By Alfred P. B. Kiadii
Comrades and Friends:
The Weah kakistorcracy basking in the afterglow of a fraudulent electoral victory and feasting on the putrid cadaver of the national treasury is nothing but a facsimile of the banditry of Taylor, which looted the republic on an industrial scale and thus retrogressed it into the abyss of economic paralysis and social backwardness. As for this current wreckage of a regime, which toys with the fantasy that it can improvise that gory tragedy on the people on the spur of the moment is at a cul-de-sac, as the country is fast transforming into a seething cauldron.
Under the rallying call for the popular democratic forces in the homeland—in the mass media, the sophisticated opposition, student community and progressive tendency—the imminent collapse of the Weah government would happen quickly than we thought and predicted. The current regime, with its backs against the walls have seen the table turned back on it in every stride it seeks to make. And that is why we write this piece to entreat all the progressive forces in the homeland to explore all democratic fronts in bringing this regime to an abrupt end.
The Struggle Continues!
We write to you from our bleeding heart in spite of the growing uncertainty and the brazen betrayal of the people’s aspiration for a new nationalism and a progressive itinerary which must advance first and foremost the social transformation of the homeland and take the people into history, where they don’t simply live with nature but master it, leading to advances in science, technology, engineering and the art.
Comrades and Friends, in this time when progressive thoughts have been consigned and discarded as apostasies and heresies. When a spiteful campaign of calumny has been launched against decent compatriots who dare to question the awkward trajectory the homeland is on. When competence and professionalism are substituted for crude chauvinism and scandalous patronage. When the sacred terrain of statecraft has been reduced to the plaything of playboys and playgirls; we cannot, must not, and should not lose faith in the republic and the people! To lose faith in the people and the republic is not only to lose faith in oneself but to approve and surrender by default to historical sycophants and gatecrashers who think the bruised republic is a gambling casino.
Liberia does exist in the confluence of the universe, and so it should be subjected to the objective laws of nature that govern human society, development and thoughts. As the class struggle is the motor force of history, Liberia is not immune from such objective reality. To understand this is to accept the truism that while swindlers and opportunists jockey for affluence and material wealth, noble men, progressive nationalists, and
enlightened patriots exuding with consciousness fight for noble causes and the social transformation of society. In this milieu, one ought to understand the heroes are not the ones who use vicious schemes or normally obtain power, but characters who sacrifice themselves for the transformation of their peoples.
Thus, it is in this pantheon that great men and women before us have been immortalized by history. It is in this league that great men like Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana; Modibo Kieta of Mali; Amilcar Cabral of Guinea Bissau; Eduardo Mondlane of Mozambique; Tom Mboya of Kenya; Govan Mbeki, Chris Hani, Joe Slovo, Ruth First, Winnie Mandela, Steve Bantu Biko, Abraham Tiro, and Hector Pieterson of South Africa; Mwalimu Julius K. Nyerere of Tanzania; Felix Moumie of Cameron; and Du Fahnbulleh, Edwin J. Barclay, Dr. Edward Wilmot Blyden, Juah Nimley, Dr. Morias of Liberia are placed.
Furthermore, even when progressive forces win, the vicious class enemies have used counterrevolutions and subterranean warfare to strangulate progressive governments in Africa and the Third World. This was how the likes of Sylvanus Olympio of Togo; Patrice Emery Lumumba of Congo; Salvador Allende of Chile; Maurice Bishop of Grenada; Omar Torijos of Panama; and Samora Machel of Mozmabique perished. Also, the reactionary class enemies even orchestrated such ploys to roll back the revolutionary gains in Cuba, Venezuela and Vietnam, but the conscious vanguards along
with the peoples of those countries decisively crushed the counter-revolutionary gangsters.
Comrades and Friends, in history, great patriots don’t struggle for winning causes, but the right causes. Men don’t only struggle when conditions are lofty and okay. Sometimes one does not reap the fruit of their struggle, but as it said in revolutionary circles that the bloods of martyrs serve as the seeds of resistance against oppression and backwardness. That is why Chairman Mao exhorted us that a revolution is not a dinner party but it is an intense class struggle, which cannot be fought by timid individuals, but by progressive forces with the fortitude and resilience to stomach the machinations and ploys of the class enemies.
Elements who think the struggle is a funfair vacillate between the popular progressive forces and the reactionary ruling class. And that is why we say to some of our compatriots who insult the people for not electing them and thus decide to join the debased ruling clique, individuals who genuinely struggle for the transformation of society don’t do so hoping to reap a reward. Conversely, they do so because their humanity is sensitive to injustice and oppression and are moved by the sight of the toiling masses eking out the soil for survival and perishing in poverty and mystery in the midst of abundance. This contradiction pricks their consciences to reject the values of the political gangsters that preside over the state to struggle for an inclusive society.
