Dear President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Please Do Not Grant Former Warlords, War “Vigilantes,” War Criminals and Former Killers Any State Funerals

The death news of and the request for a State Funeral for former Military leader, Charles Julu, militant of the Samuel Doe era and the leader of many military raids in which tens of thousands of Liberians were killed and massacred and our nation destroyed, should spark new controversies about warlords, war criminals and former killers. Liberians and peace loving people around the world should be outraged.

President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf in a photo, shaking hands in 2008 with Julu

I was reading an article in a Liberian newspaper in which citizens of Grand Gedeh are calling on the Liberian leader, Her Excellency President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf to grant the former military leader/warlord, General Charles Julu a State Funeral. I do not have anything against the good people of Grand Gedeh or the family who earnestly believe in the good deeds of Charles Julu. They want the best for their son, one that carried out their war with expert precision, but as a peace loving Liberian, I am disturbed when Liberians cannot understand that those who have in the past massacred our people should never be rewarded whether in death or in life. Were I from Grand Gedeh County, of course, I would not want to lead this mission of calling on our nation to grant Mr. Julu the highest honor of our nation by giving him a State Funeral.

The price we paid in the Liberian civil war (fellowsblog.kiva.org/…/)

After all, all of us who lived in Liberia in the William R. Tolbert era, the Samuel Doe administration, and finally, during the bloody Liberian civil war know how much of the war was attributed to Mr. Julu and his inhuman militant spirit and to his militants. We know that many of us trembled when his name was mentioned because his name meant massacre and mass destruction.

Yes, he was serving “his country” in a way that he thought “best,” fighting to help his ethnic people win the war that destroyed hundreds of thousands of our people and our nation. We know that he personally massacred people, and there’s no history that can erase that blood, whether he is dead or not. He is the equivalence of Charles Taylor or Samuel Doe or any other warlord of the times. Yes, he was doing what they wanted, but in the business of executing this duty, he became known as one of the horrible criminals of those terrible civil wars that spanned fourteen years. Like any good person with a forgiving heart, I am sad that he died too, like many of those he killed. That no matter what we do, we all die and go to that same unknown. I am saddened that he could have done better for his nation, and I wish he’d lived differently. Maybe, he too, was a victim of the Samuel Doe craz, but hey, he did not bring peace to our land, and was not even a Liberian Statesman.

What is important and what I am glad about is that his death should not only throw light on his death; it must stir up other questions of war criminals who are still enjoying honor and respect from our nation simply because they have power. President Sirleaf will be judged by how she takes seriously all of the recommendations of the Truth Commission, which includes allowing those who destroyed out nation to face the consequences of their action. President Sirleaf, do not forget that the very people who are pleading with you today will be the ones to criticize you tomorrow about the very requests they are making. Do not heed them. Ironically, the very Liberians who believe in the TRC report that you should not run for a second term are the same ones who want to honor those who actually carried arms and orchestrated many massacres and killings throughout that bloody war. What in the name of God is going on here?

I am shocked and continue to be disturbed by those who want us to bury the past without allowing justice, without allowing those who caused the wanton destruction of the lives of so many to pay for their crimes. How can we build a nation over the bones and blood of so many innocent victims without giving them their proper respect and expect to still have a peaceful future? How can we continue to honor those who have not been cleared by this unbelievable Human Rights abuses and expect to build a peace-loving nation? When will we learn that tribalism and false honor does not bring fruitful rewards?

I lived in Monrovia most of the first two years of the civil war that began in 1989, and I was in Congo Town when the terror of the first months of the destruction of Monrovia took place in 1990. I watched as Liberian/Krahn military men roamed Monrovia, including my neighborhood of Congo Town, killing my neighbors and indiscriminately setting up barriers. And don’t get me wrong, I am not even from Nimba, and I saw what went on.

I saw them kill innocent Liberians who were fleeing the desperate city of Monrovia in the Exodus from Monrovia between June and August. I too, over and over, nearly was executed by these crazy men and women. I visited and prayed with the citizens of Nimba who took refuge in the St. Peter’s Lutheran and in the Methodist Church, brought contributions to them, provided my pigs to the Catholic Relief priests to feed the refugees, and shockingly, I wept when it was alleged that Charles Julu and his militants had led the the mostly Krahn army of Samuel Doe to massacre hundreds of those very people in the St. Peter’s Lutheran Church on July 29, 1990.

I saw the burning flames of Monrovia, and was in Congo Town when that massacre took place. I listened to the radio that July morning as the massacre was attributed to the vigilance of Charles Julu. All historical records show that he led the massacre, and today, he is dead.  So what shall we do- honor him now?

There should never be a State Funeral for him not because we do not acknowledge his “greatness”as a warrior, but because we do not think it is fair to honor people who kill innocent people anywhere on our globe.

Any Liberian with a conscience, whether that person is from the family of the late military leader or not should understand this common law of nature. I will not be surprised when others start calling for Liberia to provide lawyers for Charles Taylor’s trial for Human Rights abuses. I will not be surprised when Liberians begin to march in the streets in protest against Charles Taylor’s trial, and I will not be surprised when Liberians call on our government years from now to pay for a State Funeral for Charles Taylor, Prince Johnson and all the others who are war criminals and are today, enjoying the fruit of their killings.

The world should pay attention to the recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Liberia (TRC) because if we continue to ignore the facts that war criminals should be brought to some kind of justice, we are only postponing our problems. The laws of nature are clear and simple, and the laws of God are also clear and simple: one cannot be expected to kill masses of people and expect to be treated with well wishes throughout their life. One day, that person should be held accountable to the world for such atrocities.

I am certain that there are countless people who will go on the limb again and say, “leave this alone.” Liberians have always been cowards, not standing up for truth, and maybe this is why we never saw the most bloody war in West Africa coming for us. When will we stop believing that someone else will solve our problems? When will we stop being tribalistic, and fight more for justice and peace than for tribal affiliation?

I am from the Kwa family group that the Krahn people are also part of, so I am in a way more connected to the Krahn people than others who come from another family of ethnicity. I understand the warring nature of my people, but I know lies from truth, injustice from justice, and I know that today it is Charles Julu that people want to give a State Burial. Tomorrow, another tribal group or family group will call on the government to honor another warlord, another killer and destroyer of our nation, and then those who are calling on the government today to bury their son will be screaming against that call.

Let justice be done to all men and women. Do not honor anyone who died with the blood of our sons and daughters and with the blood of Liberian on their hands. We do not see the Rwandans or the Jews granting State Funerals to their former warlords and killers. Everyone who lived  in Liberia during the war or who can read any news from Liberia about the war knows that we cannot continue to pretend that what happened did not happen, and we cannot continue to be tribalistic and expect Liberia to change. Please, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the world is watching you. Do not grant anyone whose name was so feared a State Funeral. This is against Human Rights. This is not good for the future of our nation. This is not good for the world. Let’s wash the blood of our people from our nation by practicing true justice. With Love to all peace loving Liberians, I say, do not let the world continue to laugh at us.

The River Is Rising

————————Patricia Jabbeh Wesley

a song for Liberian women

The river is rising, and this is not a flood.
After years of drought, the ground, hardened

and caked in blood, in dry places, here we are, today.

River banks are swelling with the incoming tide,
coming in from the Atlantic just beyond the ridge

of rolling hills and rocks in Monrovia.

Finally, here we stand at the banks!
Finally, here we are, see how swiftly

the tide rushes in to fill the land with salt.

Fish and crabs and the huge clams and shrimps-
all the river’s creatures are coming in with the tide.

The river is rising, but this is not a flood.

