A Patriot’s Diary With Ekena Wesley
Amid a deliberate sabbatical – we followed closely the indiscriminate wave of massive corruption reportage across the media landscape in the small West African nation. At no time did Liberians hear in campaign speeches or from slogans the pursuit of ‘corruption’ in an attempt to capture state power. How come the ‘political sheep’ at campaign rallies have become ‘wolves?’ Such is our human complexity!
The struggle launched by comrade-forebears of our progressive movements in Liberia including MOJA and PAL was tilted in the direction of the mass of the Liberian people. It was the struggle for rights; demanding equal access across the broad spectrum for the greater good. Our illustrious forebears were men and women of conscience dedicated to the proposition that all the good people of Liberia do deserve the right to education, health, equal opportunities and you name them.
History indeed has a way of producing strange or sometimes complex outcomes. Such was the rise of the military junta owing to the heightening cum prevailing situation at the time. Mind you, there was absolutely no connection between the military intervention and the civil approach by progressive elements to democratically challenge an age-old oligarchy. Merely a coincidence! Unlike other revolutionary interventions across Africa and Latin America that became people-incensed and masses-driven; the case of Liberia was not just unprecedented but was a portrayal of a lack ideological clarity to say the least.
When the masses resolved that former soccer legend, George Weah was an epitome or embodiment of their plight, they did so unconsciously. Notwithstanding, their resolve was overwhelming as it were. When the Weah-led core of newfound governors seized the strategic moment; it was no longer about the masses that for many years walked through the thick and thin of a purported struggle for a better tomorrow – only to become disenchanted amid a bunch of heartless leaders.
All the masses had wanted and sincerely craved for simple access to education, healthcare, employment and to create a system that works and serves all and sundry irrespective of creed, section and beliefs. When those entrusted with the public trust cannot ensure the basic necessities to run our schools and clinics while a deliberate array of state plunder is at a full-scale, we do a disservice to the country. We dash the hopes of the hundreds of thousands who sacrificially placed their fate in the government’s ability to make a difference.
When the masses expressed their will and determination through their votes to empower their retired football icon; it was not about sitting supinely while his friends and cronies indiscriminately enrich themselves through the act of looting. What manner of government is being led by Weah that continues to betray the trust of Liberians including CDCians? Weah has failed and has done so dismally! When he and cronies loot, pillage and plunder; they deny our schools and health facilities the basic resources to adequately and responsibly address the needs of the mass of the people.
The masses did not stand in the scorching sun, rain and dew because they wanted their aspirations dwindled by a Weah and his cabal that have simply given them reason to believe that change ‘real change’ would be self-evident. Can Weah for a second reflect his stay in the slum community – Gibraltar – when there was not a guarantee of a meal let alone an opportunity to go to school or get treated in a medical facility without being turned back due to lack of essential medical supplies? Weah can no longer think as though he ever lived or struggled in Gibraltar. Power has revealed the true Santa clause Weah that Liberia enthroned.
Today, he sits at the throne of political power and has become completely disconnected amid the harsh and biting realities that once beset him and hundreds of thousands of impoverished Liberians. Today, Weah is grotesquely presiding over massive corruption that is mirroring the faces of the masses as those heartlessly carrying out such menace have a free day.
Amid corruption, our schools would be inadequately funded; we are bound to experience perennial budgetary shortfalls; hospitals would be out of essential drugs and our people are bound to die from treatable diseases; the government would engage in ‘dig hole, cover hole’ craze; we would see a crippled commitment to empower young girls and women; support to youth training programs would dwindle; road maintenance programs will get hampered while the deaths toll from accidents would become rife; our ability to swiftly fight rising violent crimes as well as armed robberies would be nothing to write home about; and the list is just endless. Such is Weah’s banana republic.
Sadly, enablers of the regime in their utter madness would parade that ‘these crooks use the stolen wealth to build mansions in Liberia.” Sometimes the same people you try to advocate for seem not to get it. That should not dissuade the efforts to pursue advocacy unrelentingly.
