During President William Tubman’s Open Door Policy, Liberia was averaging double-digit growth rates. Being open for business, however, did not mean growth was open to all. In the 1960s, it was claimed that we had ‘growth without development’—economic activities from large-scale foreign concessions in iron ore, rubber, palm oil, and timber did not improve the…
The cultural practice of female genital cutting is rampant in Liberia, especially in the countryside. Parents send girls as young as infants to ceremonies conducted by a secretive indigenous religion known as the Sande to be cut without knowing the health risks involved. But openly talking about this secret rite of passage is taboo here. …
Clothing designer Geneva Garr supervises several men crouched over sewing machines surrounded by beautifully tailored dresses hanging for customers to see. Starting up with just one sewing machine on her porch, Garr, 37, now makes 72 outfits a week. Garr says she started the business in 2005 in Accra, Ghana and moved to Liberia in…
An opinion piece by Tetee Karneh. See original post here. Liberia is a little country of 3.5 million people basking in the mindset that because we, unlike most of the rest of Africa, were never colonized by foreign powers, we were not infected by alien cultures. But that mindset is wrong. Liberia’s openness to strangers…
Ma Sabah was only 13 years old when she was taken from Gbatallah in Bong County and forced into the Sande bush for a crime her mother committed in her village in 1976. The Sande bush is where women and girls are sent to be circumcised and groomed into women ready for marriage, as culture and tradition demand. See original story…
First appeared in Liberia’s FrontPage Africa newspaper March 1 Africa’s first post-independence president, Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, urged colonial Africa to “seek ye first the political kingdom, and all else shall be added onto you.” Nkrumah was alluding to the biblical verse, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness; and all these…
Baby Blessed wriggles and wails in discomfort in his young mother’s lap. Winnie pulls out her breast to feed her sick child and quiet his cries. She looks out at the swampy backyard behind her home as if she would rather be any place other than here. By Mae Azango. Originally published in FrontPage Africa…
Names in this article have been changed to conceal the identities of gay persons mentioned. Jerome, 16, strides like he is a supermodel on a runway. He has a slender body, and his hair is cut short. The fashionable teen is wearing denim jeans. A white polo T-shirt bathed in dragon designs reveals his bare…
By NN fellow and FrontPage Africa editor Wade Williams MONROVIA, Liberia — Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf will be sworn in for her second term this Monday but the 73-year-old Nobel laureate begins her six-year term under a heavy cloud. An acrimonious election campaign against the main opposition party, Congress for Democratic Change (CDC), was…
Clarence Jackson is Editor-In-Chief at Radio Gbarnga and Regional Coordinator of the Press Union of Liberia for Bong, Nimba and Lofa Counties. He has been a journalist for more than fifteen years. Clarence is a prolific journalist whose reporting focuses Politics and Governance. He has also worked as correspondent from Central Liberia for several institutions…
It is often said in Liberia: “to spoil it is easy but to build it is hard.” So is the case with water and sanitation here. The 14-year civil war destroyed much of the water supply and sanitation facilities. People escaping brutal battles in the heart of the country relocated to Monrovia—overcrowding the city’s slums…
Having children early may seem like an adventure for many teenage girls, but most soon discover that this choice leads to lasting consequences. The high rate of teenage pregnancy increases the economic burden of Liberia by creating generation upon generation of very poor families. The majority of teen moms live at home with their parents,…
Photo by NN photography coach Glenna Gordon MONROVIA, Liberia — Election officials announced on Thursday that Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Africa’s only female president, had been re-elected by an overwhelming margin this week in a runoff vote that was marred by an opposition boycott. President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, speaking to reporters on Thursday, said she would pursue…
By FrontPage Africa editor and New Narratives fellow Wade Williams Gloria Musu Scott sits behind her desk at the Capitol Building. The senator from Maryland County is in the process of clearing her office to return to her former life as a lawyer. She is among many women who lost their seats following our country’s…
In West Point, a shantytown community on the edge of the Atlantic, dozens of people endured long lines and the pouring rain to vote in this country’s second presidential elections since the end of 14 years of civil war. Frances Roberts, 53, arrived at the polling station at 4 a.m., four hours before voting commenced….
I squirmed when I saw the photo online of a female protester in her crisp white T-shirt, with ruby red liquid dripping down her neck and face. There were other photos in a series. One man lay on the naked carpet of a room, surrounded by the living, his thin vertical body lifeless. Another man…
If a Liberian hasn’t eaten rice at least once during the day, then he will tell you that he really hasn’t eaten. But our staple food is becoming more expensive, as global food costs are skyrocketing. This is angering many Liberians, who say they’re going hungry as a result, and putting a strain on the…
Vera was working for an NGO when a supervisor made sexual advances while the two were in his office. She remembers worrying she would not be strong enough to push him away. “He asked me to stand up and said ‘Kiss me’. I said no, then I tried to get up. He pulled me to…
Teen pregnancy is on the rise in Liberia and fast becoming a national crisis with far-reaching effects. With one of the highest teenage pregnancy rates in the world, many young girls in Liberia are exposed to sex by age 9, and about 3 out of 10 Liberian girls get pregnant before the age of…
Liberia is looking anxiously toward the country’s Nov. 8 runoff election between President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and challenger Winston Tubman. Tubman had threatened to boycott the poll, charging that the director of the National Election Commission had rigged the first-round results in favor of Johnson Sirleaf. A boycott would have created the possibility of instability in…
Drug trafficking and drug use is on the rise in Liberia according to a new report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. The problem is fueled by the influx of drugs into the region by South American drug cartels who see this as an easy route to get their products to Europe….
