Justifying the Villians!

The Analyst (Monrovia)
25 June 2007

President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf's campaign promises to eradicate corruption and wipe out the culture of impunity no doubt principally earned her the presidency.

Peal	Williams	Massaquoi

Eighteen months into her administration, however, critics and disinterested observers alike are lost on where, all political publicity stunts aside, her administration stands on the question of punishing wrongdoers in order to nip all forms of malfeasances in the bud.

They say the administration is yet to shed the damning nepotistic practices of the past, identifying two recent public appointments as "justifying the villains and nurturing the culture of impunity".

Disinterested observers and critics of the Johnson-Sirleaf administration say the appointment of Chris Massaquoi to the Bureau of Immigration and Ashford Peal to the NPA has justified villainy and nurturing the culture of impunity.

In a recent cabinet reshuffle, President Johnson-Sirleaf reappointed the director of the Special Security Service (SSS), Col. Chris Massaquoi, to the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization (BIN) where he served as commissioner at the onset of the administration.

Recently also, the Board of Directors of the National Port Authority (NPA) appointed Mr. Massaquoi's deputy, Ashford Peal, to serve as NPA chief of security.

Peal served as deputy to Mr. Massaquoi briefly before falling out of favor with the public and perhaps with the administration over the August 5, 2006 Duport Road security breach that resulted to the death of SSS Officer Emmanuel Williams, alias Silver J.

These appointments, they say, did not only ignore completely what the public and the family of Silver J. had expected from the Johnson-Sirleaf dministration, but that they also send a strong discouraging signal.

That signal, they say, is that the Johnson-Sirleaf administration was about to make no significant departure from the old practices of pampering and shielding wrongdoers by offering them public portfolios of defense and public trust.

"This is a typical page from the Machiavellian book of leadership which recommends the closing of an eye to the evil of the princes as bonds and incentives to strengthen their loyalty to the crown," said one executive of the opposition Liberia Action Party who preferred not to be named.

He said Massaquoi and Peal should have been arrested and detained for their roles in the Duport Road shootout which according to him has rudely second-guessed and disrupted the plan of the international community to re-arm the Liberian security.

He said those who earlier pledged to make available uniforms, arms, vehicles and money for the smooth running of the police and other security agencies are now dashing in token military items and counting on the government to arm the security forces.

He gave no further evidence.

Public Opinion

But student activist Jerome V.K. Thomas of the University of Liberia agreed: "The international community saw the need to allow the Liberian security forces to bear arms in order to help UNMIL curtail the increasing incidences of year-round armed violence in our communities.

But Massaquoi and Peal disrupted the plan by demonstrating on the night of August 5, 2006 on Duport Road in Monrovia to the international community that Liberians are still yet traumatized to handle their own security."

Thomas claimed that as the result of that demonstration that led to the fatal shooting of the bodyguard of Massaquoi, UNMIL and the international community are dragging their heeds when it comes to trusting and re-arming the police, the SSS, and entrusting the security of the country into their hands.

"UNMIL is still guiding the President. Night police patrols still have to be given meaning and substance by the presence of UNMIL. Armed robbery is on the increase in and out of season because the officers of the Liberia National Police (LNP) are still the boy scouts they have been since lawlessness seized this nation on December 24, 1989.

Now the people who caused all this are being promoted to positions where they will continue to hold sway over our people as government officials and make decisions affecting the lives of millions of unsuspecting Liberians.

This is not fair; it cannot come from a government some 80% of whose officials were once victims of arbitrariness," said Emmanuel Jay Polo who claimed to be a political science senior at the African United Methodist Episcopal University (AMEU).

He said by allowing the reckless discharge of unauthorized and unassigned firearms resulting to death of an SSS officer, Massaquoi and Peal, have violated the Uniformed Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) thereby discounting whatever credentials they may have that qualified them to take up top assignments in presidential elite guards.

"If they can't do that, if they can't guard the nobility and security of the President.

If they can't uphold the elitism of the SSS and demonstrate to the international community that Liberians are ready to take their destinies into their own hands following years of mutual violence, then they have lost their right to public appointment in this administration irrespective of what they did individually and collectively to put President Sirleaf into power," said public school civic teacher Molley Koffa Jacobs.

He said this was the point that should have guided the President as she appointed Massaquoi or allowed the appointment of Peal by the Chairman of the NPA Board of Directors.

Jacobs said this is why, all things considered, the Sirleaf administration has erred in appointing the two men to security positions at the BIN and NPA.

"What does the government wants us to believe? Massaquoi and Peal had done wrong in the public eye and in the eye of the international community; they never admitted doing wrong, and now the government is out to justify that they never did wrong by awarding them with lucrative positions.

