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10/15/1980 - The New Liberia by Bowden S. Quinn

NOT FOR PUBLICATION WITHOUT WRITrRS CONSENT INSTITUTE OF CURRENT WORLD AFFAIRS BSQ City Hotel Box Freetown Sierra Leone The New Liberia October Mr Peter Bird Martin Institute Current World Affairs Wheelock House West Wheelock Street Hanover New Hampshire 03755 Dear Peter Monrovia American It betray American origins Freetown shantytown architec Creole speech Monrovia relic Americana rusting Lincoln Continental behemoths Norman Rockwell postage stamps An American feels arrives country US dollar Liberian Currency On streets Monrovla signs pervasive white houded litter exhorting pedestrians Pitch In familiar mailboxes square bottoms rounded inscription R L Mail traffic uniform New York finest complete silver badge heavy volver carried gunslinger fashion The aptly named Gurley Street center Monrovla night Its names California Hotel Eagle Night Club Saloon The named place especially popular large expatriate American community Friday nights Its walls ceiling covered memorabilia Old West Much looks authentic bullwhip single rifle straw sombrero brass shield emblem U Sb Marine Corps The owner Yugoslavian wears green cowboy gleaming white Roy Rogers gallon serves drinks behind there signs Old West movie posters magazine cover photo John Wayne cavalry uniform legend Ameria Why I Love Her Other display recent American culture ralsed dance floors oloree lasstiles flashing lights beneath The popularity disco special Monrovla John TPa volta painted walls Sierra Leone Saturday Ni__ Feer white three piece accompanying likes Bob Marley Donna Summer African singers Monrovia though African FM statlon sound female voice standard radio At Broad Street commercial avenue KingBurger recently opened It Monrovia first Bowden Quinn Overseas Journalism Fellow Instie studying colonial influences West African nations His current interest cultures Liberia Sierra empoiu Other restaurants Roosters serve fried chicken quick The colonel place family Satuay burEers chicken finicky shakes cardboard boxed pastries In lighted Zess cabinet Liberia added urebeer ailablee Aother culinary feature The cream comes stainless steel naohines I Dai Queen The ppular baked beaddshortbread display windows front omers These shops large glass popcorn found movie theaters S X never layer popcorn cases seemed while S plastic popcorn Monz seedy vitality I found nowhere Af With population Fee bustlin dnore No hndca block traffic The offices Broad Street fahionebl those Feetos Siaka Stevens Street The airline encles bright The elegant shops hushed There customers either tourist season could coloe retailin capital Africa Clothes sores stores record stores stores shelvesdshelves farancesdcosmetics providin reeter variety I States Shoes sellers Many stores display selec tions C othin abundance vendors bundZes material beento taller shops Monrovia modernity cannot poverty Blackened ruins rassy Broad S behind office buildings corrua shacks YounE sidewalk candy wooden womendIrls bananas peeled stewedmeat friedfishdreasylps Most people crowdin sidewalks nowhere They money Monroli imbibed American culture unlike Dakar where French infiuence seems imposeddartificial One inhabi worlds In Dar francophile bleak edthe African accepts because Fench culture elitist The sidewalk cafes bookstores tlsseries wealthy educated world world underfoot Ame BSQ culture supposed different Fast cream parlors disco everyone American culture cratic readily available Its commonness gives class Cheapness quality In Monrovia where cornbread delicacy where street urchins watch through glass people their Kingburgers where discos charge admission Liberians spending whites American culture travesty American culture first ridged peninsula called Cape Mesurado forms Bible In agents US government church Ameri Colonization Society their pistols force ruler King Peter listen their demand The reluctantly agreed remained strongly opposed settlement The colonists initially thirty three liberated blacks white agents lived small island mouth Mesurado River while frantically worked establish permanent settlement They examples harsh first years Freetown settlement miles failure earlier American Colonizat Society venture coast teach being unprepared start rainy season On April rains began moved called Christopolls The American Colonization Society product antag onistic forces United States another forty years would country apart In North strong evangelical movement questions about morality slavery Such righteousness easily North became populous industrialized Wage earning workers would products factories needed growtl prosperity In plantation fields South slave labor essential economy Even southernersmanumitted their slaves service diligence change heart As communities blacks southerners pernicious influence slaves Although American Colonization Society started northern preachers derived F1nding frown South Northerners colonization movement toward ending slavery southerners considered means strengthening insti tution Despite their industriousness Christopolis settlers straits during tleir first rainy season Many victim climate disease West Africa Rather improving relations ounding natives settlers antagonized furthe firin attemp cargo