Do not let your eye wander away from this scene.
Yes, all the bones below the Mesurado or the St. Paul

or Sinoe or the Loffa River will be brought up
to land so all the overwhelming questions
can once more overwhelm us.

But they are bringing in our lost sister
on a high stool, and there she stands, waving at those

who in refusing to die, simply refused to die.

This is not a song just for Ellen. This is a song for Mapue
and Tenneh and all the Ellens there are.

This is a song for Kema and Musu and Massa.

This is for Nyeneplue and Nyenoweh, for Kou and Glayee
and Korto, for the once solitary woman of war.

This is a song so Wani will also dance.

This is a song for that small girl child who came out
just this morning. They are still seeking a name

to call her- a river name, a name from the water
and from the fire too. That solitary mother in flight

will no longer birth her child by the roadside
where shells were her baby’s first bed.

Let the womb quiver!
Let church bells jingle!
Let hundreds of drums pound, Klan-klan-teh!
Let men bring out old trumpets
so the wind will take flight!

Let that small pepper bird on the tree branch cry
and sing no more the solitary song.

Let the Mesurado behind my home or what was my home
or still is or maybe, maybe, who cares?

The river is rising, but this is not a flood.

Let no man stand between us
and the river again!

(Title poem of The River is Rising by Patricia Jabbeh Wesley, Autumn House Press, Pittsburgh, 2007)

For more Information, visit the following links on the Liberian war and warlords:

http://www.prlog.org/10297805-massacre-of-600-liberian-men-women-and-children-19-years-ago-remembered-at-grace-lutheran-church.html

http://allafrica.com/stories/200807160771.html

http://www.analystliberia.com/charles_julu_killer_or_vicyim_sept26_07.html

This is what the leading newspaper in Liberia, Tthe Liberian Observer had to say about the dead General:

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.voanews.com/english/images/AP-Liberian-boy-Truth-and-Reconciliation-Commission-for-Liberia-30may07.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.voanews.com/english/Africa/2009-07-15-voa2.cfm&usg=__-KPriKQvJTP_Km1uG3IAElVX8_8=&h=210&w=210&sz=42&hl=en&start=20&um=1&tbnid=Lb9S7UHYjYeyDM:&tbnh=106&tbnw=106&prev=/images%3Fq%3DThe%2BLiberian%2BTruth%2Band%2BReconciliation%2BCommission%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26um%3D1

Charles Julu Is Dead

Updated: September 28, 2009 – 7:13pm

News Section:

• Community News

The late Gen. Charles Julu

By:

Observer Staff

MONROVIA — A retired Liberian army general, widely known both as “the Rock” and “The Devil,” is dead.

Charles Julu died over the weekend in Monrovia after a brief illness, family sources said.

Prior to his death, the general’s admirers called him “the Rock” for his courage and bravery to remain firm in the face of uncertainty, while others viewed him as the “Devil” for his alleged ruthlessness.

Julu first came to public limelight in 1973 when Liberia’s 19th President, Rev. Dr. William Richard Tolbert Jr., accused him and others of plotting at the time to overthrow his government.

On account of those claims by President Tolbert, who was also a Baptist Minister and Preacher, Julu was disrobed as a military man.

It remains unclear whether he was ever prosecuted by Tolbert, who was later killed in a bloody coup on April, 12, 1980. The murder took place at the Executive Mansion on Capitol Hill, Monrovia, and Tolbert’s True Whig Party (TWP), which formed a one-party oligarchy, was dethroned by 17 non-commissioned officers of the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL). Master Sergeant Samuel Kanyon Doe, a kinsman of Julu’s, became the new Head of State.

Doe became leader of the new military junta, the People’s Redemption Council (PRC), after the bloody coup, during which 13 former officials of Tolbert’s regime were placed on electrical poles and shot dead by the junta. Julu was appointed by Doe as Commander of the Plant Protection Department of the Liberian-American Swedish Mining Company (LAMCO) in Nimba County, Northern Liberia.

In that part of the country, the name Charles Julu became a household word as his controversial methods of operation continued in 1983 during the villainous Nimba Raid, which he led.

It was widely reported that followers of Quiwonkpah, a Gio, attacked the home of Julu in Nimba County. At that time, the finger of one of Julu’s children was reportedly cut off by the attackers as Julu was fleeing his residence.

But, in retaliation, Julu, an ethnic Krahn, is said to have gone on the rampage, rounding up and subsequently killing many persons, especially those he suspected of being involved in the attack on his residence and of being loyal to Quiwonkpah.

Indeed, Charles Julu was feared and controversial.

In an article published by Runningafrica.com entitled “Profiling A General Accused of Second Coup Attempt,” Thomas Kai Toteh, a leading author, writes:

“Though ex-Army General Charles Julu is innocent until found guilty according to the due process of law clause of the Liberian Constitution, many Liberians at home and abroad see him like an old thief who becomes the first suspect or even found guilty before he faces the law….

“Charles Julu was appointed chief of security for LAMCO in Nimba County by the late Samuel Doe. Charles Julu first came in the spotlight as a ruthless individual when he intimidated players of first division soccer teams who went to play LAMCO Enforcers, a team he served as a chief patron. On numerous occasions, he allegedly flogged some players of LAMCO Enforcers accused of being responsible for lost matches…

“During the 1985 aborted invasion, spearheaded by late Thomas G. Quiwonkpa, Charles Julu became a household name throughout Liberia when he allegedly dumped [an] unspecified number of Nimbaian children into wells in a vicious retaliation, eye witnesses said, against Nimba County, where Quiwonkpa hailed from.

“His reputation and that of [the] late Samuel Doe were marred by what was later dubbed the “Nimba Raid.” Consequently, the late Samuel Doe, in order to save face, transferred the ex-general at the Executive Mansion as a commander for the Executive Mansion Guard.

“Julu survived the [1990] rebel incursion after he fled to a neighboring country, where he resided until 1994. He mysteriously appeared in Monrovia during a power sharing government headed by Prof. David Kpormakpor. Charles Julu mobilized a handful of AFL remnants that happened to be members of his Krahn tribe.

“Despite the presence of West African Peace Monitoring Group in Monrovia and at the Executive Mansion, providing security for the transitional government, Charles Julu stole the show in the morning hours when he forced his way on the fourth floor at the Executive Mansion in an attempt to seize power.

“When news of Charles Julu’s presence at the Executive Mansion as a coup maker broke out in Liberia, especially in Monrovia, dark cloud[s] formed. Speculations fill the air and suspicious eyebrows were raised at ECOMOG….

“But ECOMOG gave him an ultimatum to step down or be forcibly brought down (dead or alive). The ex-general still insisted that he wanted to play his tape, even though some of his men had fled.

“Late in the evening, ECOMOG-trained Black Berets, along with ECOMOG Executive Mansion Guards moved on him while ECOMOG Delta Company launched artillery around the Mansion to scare him away. People ran helter-skelter around Monrovia.

“Charles Julu fled the Executive Mansion at around 6:00 p.m. and sought [refuge] near the Barclay Training Center, a military barracks near the Executive Mansion. Security was put on the alert for his capture and arrest.

“Charles Julu was on foot heading toward the Mamba Point area near United States Embassy when a group of National Security agents arrested him and turned him over to ECOMOG.

“He was locked up at the Post Stockade at the Barclay Training Center. No charges were brought against him as the Constitution of Liberia was unofficially suspended due to the civil conflict.

