Fighting Ebola and Transforming Liberia Written by Samuel P. Jackson, Contributing Writer, samuelpjackson@yahoo Published: 20 October 2014 Frontpage Africa, Liberias leading online Newspaper The Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) is an existential threat to Liberia. It is a silent war raging in my country, shaking the foundation of governance and eroding the modest socioeconomic gains made after a harrowing 15 year civil war, which killed more than 250 thousand people and GDP declined by more than 90 percent, the largest decrease in output of any country since World War II. Even worse, the virus is stigmatizing Liberians and making us feel unwanted in many countries of the world. The Liberian passport I carried with pride on my first plane ride nearly fifty years ago is now more of a nuisance. Liberian workers, including doctors, nurses and lawyers in the United States, Europe, Australia and other parts of the world are viewed with suspicion of carrying Ebola. Liberian school children in foreign countries are being bullied and shunned. Even getting on the bus in Washington D.C. and New York has become hazardous for Liberians. We are being disinvited to major conferences and our presence on international panels is no longer encouraged. Undeservedly, we are becoming the 21st century personification of carriers of the bubonic plague. The anecdotal evidence indicates that we will fight Ebola successfully in the short run (the number of infections and deaths appear to be declining) with massive international support coming in and with more being motivated by our President’s recent “letter to the world”. However, we cannot sustain the condition to forestall a future widespread Ebola outbreak like the one we’re experiencing now and build the country without a truly transformative socioeconomic agenda. This will require more than a cut and paste post-war donor driven, externally supported plan borrowed from Bosnia, DRC, Nicaragua, Timor Leste and other 21st century conflicts. We will need a uniquely crafted plan that deals with the reordering of Liberian Comm society, from the bottom to top, recognizing the failings of our institutions. Morever, we must reconsider our use of a thoughtless and unreasonable development model that continues to make us caricature of a country, instead of a resilient 21st century nation state with the prosperity and social cohesion that we deserve after 167 years of nationhood. Finance led globalization, based upon neoliberal economic construct has been the philosophy behind our growth strategies, especially since 1944, with Tubman and the Open Door Policy. And yet, in 2014, we are still dealing with many of the developmental challenges we faced in the early 20th century. According to observers looking at us, we are not much more than the images presented by Graham Greene in Journey Without Maps, Fletcher Kneebel’s fictional work, The Zin Zin Road, Robert Clower et al, Growth Without Development, and in Gus Liebenow, The Evolution of Privilege. Sure we have made some progress but that degree of progress pales in comparison into how far we must go in order to build a truly resilient society and bring pride back to us as a poor but proud people. Liberia is an economic and social paradox. We are a poor little rich country, with possibly trillions of dollars in subsoil and top soil assets, yet we cannot seem to get our bearings and transform natural wealth into prosperity for our people. This has more to do with us as a people than with governance structures. Our level of development and state of readiness to fight Ebola and other potential existential threats cannot be solely ascribed to failure in governance, but rather failures in the social system, which has become even more dysfunctional due to years of obtuse manipulation by temporary dominant elites from one hapless administration to another. The institutions, both governance and accountability structures that should undergird the democracy cannot be built without the courageous participation of all members of society. Herein lies the most serious challenge. Political parties, religious organizations and other stakeholders are pliant full participants in the social order that decrees patronage and silence as golden rules in order to keep our privileged status. We make bad leaders out of well-intentioned politicians by pandering to their excesses and in no time, the vicious cycle of failed leadership emerges. This has been the history of Liberian since 1847. Good intentions went awry. The Ebola outbreak is a seminal event in our history. It could influence how this country is run over the next several generations. It can change us forever if we learn the lessons and apply them in building systems, and notice I dare not say rebuilding. We cannot build institutions on the same foundation and principles that have made us a perennial mendicant society, surviving on the largesse of the international system for as long as we have been a nation. Fighting Ebola and transforming Liberia can happen simultaneously. While the international community is providing the logistics and technical support to develop our healthcare system, we can begin the process to ensure that they do not return every decade to bail us out of war, ignorance, poverty and disease. The current administration in Liberia can redeem itself by reconnecting to the people of Liberia through local programs that can economically empower Liberians, creating a preference category for majority owned Liberian businesses in order to use fiscal imperatives to achieve that objective. That would include putting in fiscal rules and reforming the Public Procurement and Concessions Laws to create categories of domestic corporations, clearly delineating what constitutes a Liberian owned business. Liberian businesses cannot recoup the losses suffered during the EVD period and can never fully participate in the economic recovery process without a lifting hand from the government. The post EVD priorities in nation-building would require an economic transformation unseen in the country’s history. Liberians, the greatest victims of EVD must reap dividends during the recovery process. Liberia requires rebranding and strategic positioning in the global economy. How we accomplish the rebranding and the strategic positioning of the country would determine how Liberians are viewed during and after EVD. Now the priorities are clear: remove the stigma from EVD and concentrate on it as a global health crisis and not as a Liberian or West African virus and more importantly, create a post EVD recovery program that makes Liberia resilient, in areas such as agriculture, with particular emphasis on food security. Liberians have overcome many obstacles in our long history, but we have learned little lessons from our travails. EVD should change our perspectives, and that is why we should fight EVD and transform Liberia simultaneously. At a minimum, our children and future generations deserve a transformed and reordered society. And so it goes. Samuel P. Jackson, Contributing Writer, [email protected]
Posted on: Mon, 20 Oct 2014 21:21:02 +0000
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