There is a lot of talk about the fact that Corruption destroys democracy. Today, June 5, 2024, World Environment Day, provides the opportunity to tell the Truth. The Truth for today is: Safe The Earth and The Earth Saves You. The Truth is that if we do not take good care of the Earth, the Earth will not take good care of us. As Liberia is engaged in deforestation rather than reforestation, this means that Liberia does not take good care of the Earth and the Earth does not take good care of Liberians.
The Earth does not take good care of Liberians as seen in the longstanding and widespread poverty in Liberia. The so-called Land of Liberty has become the pretext for violence, which, at times, takes on the forms of coup d'etat and civil war. Both forms of violence have been in the experience of Liberians, as seen in the killing of at least 300,000 people and many more people injured. With the violence, democracy is pushed back, as seen in Liberia. With violence, there is the prevention of the participation of the people in national decision-making, leaving only a few persons to participate in national-decision making. With few persons participating in national-decision-making, we have in Liberia oligarchy rather than democracy.
This oligarchy is seen in the lack of participation of the poor people of Liberia in national decision-making. This lack of participation in national decision-making is seen in the National Legislature of Liberia where Legislators have access to at least LD200,000 a day and their foreign collaborators have access to at least LD300,000,000 a day while nearly all of the people of Liberia have access to at least LD300 a day (Annual Reports of the CBL LISGIS, MFDP, MCI, WB, IMF, ADB and UNDP). No wonder the people of Liberia have declared that Liberia is headed in the wrong direction (Afrobarometer, 2022).
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Liberia is headed in the wrong direction when Liberia has over 200 of the world's best species of logs while children of Liberia sit on the bare ground at schools, not forgetting in some huts. But Liberia is engaged in deforestation rather than reforestation. Here is the opportunity for the powers that be to set up sawmills, instill Liberian based culture and training to create Liberian ownership, employment, income generation to eliminate poverty generation and promote poverty alleviation. This opportunity opens doors for increased local production, lower prices and poverty alleviation.
Despite the promotion of poverty generation by the powers that be, people who love Liberia are promoting poverty alleviation by raising awareness to motivate people to work together within the Rule of Law to transform the prevailing unfair electoral system into the enduring fair electoral system. It is only through this transformation that persons with good records can get elected to bring in the system of Justice, the ingredient for Peace and Progress in Liberia and in any country.