“Charles Julu became a free man by force on April 6, 1996 when fighting broke out amongst four of the warring factions in Liberia. [The] National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) of Charles Taylor and United Liberation Movement of Ahlaji Kromah (ULIMO-K) moved to arrest the late Roosevelt Johnson of ULIMO-J backed by Liberia’s Peace Council (LPC) of George Boley at the Barclay Training Center (BTC).

“It was not confirmed whether Charles Julu took part in the fight, but unreliable sources said he gave orders to defunct Liberian Peace Council (LPC) and ULIMO-J militias to defend the barracks, his only rescue at the time, with their blood…”

Julu was also Commander of the Executive Mansion Guard Battalion in 1984. He remained in that position until 1985 when Gen. Thomas G. Quiwonkpah launched his abortive November 15, 1985 invasion in which Quiwonkpah was killed by loyalists of Head of State Doe.

Julu was also accused of involvement in other acts of atrocity in the Liberian civil war; but a few months ago, he appeared before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), where he outlined his experiences and/or role in the country’s armed conflict.

In his public testimony before the Commission, the retired general categorically refuted claims of his involvement in mass killings.

He was accused of burying hundreds of children from Nimba County in a mass grave, a claim he also denied. At one point, he pointed fingers at Prince Y. Johnson, now Nimba County Senator, of being behind such lies.

Julu again came to public attention during the invasion of Charles Taylor’s then armed rebel group, the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) military onslaught against the government of Samuel Doe, when he (Julu) commanded government troops into several battles in Nimba, Grand Gedeh, Grand Bassa and Bong Counties.

It was during the 1990 war in Nimba that Julu was accused of bundling scores of children into a truck from Nimba, killing them and burying them in a mass grave.

Under the command of a valiant Nigerian Army General, Adetunji Olurin, ECOMOG, the West Africa Peace Monitoring Group, then stationed in Liberia, opened fired on the Mansion and Julu and his loyalists, who took over the Mansion under the umbrella of New Horizon for New Direction, were all booted out of the Mansion.

Giving his testimony before the TRC a few months ago, Julu said he came to Monrovia on September 14, 1994; and the next day he moved into the Mansion which he captured with ease.

Before the TRC, Julu defended his takeover of the Executive Mansion. He said the move was intended to prevent then NPFL leader Charles Taylor from taking over the government by force of arms.

Julu, who was also former Chief of Staff of the AFL, further told the Commission that his action was aimed at filling a vacuum which, he said, was created as a result of the expiration of the tenure of then transitional government.

Early in the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf administration, Julu was again charged with an attempted coup plot, but was acquitted due to ‘lack of evidence.’

The people of Grand Gedeh are said to be mourning his loss.

0Copyright Liberian Observer – All Rights Reserved. This article cannot be re-published without the expressed, written consent of the Liberian Observer. Please contact us for more information or to request publishing permission.

Truth & Reconciliation Commission Recommends Prosecution of Warlords, Blocking President and Other Officials from Holding Public Office- and There’s the Charles Taylor Question….

• ” War is a way of shattering to pieces, or pouring into the stratosphere, or sinking in the depths of the sea, materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable, and hence, in the long run, too intelligent. “—– George Orwell
  

When the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) concluded its hearings and recommended prosecution of Charles Taylor and other warlords, barring the Liberian President and thirty current officials and others from running for public office in the future, many Liberians had mixed reactions. The unfortunate reaction of the William V. S. Tubman era, where traditional leaders and other politically charged people came out and pledged their loyalty to the President and officials, began in Monrovia with tribal leaders pledging their support for the Liberian President and her administration.

Doris Parker, a friend of mine and Founder and Director of the Liberian Women’s Initiative taking the oath before the TRC in Saint Paul, MN, June 2008

Here I am, testifying before the TRC also in MN, June 2008. I broke down several times during my testimony and during the testimony of others. There is no explanation on earth for the kind of cruelty Liberians suffered at the hand of Warlords and their armies.

Now that the TRC has completed its job, there were threats against members of the commission for doing a very difficult job. This is even while Charles Taylor, the originator of the fourteen year blood bath is on trial in the Hague for war crimes against Sierra Leoneans. If Liberians do not have the gust to allow the perpetrators of horrific crimes against our people to be punished, how will they have the strength to move on? How can we guarantee that another Liberian terrorist will not come into our country with guns and crazy warriors tomorrow to begin another insane blood bath?

WHAT WILL HAPPEN NOW?

Her Excellency Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, President of Liberia Testifying before the Truth & Reconciliation Commission of  Liberia on Feb. 12, 2009 (Above)

Photos: Charles G. Taylor, warlord for the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) in the Liberian Civil War (1989-2003)

Current Liberian Senator, Former warlord, Prince Y Johnson, warlord for the Independent National Patriotic Front of Liberia (INPFL

Former Warlord of ULIMO-K, Alhaji G. V. Kromah

Former Warlord, Sekou Damate Konneh of LURD

The Warlord of the defunct LPC (Liberia Peace Concil) George Boley

Liberians: A People of Many Contradictions–

Liberians have always been a people of many contradictions. We want peace, but do not work towards it. We want freedom, but cannot stand up for it. We want our leaders to be transparent and responsible, but we quickly heap praises upon them just to get small crumbs from them. We do not want corruption, but we support corruption and corrupt leaders. We do not want war anymore in our country, but when we are told to weigh in on how horribly the warlords have treated Liberians, we cannot accept the truth. How do we resolve our contradictions?

Is it because those that destroyed the country still control the country? Or what is it? Why did the Truth Commission work through all of the horrific stories, the tears, the recalling of horrific crimes against humanity if all we wanted was to come together and dance and drink to celebrate a false reconciliation? The truth however remains: there is no reconciliation with the covering up of the truth, the covering up of hurts without any accountability.

Image by ? Patrick Robert/Sygma/CORBIS

This is Charles Taylor, drunk with power after he and his unruly rebels had run over much of Liberia andcaptured the Omega Tower in Paynesville, near Monrovia in July of 1990.

The Truth Commission & Reconciliation Hearings in MN.

The TRC has made its recommendation; therefore, something must happen.

Most recently, on the July 14, 2009, I was contacted by Jamaican Radio, 93 fm, for a discussion of the ongoing Charles Taylor trial  in the Hague. During my discussion via telephone on Jamaican radio, what I was most concerned about was not that Charles Taylor was sitting in court and denying all of the charges against him; I was particularly worried that Liberians did not care enough that Charles Taylor’s war in Liberia deserve even more attention because of the gravity of his offenses in Liberia.  I was afraid that if Sierra Leone does not put Charles Taylor away for good, he will return to Liberia and cause more blood shed.

But most importantly, I was afraid that Liberians were sleeping through this all important trial of one of the world’s most serious criminals. There is the Charles Taylor question that every Liberian who preaches reconciliation must answer. What should Liberia do about Charles Taylor if the recommendations of the TRC are not followed? What should we do about the other warlords who are of course, in leadership today in Liberia?

This is what I had hoped by this time. I had hoped that the President of Liberia would have come forward with a statement, and not just a statement, but also, a call for unity and a commitment to stand by the Commission’s recommendations.If there were no intention of following through, why did they allow all of us to go through the hell of recalling our suffering in that war?

I expected something to happen, so I waited for something to happen before completing my blog posting. Instead, there all these people coming out of the Tubman-thinking era that believe that any group of indigenous leaders can line up and pledge their support to erase more than a century of injustices against humanity. That just because they declare their support for the President, then all will be well.

