the committee set up by former Head of State Samuel Kanyon Doe, and had the draft not altered, most of the governance problems Liberia is facing today would not have been a problem.

” Some of the things that we are struggling for today would have been behind us if there was no significant modification of the original draft,” he said.

     Mr. Sawyer also said during that appearance before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), that Mr. Doe ordered the arrest of members of the Constitutional Drafting Committee around Kakata, and that the arrest order “was given with the perception to prevent members of the Drafting Committee from interfering with members of the Advisory Committee.” 

     Folks, why now? Why is Amos Sawyer saying this almost two decades after the death of President Samuel Kanyon Doe, and over two decades after Sawyer chaired a committee that crafted the constitution he claimed to have been altered by Mr. Doe? What prompted this Biblical Saul-like confession – or scandal the Monrovia media, as usual failed miserably to dissect and investigate? Why did he not say something then, resign, or express his displeasure in Liberia or at a safe and friendly location outside of the country?

    With this latest revelation that the 1986 Constitution was altered, and members of that committee were intimidated, harassed and ordered arrested, is it fair to say that the constitution in question should have been deemed invalid and unconstitutional, and that every law passed, coupled with the 2005 national and presidential elections are considered illegal and unconstitutional?

     If that is the case, what becomes of Mr. Sawyer’s credibility as an intellectual and statesman whose political and academic opinion are respected and always sought in a country or administration that hardly questions Amos Sawyer’s dealings and utterances?

     This is deception, period, and also a national scandal worthy of an independent investigation to dig deep into why it took so long for Mr. Sawyer to reveal the heavy-handedness of the former president, during a time when Sawyer and his colleagues gathered to draft the constitution, a flawed constitution that has since become the fundamental law of the Republic of Liberia. 

     Since the Constitution was ratified, did the deceptive actions of Sawyer ever influenced or affected the nation, its national security or its citizens at any time? And is Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and the Liberian Legislature ready to entertain such independent investigation of Amos Sawyer’s deception?

     This is also a career killer, because Mr. Sawyer was appointed by Samuel Kanyon Doe to chair the constitutional committee not because of Sawyer’s legal skills but because of his non-legal celebrated scholarly background. And when a figure of Amos Sawyer’s stature deceive so many people and fumble so badly on such national scale with such national implications, his judgment and scholarly integrity should be questioned, his actions investigated, and should possibly be prosecuted; and the charges not dismissed as is customary in Liberia with high-profile figures.

     The 1986 Liberian Constitution needs immediate national attention, and time after time Liberians have made their frustration known about a constitution that grants 6-year term (Article 50) to the president, and with unlimited power, 9-year term (Article 45) Senate, and a 6-year term (Article 48) to Representatives, a far cry from the 1847 Constitution that grants two-year term to Representatives, and a 4-year term for Senators (Article III).

      With this revelation that former President Samuel Kanyon Doe influenced the constitutional committee to alter the draft of their work, there is a possibility that the long tenure of the lawmakers inserted into the 1986 constitution could have resulted from such intimidation, at the time from a dictatorial executive branch.