The Progressives and their Struggle
In the political history of our country, the people we call “The Progressive forces” are the most demonized and vilified struggle icons. While progressive nationalists in Ghana, Tanzania, Guinea, South Africa and etc. were given political power by their people to transform their respective societies, ours in Liberia were and are still viciously disdained by the so-called intelligentsia and some of the lumpen masses. On many occasions in post-war Liberia, elements of the progressive class have been massively rejected at numerous electoral polls in Liberia. This rejection is often accompanied by insults, demonization, and even brute violence from people for whom they placed their lives on the line.
Dr. Togba Nah Tipoteh of the Alliance for Peace and Democracy (APD – the coalition of the United People’s Party and the Liberian People’s Party) was rejected by the people at the polls in 2005. Similarly, Dr. H. Boima Fahnbulleh, Jr. of the Liberia People’s Party (LPP) was also rejected by the people at the polls in 2017. Their rejections by the people were reasons for them to insult, condemn and show outright contempt for the mass of Liberians, but these men have neither insulted nor condemned the people. Although they sacrificed their lives and the future of their families and despised wealth with the objective of discarding the bankrupt aristocracy of the True Whig Party (TWP) by struggling for the opening of the democratic space to allow the political participation of the indigenous population and agitating for the organization of the productive forces for the social benefits
of the mass of our people. They are aware the people and only the people are makers of history.
Nowhere in history have men and women who struggled for the dignity and honor of their peoples openly insult, vilify and demonstrate hate for them because the people have not paid receptive ears to their battle cries for the social transformation of the society. Men and women who place their lives on the line for the social transformation of society understand that the people are very conservative by nature. They are disposed to adhering to the philosophy, culture and politics of the ruling class or the prevailing socioeconomic and political formation of the society. Only through practical experiences have they learned from history and drifted to progressive forces to struggle. In other words, the masses of people don’t dabble in theoretical postulates or reside in the ivory tower. They learn from the hazards of big events, and their consciousness is awaken to the cruelty of the ruling class at that moment. It is based upon this dialectical movement that students and the lumpen masses in South Africa massively drifted to the trilateral alliance of the African National Congress (ANC), the South African Communist Party (SACP), and the Congress of South Africa Trade Union (COSATU) in the aftermath of the Soweto Uprising.
In fact, history teaches us wherever the struggle for social transformation has been waged by the right historical figures whether in Cuba, Vietnam, Russia or China, the mass of people who were once docile or passive have been active standing with those revolutionary processes. And so in Liberia
small molecular changes below the surface of the rotten status quo must come at the zenith and create in the people the consciousness for the necessity of change. It is from this dialectical process that individual such as Hugo Chavez emerged as a historical figure in Venezuela following the Caracazo in 1989.
Similarly, in Liberia, by the 1970s, we had reached such stage in our political history. The crumbling of the oligarchy of the True Whig Party was inevitable and imminent. The people we aptly call progressives are men and women who were providing revolutionary leadership with the objective of guiding the masses into victory. The metamorphosis of the people from passivity to activeness was demonstrated on April 14, 1979 when they decided to no longer conform to the dictates of the corrupt True Whig Party. Hence, necessity was created through accident and the people marched in their numbers against the decision of the government to increase the price of rice.
The Rice Demonstration was a decisive turning point for the people to have expressed their indignation at a 132-year-old oligarchy that showed acute condescension for them (the people) and their culture. The people acted on April 14, 1979, but the sluggishness of the vanguard to interpret the signal and take the power led to a counter-revolutionary ploy that subjected the mass of people to torture and death by the reactionary state with its armed bodies of men. Despite the victimization of the people only because they demonstrated against the ruling class, the people were still willing to struggle
against the rotten ruling class. This could have happened through another accident or at the electoral polls which was scheduled for 1983.
The coup of April 12, 1980 Military is one of the factors that precluded the progressive forces from obtaining political power. Obviously, either of the progressive parties— the United People’s Party—an offshoot of the Progressive Alliance of Liberia (PAL) or the Liberian People’s Party—an offshoot of the Movement for Social Justice in Africa (MOJA) would have emerged victorious in the scheduled election of 1983, dealing a massive political blow to the reactionary True Whig Party. But Western imperialism which had a strategic interest in Liberia during the height of the Cold War orchestrated the military coup to subvert not only the ascent of the progressive class to power but to also disallow William R. Tolbert from continuing as President. This was because they were determined to not allow Liberia to transform into another South Africa, Angola or Mozambique—so they ignited the coup to get rid of Tolbert and impose Doe so their strategic interests could be protected.
