The NEWS (Monrovia)
15 July 2008
editorial
About 24 unknown armed men dressed in police uniforms with pistols and AK-47s on Saturday around 1:00 a.m. raided several houses in the King Gray community in Paynesville and put residents at gunpoint and took away their valuables and cash.
The armed robbery in King Gray took place three days following similar robberies on Wednesday at 11:00 p.m. when a group of armed men placed residents at gunpoint in the Joe-Bar Community in the same Paynesville near the zone four police depot.
The Joe Bar and King Gray armed robbery incidents are the latest of frequent acts of criminality and terror in Monrovia and its environs.
In King Gray, residents there revealed that, prior to the attack they were foretold through a clandestine circulation of leaflets informing the community of the pending armed robbery.
But despite prior threat of the armed attack, there were apparently no efforts to ward off the robbers neither did the attackers meet any resistance.
The residents may have either taken the threat for granted and did not alert the police on time or police patrol in the area was inadequate or perhaps neglected.
Notwithstanding, what is mind-boggling is that why should communities that are near principal streets and security zones be so venerable to armed robberies when adequate security patrols to them should be acceptable and easily accessible? This leaves one to wonder more about the fate of neighborhoods that are far off the streets and security zones, where security patrols could be forbidding.
The armed robbery incidents and other forms of frequent terror in which residents are foretold of attacks through leaflets are a clear indication of threats to civil authority. And a continuous act of such robberies and terrors would keep potential investors away, thereby slowly but surely strangulating the country economically to create more hardships with the potential of igniting social unrest.
It is therefore unacceptable that criminals are having a field day. Besides, the usual arrival of security forces after the criminals have caused havoc and left the scene is indeed very sad and a dismal security performance.
The government and its international partners would therefore have to act decisively and robustly in putting to a halt the prevailing security threats.
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Is it any surprise that all this is happening in Liberia when the Nigerian contingent of UNMIL aren't receiving any pay and are rioting back home in Nigeria because of it? They are the ones orchestrating the armed robberies in Liberia to get some sort of "payday". Sad to say but I believe that every household over there needs a gun to protect themselves. To heck with the police cuz they're some of the main ones doing this to the population anyway. Get Munah Sieh or whatever her name is out of the Police!