Date: Feature Week of July 6, 2003
Topic: Black Press Business/Economic
Author: William Reed
Article ID: article_ema070603a

LIBERIA: GANGSTA LAND

Can Country Get Its Act Together ?

Looting and lawlessness in Liberia has drawn it reproaches from around the world.  Peacekeepers are needed to curb the anarchy.  Gangstas like Charles Taylor have prevented this resource-rich West African country from being as prosperous as it could, and should be.  Taylor is the latest of a line of corrupt Liberian leaders.

Who and what comes after Charles Taylor?  From its founding as Africa�s first Republic, Liberia's political situation has been troublesome.  People of the 16 tribes that live in the interior constitute the majority of the population, but have never enjoyed political status commensurate with their numbers.  Political power has always rested with the American-Liberians whose ancestors came from the U.S.

In 1815, America�s first Black millionaire, Quaker and maritime entrepreneur Paul Cuffee, financed and captained a successful voyage to Sierra Leone to establish a base of African-American immigrants.  Cuffee believed African Americans could more easily "rise to be a people" in Africa than in American slavery and legislated limits; envisioning a Black trade network set up by Westernized Blacks returning to Africa to develop resources and educate its people in skills gained during captivity.

Cuffee's venture encouraged the white-led American Colonization Society (ACS) to repatriate freed slaves to settle in Western Africa.  In 1821, �forceful persuasion� helped the ACS facilitate purchase of costal land south of Sierra Leone from the indigenous Dey and Bassa people.  The ACS secured a "36 mile long and 3 mile wide" strip of  land on the Atlantic Ocean for trade goods, supplies, weapons, and rum worth approximately $300.  The settlement grew, and in 1824, after much acrimony with the ACS, the Constitution for the Republic of Liberia was formed.

Though Americans say �we have close ties with the Liberian people,� indigenous African tribes comprise 95 percent of Liberia�s 3.5 million people.  Descendants of immigrants who had been either US, or Caribbean, slaves comprise 5 percent of the population.  Liberia lies on the bulge of Africa between Sierra Leone and Cote d'Ivoire.  The capital city and major port is Monrovia.  The official language is English but several local languages are more widely spoken.  The local currency is the Liberian dollar - US notes and coins are legal tender.

Liberia�s history of political corruption has prevented Cuffee�s vision of �technology transfer� and Black trade networks from materializing.  The size of Tennessee, richly endowed with water, mineral resources, forests, and a climate favorable to agriculture, Liberia�s economic developments have had little impact the on population as a whole - �growth without development".

Liberia�s economic growth has come from beyond its borders.  In 1926, a 99-year lease enabled Firestone Rubber Company to establish the world's largest rubber plantation in Liberia.  The U.S. company built a 90,000-acre rubber-tree empire with top-quality schools, living quarters and medical facilities for its staff and workers.  For decades Firestone helped Liberia�s infrastructure with new roads, schools, bridges and other infrastructure.  Iron ore, first mined in 1951, has replaced rubber as Liberia�s largest export and most important source of foreign exchange.

The 1989-96 civil war destroyed much of Liberia's economy, especially the infrastructure in and around Monrovia.  Like now, many businesspeople fled the country, taking capital and expertise with them.  Taylor�s government inherited massive international debts and relied on revenues from its maritime registry and timber industry for foreign exchange earnings.  Any post-Taylor government will have to restore infrastructure, find jobs for the 70 percent of Liberian people unemployed, and raise the $1,000-per-year per capita income and $3-billion per annum economy.  Growth in Liberia requires major economic policy successes and containment of armed rebellion.

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