wrecked The natives prepared enfeebled colony shape repel Christopolis might Granville Town first settlement Sierra Leone which destroyed angry ribesmen arrival Au lirty blacks wiite named Jehudi Asllmun trade ltostility natives prevenLed failed teacher States Africa mbney debts proved leader Wih military raininf Flair military tactics especially yiven overhelminN technical superiority directed construction battlement could criss cross cannon about settlernent drilled settlers fiThtin When natives attacked months after Ashmun arrival settlers ready AI thoug vastly outnumbered decimated attackers losing their Richard West author Bac____k A_fr_i history Liberia Sierra Leone quotes AsImuns journal scribing battle Ima ination scarcely figure itself throng human beings capital state exposure destructive power machinery modern warfare Eight hundred pressed shoulder shoulder compact child might easily their heads other presentinc their breadth equal twenty thirty exposed great power raised platform thirty sixty yards dista Every literally spent force solid living human flesh The blood spilled would horribly avenged years later Firmly planted African colony slowly stunted contradictions origin America Like British colony Sierra Le meant receive freed slaves captured slaving ships Unlike Britain United States never effort trade although government declared illecal agreed Treaty Ghent which ended Britain traffic While Freetown received thousands Negroes hulls slave ships first nineteenth century Liberia received hardly trickle emigrants America colony Many these former slaves emiration condition freedom For blacks United States return Africa The American Colonization Society became target abolitionists US firebrand William Ll Garri He considered society affront Negro Amer Africa subtle slave owner slave trader The colonization support abolitionists campaign their first target The issue Garrison wrote whether climate Africa salubrious whether colony prosperous condition whether transportation whole colored population effected thirty years three centuries whether slaves emancipated condition BSQ banishment whether dctrin R Pnoip Society accord doctrines principles Gospel whether slveholMers proprietors their slaves whethe sacred nation abolsh system slavery recognize people color brethren countrymen unjustly treated covered unmerited shame Beleaguered abolitionist American Coloni zation Society could longer afford support enthre As battle lines ormed US country forgot Aran offshoot The Ameri overnment never cepted responsibillty colonT colonization antithetical republic undamental philosophy The overnment apparently remained unimpressed settlers chanedthe nameo Christopolls Monrovla in8to honor memory president aided founding colony The wishers could territory declare independence something colonists anxious In settlement Cape Mesurado nearby settlement slaves ounded Misslssip Colonization ociety They ormed Commonwealth Liberia A similar settlement started Maryland Colonizatlon Society stayed outside until In conmonwealth became republic ritan which country manufacturers traders without headaches colonlal administration reconized state France other European countries lowed The United States wantin Negro iplomat in1ame tempers urther volatile Washington wlthheld recog nition until Civil War ended overnmen concern southern susceptibilities Liberia black republic Arica Haiti become modern black state ollown years blood7 slave revolts The ancient empire Ehiopia black natlon withs centuries northr aresslon Arab later European As Richard West points Liberia ained independence easily because overning black state posed threat Western powers It European tlons became possessive nineteenh century because their mutual susplcions ealousies blacks unable overn themselves became ashionableo In Europeans eased their consciences ignored evils colonlalsm ratlonali slavery propagating Negro subhuman Had Liberia asked ndence rather West observes people would doubt government For almost years after independence years before became nation Lberia small prosperous state Coffee coton export readily produced crops BSQ consumption As today Liberian American single field cargo ships plied Atlantic Yet tensions growin between small population immigrants their descendants Who probably numbered So called blacks mulattoes polit control country The antagonisms broke lence after Edward James Roye black elected presit 1870o A later Liberian 0mess deposed former President Joseph Jenkin Roberts mulatto reinstalled power Roye after either murdered prison drowned tryin escape It coinci factional violen broke Liberia economy declined The decline number factors The international nomic situation entered extended period instability arotlld While demand African agricultural products increased prices Liberia especially competition Brazil coffee market The price Liberian coffee dropped From cents poun4 cents pound century Tlte rowth sugar industry Europe backed covernment subsidies cripled Liberia sugar trade As independent country Liberia advance protectionism Europe restrictive trade practices spread colonialism Com petition ffrol European shippinc lines avored I uropean actrin Liberia fleet business In uided improve economy Liberian overnment entered disastrous financial deals