But I have bad news for them; this is not the 1950s or 1960s. The crimes against humanity in Liberia must be brought up to the forefront and discussed everywhere, debated, and those who must be prosecuted, must be prosecuted, those who earned money from such terror, must turn over to Liberia the money stolen over the years, and those who cannot occupy public offices again, must find other means of living. A country that is run by warlords will always go to war again no matter how many of us dance in the streets to declare our support for them. Too many Liberians have died; too many languish abroad; too many languish still in refugee camps; too much is at stake for us to return to the age-old Tubman day of “So say one, so say all.”

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Finding My Family

———-By Patricia Jabbeh Wesley

Good friend, please help me
Did you happen to see
two boys when you lived in Kataka?
One dark, chubby?
The other, light with dark eyes?
Good friend,
did you see them while you lived in Ganta?
One would have been ten
and the other this tall.
My big boy, Nyema, the small one, Doeteh.
Good friend, can you tell me
if they went to Tapeta?
Were they given weapons, did they kill?
Good friend, can you say
if they walked to Bassa?
Did they starve to death?
Good friend, can you say
if there was a mother walking by their side?
Was she healthy? was she treated well?
Oh, good friend, so this is where
they took them out of line?
Good friend, were they hungry
when they met their end?
Oh, good friend, I will follow
to wrap up their bones.
Thank you, good friend
But how will I know their bones?

Liberia’s President, Her Excellency Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: This Child Will Be Great

The President of Liberia, Africa’s first female Head of State, Her Excellency President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf has just authored her memoir, and is in the United States to promote the book. I did not get the chance to watch her live on PBS or on John Stewart’s “Daily Show,” but I tuned to my laptop and watched her brief appearance this evening. I was very charmed by her spirit, her ability to be the light-hearty Liberian woman that she is. I am sure her appearance brought smiles to many Liberians when she pulled out the country gown, and declared him “Chief” in the Liberian fashion. I wanted her to robe him the way they actually do, put that gown over his head and the hat on his head to shut him up. She was charming, and even I, who am often afriad of heaping praises on any leader, was so proud of Ma Ellen’s ability to laugh despite all that she has to handle back home.

From Publishers Weekly Says This About Ellen’s Book—

“Forbes lists Sirleaf, the 23rd president of Liberia and the first elected female president on the African continent, among the 100 Most Powerful Women in 2008. In and out of government, in and out of exile, but consistent in her commitment to Liberia, Sirleaf in her memoir reveals herself to be among the most resilient, determined and courageous as well. She writes with modesty in a calm and measured tone. While her account includes a happy childhood and an unhappy marriage, the book is politically, not personally, focused as she (and Liberia) go through the disastrous presidencies of Samuel Doe and Charles Taylor. Sirleaf’s training as an economist and her employment (e.g., in banking, as minister of finance in Liberia, and in U.N. development programs) informs the perspective from which she views internal Liberian history (e.g., the tensions between the settler class and the indigenous people) and Liberia’s international relations. Although her focus is thoroughly on Liberia, the content is more widely instructive, particularly her account of the role of the Economic Community of West African States. (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

I have just ordered two copies of the book for myself and a friend in Europe, and should find time to read it as soon as I get my copy in my hands. President Sirleaf’s title, “This Child Will Be Great” should create curiosity just as much as her entire life story. No matter the critics on all sides, Ellen has achieved so much, and her book deserves a closer look.

Below are two photo clips from my time on the Diaspora Panel with President Sirleaf in Monrovia last summer. One is our time listening to one of the speakers on the panel and the other, where Ellen is waiting for me to sign a copy of “The River is Rising” for her.

Ellen and Me here as I sign my book, “The River is Rising” for her.

This Child Will Be Great: Memoir of a Remarkable Life by Africa’s First Woman President is finally out, and whether you love Ellen Johnson Sirleaf or not, whether you are her critic or not, there is one thing you cannot dispute: this woman is one of the most formidable women in world history.

I first came in close contact with Ellen when I was a student at the University of Liberia. She was a guest speaker of one of the University’s National Forums. At the time, she was Minister of Finance. I was a student activist and a student leader at the time, probably a junior student then. I recall that night that I was one of the students who asked her a question about her leadership in the William R. Tolbert government and the issues that plagued our nation at the time. I know that that night was a difficult night for her because our country was at the brink of the troubled times we now live in, and there was much unrest. But even in that day, Ellen was a strong woman in her own rights among the men who drove our country into bloody warfare by their refusal to listen to change.

When she became President of Liberia, I was not particularly emotional about a woman president as many others were. What was intriguing to me however, was the fact that for the first time, a nation that had been ruled by corrupt men was now in the hands of one of our kind, a woman. It made me proud to be a Liberian woman. Liberia that has always been some sort of stepchild of no one, was again leading by electing the first woman president in Africa. But this title in itself is supposed to be both a challenge and a burden for Ellen. As a woman leader, she cannot be a man, and cannot practice what men have practiced. She has a very thin rope to walk, and she must walk it standing up. So, one must have both criticism and admiration for the complexity both for her situation and for the woman that she is. This is where I stand.

–Ellen proudly steps at the UN

There are the critics, Liberians, who would want to dismiss her and her book as Liberians are noted for. They have their reasons. But let us not forget that this is a woman whose story continues to put Liberia in the spotlight when for more than a decade we have only been thought of as murderers, war lovers, and blood thirsty fighting people. I am proud to know that Liberians, including their leader are writing their own stories for the world to read. We may not like their stories or the way they tell their stories. We may not even think their stories are true to our understanding of the matters discussed. But we must respect the fact that it is their stories, and it is how they see their stories.

I have often been baffled by my Liberian sisters and brothers who claim to be descendants of free slaves from the American South. I sometimes feel like laughing at the stupidity of this claim since even the slaves who never left the US would loath being referred to as having their original roots in a place that kidnapped them from their original homelands and enslaved them for centuries. But in my disapproval of this claim, I must respect the fact that people have a right to be called whatever they want to be called. I am proud to be an indigenous Liberian, however, a Grebo woman born of Grebo parents, coming from both the ocean and the forest land of Liberia, and having no roots in slavery or its descendants. I am aware that that makes me “a country woman” in the eyes of those who hate to be called indigenous. Let others be proud of where they want to belong. This is said to assert the fact that Ellen’s story may have things we all disagree with, but it is Ellen’s story, and therefore another story of Liberia, our beloved country.

Exactly a year ago, my poetry readings took me to Johnson C. Smith University, a small liberal arts college in Charlotte, North Carolina. During my two day residency as guest of the Johnson C. Smith Lyceum Series’ World of Words Poetry Festival on campus, I met a professor who is originally from Ghana. During our conversation, I was careful to note his remark about Ellen Johnson Sirleaf as “a woman among the men.”

He spoke of her in that sort of reflective mode, as if he were seeing something beyond humanness when he said, “We men used to think this sort of leadership was only meant for us. But look at her between the men.” I understood all of this, but I pitied Africa that held back its women far longer than most other continents, not sending women to school and relegating them to the kitchens and bearing children. For a woman to reach this far, it took all the life it could, and for Ellen, it took a life time. Let her have her glory. Go out and buy that book, and read it because it deserves to be read.

Finally, my memory of meeting Ellen in Monrovia, sitting at the head of the table with her makes me laugh. I came into the hall a few minutes before she arrived with her Presidential security guides and cameras. I had wanted to see her during my trip, but she was out of the country most of the two weeks I was in Monrovia. So, I was more than glad when I received a call from the Executive Mansion inviting me to sit on the panel with her. When I took my seat a few minutes before she came in, I was told that they’d decided that I would sit next to the President. So, I quickly edged my chair closer to her seat, which was still empty.