William R. Tolbert was seen as drifting to the left with his membership with the Non-aligned Movement. This Movement floated the idea that ‘Countries of the developing world should abstain from allying with one of the two superpowers (the United States and the U.S.S.R.) and should instead join in support of national self-determination against all forms of colonialism and imperialism.’ (Encyclopedia Britannica). On the other hand, the progressives were seen as group of Marxist-Leninists that
advocated for the social and transformation of Liberia through the prism of Marxist-Leninism. This line of politics was in jarring contrast to the interests of Western Imperialism. To understand what this mean one would read the domino theory espoused by Dwight Eisenhower. That is why it was revealed later that the 1980 military plutsch in Liberia point to the fact that the coup was part of a conscious plot of the United States to disallow left-wing movements from taking power in Africa, Asia and Latin America during the height of the Cold War.
Another factor that denied the Progressive forces from taking power was not only their political isolation by Samuel K. Doe but also their barring from participation in the 1985 Presidential Election thanks to a scheme designed by right-wing elements of the American CIA in alliance with relics of oppression and plunder like John Rancy, Emmanuel Shaw, Jenkins Scott et. al of the defunct True Whig Party (TWP) who reemerged in top governmental posts in the military junta as a result of vicious political maneuvering. Also, the Liberia Civil War, organized by Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Baron Tarr, Harry Greaves, Tom Woiyewyou et al. with support from American imperialism, produced the so-called new heroes like Charles Taylor, Prince Johnson and etc.
And because the progressives did not lead any armed group to participate in the Civil War, they disappeared from the sight of the people. In the 1997 Election, power was given to those who were seen as the new liberators. But in true sense, actions from the so-called liberators after taking power proved
that they were nothing but economic gangsters who initiated a war as a mean to avenge the 1980 Overthrow of the oligarchy of the True Whig Party. We cannot include as part of the factors that denied the progressives power, the disintegration in their camp because the little disagreements were non-antagonistic contradictions which are normal in every liberation movement.
The Way Forward: Fight or Perish
Comrades and Friends, we have stimulated you to continue upholding the tribune of freedom, contrary to the revisionist perspective our avowed class enemies have peddled about the politics of the progressive forces in the homeland, we have aptly explained the social forces and the subjective factors that prevented the Liberian Progressive from obtaining political power in the homeland.
In life, as in history, the failure of any society is as a result of the failure of its political leadership, and the success of any country is as a result of its political leadership building popular power and thus bringing the people along with it into history. This has been the basis on which all countries in the Third World which have placed a meaningful dent in poverty, raised living standards, develop science, technology and engineering succeeded in.
The conscious efforts of the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), building an inclusive society where the people share in the common wealth of the nation, has been the main motor force of that country’s buoyant transformation. In spite of th
colonial plunder, slavery, captive markets and imperialist war, through the inclusive involvement of the people with the right political leadership that Asian nation is the second biggest economy in the world. Unlike China, India with similar demography, using the anachronistic precepts of capitalism, has not achieved the feat of China. Today, social backwardness, economic paralysis, and grinding poverty run amok in India.
Yet, since the foundation of our country, our economy has been organized in a colonial way, where our country is structured to produce and generate raw materials for the First World. In this setup of unequal trade, our country obtains low return for labor. Meanwhile, when the capitalist system experiences its cyclical crisis, our country experiences dire consequences because we have not effectively developed our economy to offset global shocks.
Thus, the problems of Liberia dating back to the formation of the state has always been and is the problem of its political leaderships. The crisis facing the homeland can only be resolved when popular forces for social change continue with the struggle for popular power and economic transformation.
Currently, even in the face of clear looting, unending accumulation of wealth by the social parasites and the comprador elements of the debased government, young radicals, and progressive nationalists must coalesce forces to ensure that this national aberration that masquerades as a government is democratically eliminated from the republic. Of course, the task ahead seems arduous. It is herculean, but it is not impossible.
As we say it is either we struggle or perish—there is no third way!
Aluta Continua!
Kiadii studies Political Science with emphasis in Public Administration at the University of Liberia. He is the Secretary General of the Movement for Social Democratic Alternative (MOSODA). You can reach him through Cell#: +233552176627, or [email protected].