British overnment private inustry By country nearly bankrupt uspicious Bri intentions Liberia turned US quickly became dependent Amer It erican company govennent Libel economic colony As Henry Ford nxtion wheels Anericans worry about round In lnlish trolled rubber ustry through domination Malay jacked rices viich cents pound pound three years Tire manufacturer HarVey Firestone decided nethin about Liberian overnment ninety million acres forest bargain ained larvae amount control Libeian econoy Soon Liberia little subsicliary C tubber Company Euro Dean ntries especially Britain American penetration continent ustry sidered their campai divest Liberia sovereignty League Nations mandated ritory To focused atention hitherto noted ationshiD between Americo Liberians digenous tribes Stories Liberian overnment officials sellinr native Kr slave labor international headlines BSQ I9 Vor while US overnment withdrew rcognition Liberia The furor became clear England using issue which truth peculiar Liberia discredit government American backers Few people really interested Li berian natives With rubber prices Thig6ies prosperity returned country The American presence creased advent World War II US built country La Liberia became Voice America transmitter American banks Chase Manhattan Citibank moved facilitate money country Liberia remain American preserve however Swedish other buropean companies exploitation mineral reserves importation Euro manufactured The Americo Liberians benefited enormously fusion foreign capital Ol power hands families notably Tubmans Tolberts William V S Tubman became president served capacity until death succeeded president twenty years William Tolbert Throughout their careers divisions between descnd natives being erased division between black mulatto among immigrants gradually disappeared Neither actions words He Tubman Tolbert I power money I I You That story Monrovia director national security Kru probably apocryphal mytholo sprung almost overnight explain creation I iberia Monrovia stories stories events months For start revolution however people eighteen months April Saturday When talks killin Pres ident Tolbert where begins No Monrovia seems derive pleasure satisfaction assassination almost invariably person shrug He warned If never realized their extent before apart Saturday should opened president frustration people Lamini Waritay editor Ne_w Libe_ ____ria_ newspaper worst outpouring couldn compare The trigger small anger seatsd Estimates number people killed police range twenty Tolbert blamed ProgreS Alliance Liberia opposition ordered BSQ arrest leader Gabriel Baccus Matthews The Dresident blamed students closed Univers Liberia 0tllel actiolls uence A later situation apparently calmed Monrovia preparing For mayoral election The PAL nounced would ister political party contest election Despite claim ensuring democratic freedoms Tolbert overnment prevented PAL political recistrationo Matthews called national strike protest Tolbert government uncovered attempt again threw PAL leaders On April another Saturday Samuel Doe master Liberian other rankin tilers snuck palatial Executive Mansion Dresident bedroom Tolbert taken Covernment There little resistance The soldiers apparent political connections ology before They brought ovevnment Matthews foreign minister leader Movement Justice A9rica MOJA another croup opposed reinin Tre Party Observers disagree whether incorporation civilians overnment their leftist views national lition attemp neutralize oDposition It ficult point runnin overnment direction headin Monrovie remains unsettled community The welcomed soldiers saviours second thoughts Roberts International AirDort thirty miles ffrom capital drivers fore_i The oficial Fare 22o50 I I I No drivers assred I I sDlit CaPe other Dasseners The drivers insisted other passen already departed I stuck front window asked white wanted Sure saicl Th driver before could I could I other African As I climbed I Daper between seats front written I resolved Denny A miles airport Gun totin soldiers bored reedy unspervised roadblock Three taxis pulled sseners openin suitcases We stopped opened tcunk The perlaps soldier waved driver ahead other psssener D I I about twenty yards When I reached soldiers reprimandn Iriver Cot treatment Tiey looked Dvffinctorily I started cettinc pulled BsQ I9 front They would detain driver making I understand first Libertan English creole spoken thick accent dropplnK consonts I protested thiin I Koln talned The soldler tryln explain A Jew yards other soldler waved spoke through window He sters himdthey tried somethln I couldn comprehend edriwe started soldier sharply looked drlved watery Ater anothe atemp Ket through soldier impatiently A little urther another soldier wantln edriver slowed passed Although soldler I thought Z others nearby I wondered whether windshield would shattered bullets I think Idle driver passenger furtive glances before range After driver pleasant mY0without protest The soldiers In Monrovia Many cart7 apparent reason other likln across their sholders American businessman plane Freeto skinned atlan Negro ranin through checkpoint Way Monrovla For soldiers openin luggage One night makln local business acquaintance Lebanese noticed soldier submachinentailln etime entered ollowed