As soon as I’d done that, the Security guide who was standing behind our seats, tapped me on the shoulder, “Dr. Wesley, please, you cannot draw your chair this close to the President’s. There must be room between her and everyone else,” he said. I laughed, and he helped me return my seat to where it originally was. Then the President marched in as we all stood. What amused me however was that as soon as she got to her seat, she drew it closer to mine, and tapped me on the shoulder the way a woman taps another woman on the shoulder, not as a man would or as a President would. During the entire program, she’d turn to me and smile or nod or touch my hand or say something just like a woman does to a friend. Then my turn came for me to speak. I went up, read my poem and did my talk. When I got to my seat, she leaned over to shake my hand and tap me on the shoulder again. The most charming of the day came when soon after the program, she stood and turned to me and said, while trying to get my third book, from which I’d just read the title poem, “The River is Rising” out of my hand,  “How come I don’t have that other book?” She asked, smiling.

“Wait a minute, Madame President, I will give you a copy,” I said, to which she responded,

“I have the other books you gave me, but this one,”

“Let me sign it for you,” I said, and she stood there with me on the photo above as I signed my third book for her.

A woman is a woman, I have always thought. There were times when only a few people could write and publish their books. Today, a Liberian President in all of her struggles and challenges is proving that our world is much smaller than we think it is, and that despite the size of our country, we can be bigger than others imagine. Whether or not we like her, it is true when Ellen says, “This Child Will Be Great,” because she is indeed someone great and wonderful.

Wilton Sankawulo: Liberian Literary Warrior is Dead- Come, and Let Us Lay Out the Mourning Cloth! Come, the Warrior is No More- Bring Out the Town Crier- The Hero is No More

Wilton Gbakolo Sengbe Sankawulo, Liberian novelist, folklorist, Professor, and former Head of State of Liberia’s Interim government in the 1990s was born in Haindi, Bong County, Fuama Chiefdom, Liberia, in 1937, and died on February 21, 2009.

Wilton Gbakolo Sengbe Sankawulo, the author of “Why Nobody Knows When He Will Die and Other Liberian Tales from Liberia” is no more.

Professor Sankawulo, died around 1pm today, Saturday, February 21, 2009. Throughout his life, Wilton loved Liberia and Liberian literature. Many of us who attended the University of Libera were students of Professor Sankawulo. I knew Wilton first, when I was a student at the University between 1977-1980, and later in the 1980s as a colleague in the English Department at the University of Liberia. He was both a teacher, a father figure, a friend, a passionate writer, a politician, and a Liberian hero.

Sundown at Dawn: A Liberian Odyssey (Dusty Spark Pub)
by Wilton Sankawulo

By Wilton Sankawulo

• Why Nobody Knows When He Will Die, and Other Tales from Liberia
• by Wilton Sankawulo (   Macmillan)Edition    Hardcover
• The Marriage of Wisdom, and Other Tales
  by Wilton Sankawulo
  Hardcover, Heinemann Educational,

Professor Sankawulo departed this world today, leaving many memories with so many of us. For those of us who love Literature, he left us several books to read and remember him. Some of us remember his huge frame, walking in the English Department of the University or we recall him signing his book even in Liberia those days. I recall many debates with him as a colleague,debates over what I thought Liberia literature was compared to what he thought.

Up until his departure from the United States a year ago, Professor Sankawulo never stopped calling me “Jebbeh, dragging my name the way the Vai people call the name, Jebbeh. He never took my corrections seriously from the days when I was his student in his Composition class at the University up to the days before he departed the US for Liberia. I would correct him that I was not “Jebbeh” the name for a Vai girl, but “Jabbeh,” the last name of my father’s family. He was a jovial, sometime serious politician. But whether he was a writer, a friend or a politician, Prof. Sankawulo loved his country and its people. He wanted to carve up all of the stories about Liberia that he could come up with. He wanted to live longer, to find time to finish that memoir of his civil war experiences.

What Dirge
By Patricia Jabbeh Wesley
__________________________________________

So what shall I use to wipe my brow?
To bring back a life
snatched away in its prime?
What shall I say, and what shall I lay hands
so helpless upon to wipe the sorrow
from my brow?

What shall I wear to mourn a life
whose end has dealt us this blow?
Shall I wear black, so when our townswomen,
hearing the drums, come wailing, wailing,
they shall see the sorrow
of my heart on my dark lappa?

Shall I tie a string around my forehead?
Shall I lie prostrate on The Mat?
Shall I cry tears for those you’ve left us to feed
when we ourselves cannot feed ourselves
in a land where the hungry, forever hungry,
keep the faith?

What dirge shall I sing?
Shall I recount the battles fought at Nganlun?
Shall I sing of blood shed at the cracking of a gun
when I myself am so afraid of the gun?
What shall I say when the women,
hearing my song, come wailing
and knocking at my door?

(Copyright: Before the Palm Could Bloom:Poems of   Africa)

——–
Photo and article, takenFROM THE LIBERIAN OBSERVER

WILTON SANKAWULO DIES
Former Chairman of Liberia, Author, Literature Professor

Published:  21 February, 2009
Picture of Prof. Sankawulo on the back of Rain and the Night

Wilton Sankawulo, a renowned Liberian novelist and folktale writer, who served as Chairman of the Council of State of the Liberian National Transitional Government in 1995 during the civil war, died at the John F. Kennedy Medical Center on Saturday afternoon, February 21, 2009, following a protracted illness. He was 71.

His wife of nearly 45 years, Mrs. Amelia Yatta Sankawulo, was at his bedside when he received his eternal summons.

On the night before his death he was visited by Liberia’s Head of State, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

Wilton Sankawulo started his literary career at Cuttington College and Divinity School (now Cuttington University) which he entered in February, 1960. His short stories were first published in the Cuttington Review, the college’s literary magazine, edited then by his classmate, Kenneth Y. Best. The faculty advisor on the Review was Mrs. Judy Gay, Cuttington’s lead English teacher during that period. Wilton frequently won the top prize for short story. Following his graduation in 1963, he was awarded a fellowship to study Sacred Theology at the Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley, California, United States of America. There he took the Master’s degree in Divinity. He later participated in a writers’ workshop at the University of Iowa, which led him on to take a second Master’s, the MFA degree in English.

Returning home in the late 1960s, Wilton was employed at the Department of Information and Cultural Affairs (now Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism), where he served first in the Press Bureau and was later appointed Director of the Overseas Press Bureau, during the administration of E. Reginald Townsend and later G. Henry Andrews, the country’s first Minister of Information. In 1973 he was appointed Special Assistant to the new Minister, Dr. Edward B. Kesselly. But during this early period, Mr. Sankawulo always maintained a teaching position at the University of Liberia, rising to the post of Associate Professor (1985-1990). He resumed his teaching at UL last year, following his return from exile during the latter part of the Liberian civil war years. He also taught English and Literature at his alma mater, Cuttington.

Professor Sankawulo began earning his fame as a prolific Liberian writer already in the 1970s. In 1974 he published The Marriage of Wisdom, his first collection of Liberian tales. The book was published by Heinemann Educational Books and became, like many others, a standard literature text in Liberian schools. His second collection, Why Nobody Knows When He Will Die, was later published by Macmillan Education Ltd.

The Rain and the Night, a novel, appeared in 1979. Many of Sankawulo’s stories appeared in the Pan African Journal, Negro Digest, African Arts, World Encounter. Sankawulo also produced an anthology of African stories entitled More Modern African African Stories, published by Fontana Books.

On the accession of William R. Tolbert to the Liberian presidency, Sankawulo, while still in the employ of the Ministry of Information, wrote a biography of the new President entitled Tolbert of Liberia.

