http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/314/eva-acqui-1.jpgAnthony Morgan, Jr. highlights the complexities and contradictions inherent in Liberia’s checkered past.

It is not difficult to imagine the grandeur of July 26, 1847 if one goes by the memory of more contemporary 26 Day celebrations. The dazzling splendor of parades, gaily decorated and crowded streets, the lavish banquets, balls and endless receptions attended by dignitaries from as far away as India, Sweden and Japan. But if the majesty of that glorious day can be visualised by students of African history, the contradictions surrounding the nation in its infancy are even easier to imagine. For even as the Fort Norris cannon noisily announced to the world that Africa's first republic was still alive despite the enormous odds arrayed against her from inception, stark contrasts were illuminated with each explosion of fireworks in the Monrovia night sky. These contradictions formed the core of Liberia's being, and speak to the very essence of Africa and Africans, to the collective 'soul of Black folk,' in the paraphrased words of Dr. W.E.B. DuBois.

Glaring schisms between perception and reality, liberty and subjugation, democracy and repression, no-show jobs for the privileged and forced labour for others, prosperity for a few at the top and grinding, debilitating poverty for the masses. A government credited with ending slavery on the Grain Coast at great and heroic sacrifice of life, and itself charged with slavery and forced labour. Contradictions within the ruling American settler upper class itself, which, unknown to most people, was actually composed of equal Vai, Grebo, Bassa, Mandingo and Kru elements. Diametrical lines between Pan-Africanists like Edward Blyden, President Arthur Barclay and Gabriel Johnson, High Potentate of the Garvey Movement on the one hand, and the corrupt, slave-trading President CDB King on the other. King himself was a living contradiction for he had quite brilliant ideas about indigenous inclusion and his second term vice president was a Grebo, Henry Too Wesley. With Wesley's death, however, King's choice for vice president was Allen Yancy, Mr. Fernando Po, one of the worst examples of settler human rights abusers.

Contradictions indeed. Between the fledgling nation's precarious struggle for survival against a world hostile to the very idea of a "Black republic," the Berlin Conference's partition of Africa by colonial powers, and the 1960s, when her crippling hundred year-old debts had been mostly paid off, and she was for the first time enjoying a favourable balance of payments and a growth rate second only to Japan. Between a perception of her on the part of thousands of Africans who flocked to Monrovia from other countries as a shining beacon of inspiration, and how the residents of Monrovia's slums viewed their country.

To some she was the elder sister with the most experience navigating the treacherous waters of international affairs, and according to Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe's book ‘Liberia in World Politics,’ a very effective voice for the masses of colonised Africans. Along with Ethiopia and later Egypt, she ably represented the continent at the League of Nations and the succeeding United Nations Organisation, co-founded the OAU, bankrolled liberation movements, afforded asylum to African freedom fighters and hundreds of Haitian dissidents in the 1950s, and sent troops to the Congo in 1963. But while the country's performance and status on the international stage were quite impressive, her dismal domestic record of inclusion, while much improved since World War II, still stood in stark, embarrassing contrast. Did a father in the slums of Soniwehn for example, really care about Angie Brooks being elected President of the UN General Assembly when he could not afford to feed his children, much less send them to school.

There is a dichotomy also in the interpretation of Liberia's history, between ethnic minority oppression as the defining factor, and a glorious if imperfect achievement in African self-rule. "If I hear 'freed slaves imitating their plantation masters' one more time," says a Liberian writer in exasperation, "I'm going to strangle somebody!" His argument is that Liberia was and is no different from any other Black country; that all the worst aspects of our history—social stratification, rural neglect, contempt by the westernised ruling class for the more African majority—are present in every single country run by Africans or people of African descent, and that it is unfair to single out Liberia.

The Haitian Gens du coleur and the Jamaican Twenty-one Families exactly mirror the old Liberian aristocracy. Ask the people of Cite Soleil or those in the ghettos of Kingston. It is difficult to think of any African country, continental or Diasporan, that doesn't have a westernised ruling class lording it over a more African majority. The common threads linking all these ruling classes are elitism, power from indirect foreign rule and all of the other contradictions that have characterised Liberian society.

Though the central issue throughout American history has been its most shameful aspect, race, she is not defined by it. Her complexity is appreciated, even by her critics, along with her ability to challenge herself morally and attempt to right wrongs against her citizens of African descent. Somehow when it comes to Liberia, a double standard is plainly applied and no distinction made between historical Liberia and the contemporary Liberia which is a very different country.