slttln quiet17 alone oxcep stayed place slttin Jew yards hisnpointed their eAmerican paused cigarette The soldler newer Perhaps actin bodyard I Lamlni Waritay through Pies Foray Tablet In Free They classmates Fourah Bay College tarted paper toether War Father overnment family pressure combined displeasure drove He eatues editor Ne overnment paper bosses paper remoec simply radio report their Wartay inherited edltor A later mistake prnti letter complalned soldiers actln Pdn around In Mercedes msions Aed showed Waritay supervlsln editor deput7 editor questioned seized deputy He weptdclaimed editorial sponsblty I other decided salde Warita7 later pointed needn added coent A dssted soldler called woman story War claimed because nothinon Later I again condition diers btened They control Some drunk As Waritay other editor being marched ministry information another soldier their catprs These celltots Of paper letter Then bother Wartay emembered soldier Spray The diers showed restaln spray their prisoners The spent hours ministry explain freedom press soldles couldn logic ovement pawer orint somhJ critlca ovemen At release The soldiers first after collop One still The New Liberlmn offices intheRoyebuildinonAshmunStreet ItMavaoa SIdlers anythin could condi ioners rniture ypeiters Someone appropriated paper At airport closed looted soldiers A bullet holes windows there should Tho height public execration I former overnment True Whi Ps yoeials Wai ywshlthpess ornand almos esptvo sdlenee Repo called press eonEerence Eeet MnsJon there xectton meware One Waritay described terror condemned tauntin lauhin soldiers It hundreds years comin That exaeration settlers arrived execution Kin Peter tribesmen mowed settlers Watay round killim makim hrouh nconspicuously depar perhaps anger soldiers He walked Monrovia ryinff His shoid accep average Liberian8 response killins His orica eultually Africans violent oples The executions ypical iberians MyLai massacre typlcal meicans The stuaion uncet Ostensibly owenmen polic_os reoms moderate A burdensome hutxhas ltted Income taxes salaried workers increased progressive Milia ciwil servant upped Rorei investmen encoutaed The ovemn malnta capltallst economy plans ansfer money public corporations private BSQ hands Doe repeatedly called soldiers molest citizens An captain removed ruling People Reempt Council assaultlng ordering arrest hospital doctor Yet there signs armyts revolutionary ardor chase foreign investors The PRC officers recommendations improvements foreign owned foreign businesses Suggestions I changes Monrovia Breweries would scare almost Western business Among items automatic loans request employee AnOther demand worker participation decision making consistent government stated objec tives unlikely welcomed forei managers More disturbing signs rulers cumbing seductions power erode intentions interest oppression Waritay complained about female students vacation They ournalistic experience training tives PRC members The cafeteria beneath newspaperIs offices families influential Amerieo Liberians relatives PRC The cheaper these minor abuses power cousin harden system corruption At moment commandeering occupying houses simple lessness ntitlements office given strength Much depend Samuel Doe He shown surprising amount leadership young trained trans orders One wonder there powers behind throne Waritay heard Doe eager power civilians being urged remain office colleagues Matthews UN recently country schedule elections More recently FRC spokesman Liberians foreign dents concerned about would return barracks together would reconstruct country While Monrovia radio began broadcasting Our Redeemer repeating several times It heady stuff young master sergeant The revolution motto In cause people struggle contlnues Doe concludes speeches Tee shirts street printed beneath Yet already quarters spoken smile derision The suspicion grows newspeak designed truth truth Right people worried about economy democracyo Liberiats economy ruined years Tolbertregime unwise unproductive investment foreign loanso Private investment dried foreigners outcome Thousands Liberians Monrovla rural areas fruits revolution bitter taste ployment verty Crime increased alarmin despite R Liberians expect US They Aer bscke forme regime pourin money count while umnin people ferin Repe point In words nationaL securi eirector America solve problem Liberia poverty It meant breat prediction Liberia loner docile follower US dictates America friend Africa Doe expected credentials Aust Etbonis commnique criticizin American military Somalia More socialist rhetoric pPobab ffovernment prononcements It would miste shortsighted ressmen withhold because independence I I S Liberia financial dificultJes leave political twistin West A ffrican lesdePs Nigerian PreSident Shehu Shari already shown stron dlplom pressure restrain excesses Liberia military Sierra Leoile President S28ka Stevens certainly displeased events restive polit flefdom whatever power chairman Orcran zation African Unity Liberian overnment remains moderate Monrovia American Liberia truly African country riendship respect US probably strom country Africa If US earnestly overnment without tryin remain As Liberianp oplewJ lbenefitfromUSaid isupo benew rulers Regards Bowden Quin Received I auover