Sankawulo’s last position at Information was Research Specialist, following which he was transferred to the Executive Mansion, where he spent almost a year as Assistant Minister of State for Presidential Affairs. Between 1983-1985 he served as Director General of the Cabinet and later Special Assistant for Academic Affairs to President Samuel K. Doe. It was in this position, as Doe’s teacher, that Sankawulo helped the Liberian Head of State to complete his academic work, leading to his graduation from the University of Liberia in 1989.

Professor Sankawulo later served as a writer with the Educational Secretariat, Catholic Archdiocese of Monrovia.

In 1995 he was named Chairman of the Council of State of the Liberian National Transition Government, a position he held until July 1996.

At a certain point Professor Sankawulo gave up his career in government to devote his life to writing and research dealing with Liberia’s traditional culture. According to him, he made this sacrifice because he felt that very little attention had at that point been given to the preservation of his country’s traditional culture, which he feared “was speedily passing away.” In this vocation, he said he had been inspired by the works of Liberia’s foremost folklorists, Bai T. Moore and Dr. S. Jangaba Johnson.

Though a novelist and short story writer, Sankawulo is himself best known as a folklorist. He described Liberian life in its traditional setting and bore witness to the richness and greatness of the mind and thought of the African people.

Wilton Sengbe Sankawulo was born on July 26, 1937, in Haindii, Lower Bong County, a Kpelle town in the Fauma Chiefdom on the St. Paul River. His parents were Dougba and Nasuaa (pronounced nay-suah) Sankawulo.

Wilton began his education at the Kpolopele Lutheran Mission near Haindii, and continued in other Lutheran Mission schools, first in Sanoyea, where he met his lifelong classmate, Dr. Walter Gwenigale, Liberia’s current Minister of Health and Social Welfare. Wilton and Walter completed the fifth grade in Sanoyea, then in the Central Province (now in Bong County). These two promising Kpelle boys were then sent to Belefanai, also in Bong, for a semester. In 1953 they were transferred to Zorzor for the sixth and seventh grades. From Zorzor they were again transferred to the Lutheran Training Institute in Harrisburg, where they completed the eighth, ninth and tenth grades. In 1958 Wilton and Walter, along with other students became numbered among the first students to enter the Lutheran Training Institute (LTI), which was transferred from Harrisburg to Salayea in the Western Province (now Lofa County). There they completed their secondary education, graduating in 1959.

The following year these lifelong classmates entered Cuttington, parting only in their sophomore year, 1961, after Walter, a brilliant Science student, received a Lutheran fellowship to study Medicine in Puerto Rico.

He is survived by his widow, Mrs. Amelia Yatta Sankawulo; two sisters, Gbesse and Evelyn; two daughters, Mrs. Rose Cooper and Mrs. Minnie Ricks; two sons, Roland and Wilton, Jr. and a host of other relatives.

Funeral arrangements will be announced later.

This article was taken from the Liberian Observer (Published by a Mr. Kenneth Best, a good friend of mine and a Liberian veteran journalist in Monrovia, Liberia, Feb.21, 2009- the Observer link: http://www.liberianobserver.com/news/fullstory.php/aid/15399/WILTON_SANKAWULO_DIES.html)

7 Liberians Killed in Philadelphia House Fire That Was Preventable-What a Sad Day!

How Each of Us Can Help Keep Our Sisters, Brothers, Neighbors, and Friends in The Liberian Immigrant Community from Experiencing these Preventable Tragedies–

The home where 7 Liberians, including a one year old, were killed by a house fire

When 7 Liberians can die in one House Fire so early into the night, I Wonder: “How Can Each of Us Prevent this from happening again?”

Liberians across the United States and elsewhere are today mourning the death of seven Liberians who were killed in a December 27 house fire in Philadelphia. According to the news, the house fire began from a woman pouring kerosene in a kerosene heater, and when it was overheating, tried to move the overheating unit out through the basement door. The fuel spilled on the carpet, news media claims, and the carpet began to catch on fire. Then the Kerosene heater exploded, but before then, one victim who survived, Murphy, a 35 year old ran with others into the basement bathroom where they opened the water tap to stay wet until the firefighters arrived. After the smoke engulfed the house, Murphy decided to get away through the only door to the exterior from the basement, leaving the rest of those in the tub in the burning house.

According to the medical examiner, three of the children died of smoke inhalation. An adult died of smoke inhalation and burns. Some of the victims included Henry W. Gbokoloi,  a 54 year old man,  8-year-old Ramere Markese Wright-Dosso, 6-year-old Mariam Iyanya Dosso, and 1-year-old Zyhire Xzavier Wright-Teah. All lived in the home.

Murphy, one of the four survivors, who lives down the street was watching a movie with others at the home when the flames erupted. He was able to escape to tell the story.

It must be a difficult day not only for the four survivors, but for the rest of the Liberian community in Philadelphia . It is also a sad day for many of us immigrants, for those who were brought over to the US and settled in the poverty of American cities without adequate heating, cooling, or housing. You only have to visit one of these neighborhoods to know.

Looking at the burnt home, it may not appear to be one of those homes because of its brick structure, but it certainly must have been. You may ask how could this have happened to a building that appears to be a regular well-to-do home? Or are there questions about landladies and landlords? Is it a question of landlords and home owners refusing to provide the proper alarms and exits in homes that were originally one family owned, turned into multifamily units, floors split up to create more apartment space without the proper exits of escape? Are there more questions to be answered?

Firefighters carry a body of one of the victims of Liberians in the Philly house fire.

My heart goes out to the families and friends of the victims, and as a Liberian myself, let me focus my blog on how we as a community all over this great country can prevent our relatives from such horrible deaths.

All of us, whether we are middle income or not have relatives from our homeland who cannot afford our lifestyles, who do not have the means, who have either lost everything in Liberia or had nothing to begin with before they were brought here during the fourteen year war. Many of us live among Liberians who live in homes that are unfit for dwelling or in homes where safety is compromised either by bad landlords or our relatives and friends themselves. How many exits does  your home have, how many ways of escape are there in your home in your Philadelphia, Brooklyn Park, Minnesota or your Staten Island home? Where will the small children pass to run from a fire in case of fire in the middle of the night? These are the questions that haunt me each time I visit a heavily populated Liberian community like Philadelphia’s Woodland area or Brooklyn Park or Staten Island?

It is not enough to weep for the dead. It is not enough to blame the dead or those who survive. One must do something about this sort of dying. Remember, most of those who are dying in US cities today escaped death to be here.

Two years ago, I went to visit my sister who lives in that sort of community in Staten Island, and was shock to discover that  she had moved to what she thinks is a larger home. I discovered first that she had one exit out of her home. The first thing I told her was that she had to move out of there. She had signed a stupid lease for two years, so I have been hounding her to move out as soon as the lease expires. Then I noticed on that first visit that she had no smoke detectors. I am her oldest sibling, so I can push her around a bit.

She had none, and did not even know too much about smoke alarms. We called her landldady who did not take any interest in installing smoke detectors. I also wanted to know about carbon monoxide detectors for the two storied floors. She had no money since my sister does not have the means and she is a new immigrant. I gave her a hundred dollars to purchase the detectors. When I arrived home back in PA, I called the next day to ask where she had installed the detector. It took several calls before she bought them. I visited a couple months after that and walked through the home, checking out each detector for myself.

I also noticed how her furniture blocks her doorway; I noticed the space heater, and began to speak to her and her husband about how to escape in case of emergency. I told her that in case of a house fire, one does not try to hide in the building. One needs to get all of the kids out the door, get to the nearest doorway and leave the building. Don’t worry about the things in the house, I asserted. I spoke to her about insurance for the things in the house. Today, when I read the news of the fire, I called my sister, and rehearsed how she needed to change the smoke detector batteries.

