Monrovia — Liberia's historic cemetery, the Palm Groves cemetery, has turned from a burst gravesite to a forest right in the heart of the capital city of Monrovia - making it impossible for relatives to clean their deceased family members' graves on Decoration Day, March 8, 2023.
Every second Wednesday in March is set aside as Decoration Day, and scenes at every cemetery across Liberia are usually filled with hundreds of people who reflect on the lives of their fallen family members and pay respect to them.
Like other cemeteries, a few years ago, the second Wednesday of March brought scenes of wailing, singing, and dancing.
Center Street, which divides the Palm Groves cemetery into two halves, with each on Gurley and Lynch Streets, has always hosted the largest number of family members paying homage to the dead.
Individuals who come to the Palm Cemetery alone easily hire others to paint their relatives' graves and at some point hire people to cry for their deceased relatives.
But it will not be the case on March 8, 2023, as the Palm Groves Cemetery, Liberia's oldest gravesite in the heart of Monrovia, despite the deplorable graves, has been taken over by a forest, a visit to the cemetery by FrontPage Africa reveals.
In 2016, the government of Liberia at the time spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to build a fence around the site. Something that has even caused more damage to the cemetery.
The fence was later broken down, but the oldest and historic gravesite remains a death trap and is now turning into a forest.
The Palm Groves Cemetery dates back as far as the 1820s. Almost all the graves have been broken by criminals who are presumed to be drug addicts.
For more than a decade, the place has served as a hideout for criminals. These vagabonds have virtually opened almost every grave. Their fearful presence often scares away relatives of the dead.
Alex Dickson has his late mother's grave at the cemetery. He told FrontPage Africa that he nearly lost his life while jumping over many burst graves to locate his late mother's grave last year.
Dickson said he will not go to the cemetery to clean his mother's grave. He promised to relocate the remains of his late mother.
"Every year we come to decorate our mother's grave; we have to fix either the top of the grave or the side of it. I do not know who is doing this act. Last year, when we came to decorate, we could not see the steel rod, and even the tides that were on the grave are all gone," Dickson said.
He added: "This year is worse. I will see how best to transfer my mother's grave because I can no longer make my way there."
Like Dickson, Ma Alice Johnson said, "I will transfer my father's grave to Bomi County where we buried our grandmother."
Marthalyn Kollie's father was buried at the Palm Groves Cemetery. She told FrontPage Africa that the government needs to build a throne to represent all of the people who were married at the cemetery.
She added: "I think the government needs to shut this place down and build something like a throne to represent the people that are buried here."
Kollie continues: "We have experienced over the past times, the government is unable to manage the place."
Moves in past times by the city government to keep the cemetery sacred have proven futile.
Former President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf's regime promised to relocate the entire cemetery, but that decision was put to a halt by the action of then-Senator of Bong County now Vice President of Liberia, Jewel Howard-Taylor.
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In 2016, the most famous and historic cemetery came close to being demolished by the Special Presidential Task Force headed by General Services Agency Director General Mary Broh.
But Madam Taylor wrote the Plenary of the Senate requesting the body to put halt to the ongoing demolition of the Palm Groves cemetery.
In her communication, she stated that the cemetery was established by law for permanent hosting and the final resting place for "distinguished citizens, respected patriots, and ordinary citizens."
"This trend of thought to remove our loved ones from their resting place should not be accepted, but instead designated burial places should remain as such, which shows our collective national respect for the dead," the Vice President of Liberia stated back in 2016.