One of the greatest contradictions seems to be in the way Africans perceive themselves. Who decided for instance that, as a writer from the opposing school of thought says, the indigenous people of Liberia were deemed "inferior?" This question of "inferiority" delves deep into the psyche of the African. Understandably, we do not like to discuss it. But can a sense of inferiority really be imposed from outside oneself? One finds it hard to imagine the Vai people, for example, an advanced society in their own right, complete with Islamic scholars and the very first written language in sub-Saharan Africa, feeling "inferior" to anyone, much less a group of people descended from Vai slaves who could easily be wiped out if not for the US Navy gunboats off shore. Most people are unaware of the 1826 mutual protection treaty between Liberia and the Vai, when the latter was in trouble with other ethnic groups incited by the British, and how the treaty resulted in an alliance with the powerful Massaquoi and Fahnbulleh clans, thus securing the colony's existence. The Vai people played as much a part in the building of Liberia as the American settlers, and to lump them and other coastal groups into some oppressed "native" polity is misleading and erroneous.

Obviously the contradictions at the core of Liberia's makeup are her strengths as well as her weaknesses. The Vais, Grebos, Mandingos and Krus were most successful at integration into the ruling class because they were not intimidated by westernised people, nor did they show any of the deference to them characteristic of some members of other interior groups. They were also wealthy from trade on the coast and that always helps. They had the advantage of education and long exposure to western culture. And they all participated in the building of Liberia, in all areas, to the detriment of the myths about "Americo-Liberian" domination.

The list of contradictions continue, from those who defined William Tubman to those who destroyed his successor William Tolbert. Vat Tubman, unifier, creator of Liberian national consciousness and champion of indigenous rights on one hand, staunch guardian of upper class privilege and foreign interests on the other. Although single-handedly responsible for Liberia's post-World War II prosperity, Tubman with his iron-fisted twenty-seven-year rule almost guaranteed a chaotic power struggle after his demise. That the fragmentation of society was staved off for a decade after Tubman's death is to the credit of his successor, William R. Tolbert, another study in heightened contradictions. Tolbert was Pan-African oriented, stressing a non-aligned foreign policy and greater inclusion on one hand, but he was indecisive on the other. That the more progressive Tolbert was less popular than the benevolent dictator Tubman is perhaps the contradiction that speaks most directly to the soul of Africa. Tubman was more a Paramount Chief than a president. Liberians understood him. They did not understand Tolbert. Our preference for strong, decisive, benevolent chiefs was recently reaffirmed in a petition by the people of Gedeh to President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf to basically remain in office as long as she likes. This was common during the Tubman years. "The Old Man" is a good chief, was the reasoning. Why replace him? What else could explain Charles Taylor's election as president? Taylor was the definition of a charismatic, ruthless but generous warrior chief. Unfortunately, though, one who had no idea how to run a country.

If the Truth and Reconciliation Commission is to fully serve its purpose in Liberia, it must explore and examine all these historical contradictions to get to the root of our national psychosis. It must investigate why we continue to follow the patterns of governance set by the True Whig Party even as we condemn them for their neglect of the rural majority, why we criticise their belief in the superiority of western culture while we also act in accordance with that belief. It must ask why we continue to repeat in the formulation of domestic policies, the same mistakes made by the old ruling class we condemn as unAfrican and oppressive. It must address why we continuously fail to factor into development programs the fact that most of our people are not westernised and have no desire to be. And why we continue to portray past governments as bad people rather than simply people trapped in a bad system. Why do we think we can make the failed, foreign-imposed system of the past work today for the inclusion and to the benefit of all our people?

But perhaps this may require us to look too deeply into ourselves, as Africans hate to do. It would raise too many difficult questions, like why the 1980 "revolution" instituted no social reforms but divided what had become one nation, Liberia. Liberians demand acknowledgement of too many mistakes, too many shameful and bloody episodes that could have been avoided.

"I do not make any distinctions between Africans," my writer friend says. "Native, Americo, continental, Diasporan, Jamaican, American, Francophone, Anglophone, Portuguese, none of that crap. We are all victims." I am reminded of a Lucky Dube song. "We are the victims every time," he sings, "We got double trouble, every time."

* Anthony Morgan, Jr. is the author of the forthcoming book excerpted here ‘ Kru Wars: Southeastern Revolt in 19th to Early 20th Century Liberia.’

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