Now with all of this back and forth with my lovely sister, you might think she is stupid, but she is not. She is a very intelligent, well meaning mother of two young toddlers, one who often watches her toddler grandchild also, whose home is often visited by other Liberians. I need to to this because my sister has only lived in the US five years, did not live in homes made of plywood and paper before immigrating, and never grew up on gas furnaces, snowfalls, and zero degree temperatures.

WE MUST BE THE KEEPERS OF OUR RELATIVES: This is a new reality for all of us

Liberians are mourning today all over the US.

A couple years ago, another immigrant family, this time from Mali, were killed in a New York City, Bronx fire. That time, 8, including one mother and eight children were killed. Today, that immigrant family is Liberian. The victims included six who were huddled together near the basement door, apparently, the only door from the house. One of the adults was cradling a one year old baby. A seventh victim was found at the mouth of the basement door. They were trying to escape after taking much of their time in the home, not knowing what to do apparently.

But these deaths were a preventable tragedy. This sort of tragedy should not have happened if everyone coming in and out of that home had taken notice of the condition. But the saddest part is not only this tragedy; it is that across this country, tens of thousands of Liberians live in similar conditions. They have no adequate heating, and therefore turn to cheap kerosene heaters, dangerous space heaters, have no smoke detectors or carbon monoxide monitors, have small spaces with huge furniture, have too many babies cramped in small spaces or live in dangerous housing units.

In Staten Island’s Park Hill apartments, Liberian immigrants are crowded in small apartments in the sky-rise units. Many have lived in that housing complex for the past ten, nine, five or three years without even stopping to think of what could happen in case of a fire. They come and go every day, going about their good business, trying to survive the difficult immigrant life. It is not an easy thing to lose everything in one country and try to rebuild your life from scratch in a strange one. Many are great survivors, people who have beaten all odds.

Two years ago, I was visiting the Park Hill, Staten Island housing complex to interview Liberian refugee women. I had my video camera ready to record, my paper in hand, the audio tape on the table as I prepared to speak with a group of Kru and Bassa women from Liberia. All was right, my usual professional suit, all right for the occasion. “Can you tell me about your life during the Liberian civil war? Can you tell me what happened to you?” I asked a woman in her seventies or older.

She took one look at me, this resident of Park Hill, a woman who had had so much in the better days in Liberia, a woman who had come here with nothing, not even her grown children that would have helped to provide for her. “Look at me, my daughter,” this Kru woman who still command the air about her even in her great loss,  said, looking at my pathetic “academic” air about me. “You want me to tell you about my life?” She said very sternly. If I didn’t understand my own culture, I would have felt insulted, but Idid not feel insulted in any way. I stood there and watched her body language, the things she did not say and could not have said if she wanted to.

“You want me, me, the woman that I am, to tell you how the war took everything from me, how the rebels killed my two sons, my grandchildren, burned down my home, took all my money, and now that I am so old, I come to live in this building with small windows, no way to go?” She looked at me with pity. “I can’t tell you,  my daughter,” she said. “Just look at where I live and write you book. Look at where I live!”

“Just look at where I live and write you book…”

If each of us can just look at where our people live, and do what we can to help them change in whichever way we can, maybe we can be spared the sort of tragedy that has befallen us.

I tell my sister from time to time that what is important is that she and her children survive the immigrant experience and live a better life than they lost in Liberia. That better life does not have to be beautiful clothing and TVs, nice cars or a mansion. If she can live in a decent and safe home where her children can get some education, maybe she can be consoled one day for losing two children in the war.  But this will come with some sacrifice, not settling for the worst housing, cutting here, cutting there, allowing a safe passage room in case of a need to escape. We live in America now, and we must learn to live in America, I will say.

WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH: An Estimated 500 Liberian Women Refugees, Protesting in Ghana’s Buduburam Refugee Camp Arrested and Thrown on Buses and Trucks- Can Somebody Tell Me What’s Going On Here?

When refugees from one of the world’s bloodiest wars can remain in a refugee camp in the tens of thousands while the world goes on for fourteen to twenty years, and because of a peaceful protest, be thrown into buses and trucks at dawn, with their children, involuntarily taken to a destination not of their choice by military men from their host country, this is a sad day for the world. The last I heard, there was a United Nations and a refugee commission to help ease such a conflict between refugees who have nothing and their host country. But to pack them up while they are supposed to be asleep on buses for repatriation to their homeland is not a good thing to do to any group of people.

But this is women’s History Month. A week ago, there were big celebrations of Women’s History around the world, Women’s achievement, and a group of protesting, angry women, trying to get the world to listen to them get forced on trucks to be forcefully sent back to a country they escaped forcefully years ago? The sad thing is that many of these refugees have lived through other times when they saw many of their country people forcefully taken on trucks and dumped in unmarked graves during the Samuel Doe Charles Taylor wars. Now before I go on, let me say this is the news. I am not making any of this up.

Liberian women sitting out in protest a week ago before the arrest. ( SOURCE : www.equalitytrumpet.net)

According to news from Agence de Presse Afraine at this link: http://www.apanews.net/apa.php?article58141

about 200 women and children were forcefully removed at 4 am by military forces and taken to an unknown destination, and that sources indicated that these peaceful demonstrators will be repatriated involuntarily. In another news brief, there are claims that the number of those rounded up with AK-47s and taken away was as high as 500 refugee women. Check out news sources for more news on this grave human rights issue. As a blogger and a Liberian, I thought to respond to the dozens of hits my blog has got every day with readers searching for news on this Liberian -Ghana -world problem.

Liberian women are seen here, sitting peacefully in protest about treatment in the Buduburam Camp in Ghana

I bring this grave news to your attention only as a blogger, knowing that I am not a journalist, and most of the information I react to comes from internet sources. We do not hear any news about Africa or about the rest of the world from our news media; therefore, many of us depend on the Internet for our news. I am now here reacting as a blogger, a writer, a Liberian woman, a poet who believes that there is a need to bring harmony to such situations before they become destructive, as a relative to some of those women who are protesting, who were forcefully removed from what they have known as home for so many years, and as a human being.

There are things we can do to assist others in getting the news and there are people we can call to stop this craziness. I have sent an e-mail to Amnesty International, an e-mail to The Advocates for Human Rights, have signed the petition at this link, where you too, can sign:

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/buduburam/

Now, maybe the Liberian President, Her Excellency Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and her government will pressure the UN and the government of Ghana to return the protesting women to their homes and give them a voice. It is my hope that the Liberian government will move speedily to resolve this problem. The government of Ghana is also in a tight spot, but the use of the military on these refugees does not look too good for both sides.

This is Women’s History Month. Let us allow the voices of the disadvantaged women around the world to be heard. There have been hundreds of hits over this week on my blog where readers are desperately looking for news of this horrible news. Now join in and protest in your corner and in the open so that these women are released by tonight.

Remember, this is Women’s History Month and we are increasingly being called on to support women in power. But around the world, women are still struggling just to be left alone to sit on the bare muddy ground to protest.

Living Longer than Our Mothers: Tips for the African Diaspora (Black)Woman

CHECKING TO BRING DOWN THAT BLOOD PRESSURE:

I was in high school when I first began hearing my late mother complain about High Blood Pressure. Everyone in our family and anyone who knew my mother knew that she was a High Blood Pressure patient. During that same time, I can recall my stepmother also complaining about High Blood Pressure. I did not know what that meant, however, but one thing was clear: the two mothers in my life had High Blood Pressure.

I also began thinking, hey, maybe all women in their early middle ages or older were bound to have High Blood Pressure.

Maybe that didn’t have to be.

Those two beautiful women, my mother Datedor Mary Hney and my stepmother, Nmano Jabbeh died in their early sixties from complications of High Blood Pressure made complex by the Liberian civil war with its bombings and lack of medical care.

But that’s not true of many of us today. We do not have to die of the same illnesses that killed our mothers. Many of us are more educated and better off economically than our mothers were, and have every resource it takes to survive the silent killer called High Blood Pressure. But that is not the only illness that can kill us however.

The stories are numerous and sad. The reality of the stories is that High Blood Pressure as a disease is more common among us black women than women of other races. The symptoms are so subtle, you never know you have High Blood Pressure just from feeling something inside of you. You can be dying of the disease and not know it. And worst of all, everything we do every minute of the day, including eating can contribute to raising our blood Pressure.

If High Blood Pressure can easily kill people at home in Africa where the stresses of everyday living are far different than the stresses of living in a high pressure, busy, hurried, capitalistic, puppy-eat-puppy world,then of course, the story is worse here in the US than at home.

Everyone knows how busy all of us are. The things that will hold off High Blood Pressure or other related diseases are not as accessible to us immigrant women. The food many of us now eat in the US is far different from the food we used to eat at home. The children we are raising are far different from the ones we would have raised in Africa.

Here in the US, our children are more rebellious and more difficult, and are themselves faced with the popular culture of rebellion that children coming up in other parts of the world do not face. And yet these are the children that we who are prone to High Blood Pressure and its related diseases must raise. To crown it, we do not have the extended family network of grandparents, uncles and aunties, neighbors and a long line of extended relatives on all sides that Africans are used to. Of course, these extended relatives come with their own stresses upon African families, but hey, the benefits such family connections at home give us far outweigh the disadvantages. Unlike our mothers who raised us at home in Africa, the stresses we deal with in a simple immigrant family community are far higher and far more complex.

And yet we must live longer than our mothers and our grandmothers because we are far better off than our mothers and our grandmothers. I know, some of you may say, “No-no, that’s not true.” Some Diaspora women today are not better off than their parents were; however, and in fact, many from my own country came from families that were far better off economically. This makes it even more imperative that we live longer, healthier and better than our parents.

Tips to Help You Overcome High Blood Pressure:

Remember that High Blood Pressure is more common among women than men, so watch yourself as you climb up the age ladder. When you are thirty-five years old and older, this is the time to really be on a watch out for those stresses and signs of High Blood Pressure. Always ask the nurse to tell you what your pressure is when you visit the doctor, and if you are over 40 with children at home, you should begin to take control of your pressure readings. A black woman with a pressure of 125 over 90 should be concerned since one salty meal will raise your pressure without you even noticing it.

If you have other problems like Diabetes, a heart condition or high cholesterol, you are at a higher risk than someone without these added conditions. If your mother or your sisters have high High Blood Pressure, you should know that you might have or could develop High Blood Pressure.

If you have High Blood Pressure, you have the illness for life, so girl, just buckle up and begin the process of doctoring yourself along. High Blood Pressure does not go away simply because you are feeling good on a particular day. You will need to work with a family doctor to help bring your High Blood Pressure down to a level that is normal. This is what I and my doctors consider normal for a black woman. 120 over 80 or less is better than 130 over 90 or higher.

Most black (African women) need two types of High Blood Pressure medications. One of them is supposed to be a water pill that helps your body get rid of salty fluids. I have friends who have complained about water pills that drain one’s body of all of the potassium; therefore, you need to work with your doctor so you get the right kind of water pill. There are water pills that get rid of the bad water while retaining your potassium in your body. Work with your doctor until you find the right medications that works only for you.

The same tablets that work for your mother or your sister may not work for you, and some medications will be bad for you because of your body make up. You need to remember that each time your blood is splashed against your heart’s interior walls, the heart needs time to relax before the next splash against the walls, and an individual with High Blood Pressure has the blood splashing at a higher speed and at a faster rate than a normal blood pressure individual. This therefore puts added weight on the heart because it is required to do what it was not made to do, and each pressure weakens the heart’s muscles. After many years of your heart doing a job harder than it was cut out to do, you are losing life time, and finally, after many years, your heart will give up, and you will die. All of this is in a lay man’s terms. I am not a medical doctor, so you need to talk to your doctor about this.

You need to remember that the foods we eat contribute to how healthy or how sick we are. Avoid foods that are high in cholesterol, high in salts, foods that are fatty, and sugary, etc. Remember that fresh vegetables, home cooked meals, sea foods like fish, white chicken, etc. will keep you living well. Avoid too much beef, pork, prepared meals, processed foods, fast foods, etc., especially, at your age.

The foods we eat as African immigrants are less troublesome, but it depends on how you cook your food. Avoid vegetable oils and use more Canola or Olive oils. Olive oil is expensive, but Canola oil is better for you. Avoid frying your chicken each time you need to eat chicken and try baking your chicken (wings and white parts of the chicken) in spices, hot peppers, and you will see that jollof rice tastes good with baked chicken too. This cuts the use of oils. Make a point of buying fish, roasting or baking your fish more and more.

Now, let’s talk about how to watch your Blood Pressure:

You need to have a High Blood Pressure machine if you are a High Blood Pressure patient. Make a point of taking your pressure with either a digital machine or a hand one if you can use one. While you are under a doctor’s care for High Blood Pressure, take your pressure every day until a time when your pressure is brought under control by your daily pills.

If your life is as stressful as mine, meaning that you are a professionally busy woman, a mother, a wife, and if everything under the sun waits for you in your world to be done, then of course, you need to take your pressure machine with you whenever you travel, and take your pressure on long trips to avoid getting sick when you are away from home. Do not ever ignore swelling feet or hands because these are signs of danger. Remember that it is better to drive yourself to the emergency room than to wait until you need to call 911.

Exercise is also key to bringing your pressure under control:

One of the mistakes immigrant African women make is to believe that they can live here in the US as if they were still at home in Africa. I know a few women who do not exercise, and when you ask them, they will pretend that exercise is a white woman’s thing. They are like me, drive to work, return home and drive right into their garages at the end of each day. They want to exercise, but cannot find the time to visit a gym where they can exercise. Unlike me however, they do not find time to work out at home. Of course, they are intimidated by the very complex machines even if they could get to the gym.

Well- you don’t need to go to a gym to exercise. Just do your work-out at home, right in your own home where you do not have to make any great effort to be physically fit. This is what I do. I simply turn on my African music or cd, a favorite one that has the kind of beat I need, a whole cd with music I like, and do my dance, my push-ups, and sit-ups, letting my music inspire me at least four times a week, working out for forty minutes each time.

Exercise keeps you younger, healthier, and physically fit enough to beat up anyone you may feel like beating up-ha-ha.

My eighteen year old son is taller, bigger, and looks stronger than me, but hey, he cannot knock me down if he tries. He likes to wrestle me when he gets bored and wants to play fight and his older brother is not around, and when he throws a pillow at me, and I try to fight back, he gets himself into a real fight if he tries to wrestle me. He’s done that since he was a kid, and now he has discovered his Mom cannot be beaten.

Well, I hope none of us ends up like my mother who died at 63 from High Blood Pressure. I can tell you that all of the above tips have helped me have the best pressure for five years now, I mean far lower than what is the normal. Do not let your blood pressure get a hold of you- okay?