We don't see how the President can justify this kind of affront to public opinion and expectation," said Momo J. Simpson who claimed to be a political analyst of George Weah's 2005 presidential pool second runner, Congress for Democratic Change (CCC).

Many other observers who spoke to The Analyst on the commitment of the Sirleaf Administration to the eradication of corruption and the wiping out of the culture of impunity from post-war Liberia vis-à-vis the appointment of Massaquoi and Peal said they had not seen so strong a signal of nepotism in the Johnson-Sirleaf administration than that sent by these appointments.

But a Johnson-Sirleaf administration insider, speaking in a private capacity, told The Analyst last night that those making the allegations failed to know that the law prevails over opinions, whether private or public.

He was not prepared to go into the argument raised by our reporter that laws were made to serve ultimate public good and security and that therefore they may be interpreted to that end at all times and not the other way around.

Instead, he ranted about the rule of law, arguing that the two men deserved their appointments because they were never convicted of murder or of violating the law in a relevant court of justice.

"We all have our biases. I would prefer that the two men not take public portfolios until public sentiments against them die down. But what will be my legal reference point? Public opinion, good as it may be and representative of democracy as it may be, is not a legal reference point.

The panel set up by the President in August did not indict the two men for prosecution. So, why can't the President appoint them? Will she not be violating the spirit of the reconciliation if she doesn't?

That's the delicate question that whoever is considering the question, critics or independent observers must answer," he said.

He conceded that the public was shocked at the outcome of the probe which should have advised the government on the next step, but he noted that government is under obligation to accept the outcome and abide by it until another probe is ordered if need be.

In his view such need was unlikely to come up because in his words, the so-called public had up to the moment of the appointments last month failed to come forth with evidence that contradicts the findings of the panel, save to whip up sentiments about the death of Silver J and the need for justice.

The public that believes in justice, he said, is one that is prepared to offer the government alternative reasons to change actions and decisions. Whatever that means vis-à-vis the constitutional responsibility of the government to administer justice and provide security for its people at all time whether they are complacent or not, he did not say.

But he noted further, "That is the essence of the rule of law. You can't bend the rule; that will be political machination which activists often speak of without bothering to find out what exactly rule of law means."

Whoever is right in the raging public arguments about these appointments with which the government seems contented, analysts say, the bigger political puzzle that needs to be solved forthwith by the Johnson-Sirleaf administration is how to balance the art of eradicating impunity and corruption with the art of reconciliation and peace.

They say there is bound to be trouble when the administration leans too much or too heavily on the right or left. "The typical example of this is Massaquoi and Peal could not be denied their rights to take public office in the absence of active legal indictment or conviction of wrongdoing.

But in the same vein, the argument of legal absence cannot solely lie without expressed effort by the administration to prosecute Peal and Massaquoi or execute some administrative sanctions for what wrong the public believe they committed.

There is a way out of this," they said. "But what is that 'way out of this'?" many say, is the enduring question.

Clip From the Archive

It may be recalled that an investigation panel commissioned in August 2006 in the wake of public outcry for justice to probe the circumstances that led to the shootout in which SSS officer Emmanuel Williams disappointed public expectations and opinions when it issued no indictment for the prosecution of those involved.

The panel, comprising the Crime Services Department and UNPOL/UNMIL advisors, at the end of the probe reported in consultation with the county attorney of Montserrado that Deputy SSS director Ashford Peal was liable for actions that amount to unethical and unprofessional attitude, not complicity in murder as public opinion had concluded.

"Following the recording of all pertinent statements in this matter and a thorough review of all the facts among the investigators...the investigators have resolved that...co-defendant Deputy Director Ashford Peal be charged with the commission of the offense of 'criminal attempt' under Chapter 10, sub-chapter 'A' Section 10.1 (1) and (2)," the report dated September 2, 2006 said.

Whatever "criminal attempt" means without recommendation for prosecution was not said, nor was it said what would happen to the accused as the result of the findings. Incidentally, Peal is currently suspended pending the outcome of this report.

This conclusion is notwithstanding the panel's stated findings that Col. Peal indirectly caused William's death in a number of ways. It said Col. Peal stopped Director Massaquoi three separate times en route to his (Massaquoi's) house to ask if he (Massaquoi) was okay, having earlier refused to deploy men at the director's residence in the wake of information that armed robbers were poised to attack it.

The report described Peal's action thus: "While the Director's convoy was still en route on the GSA Road toward his residence, Col. Ashford Peal drove from the rear of the convoy, overtook the convoy and headed directly to the director's compound.

After the passing of the Director's main entrance gate, Col. Peal blocked the road by crisscrossing his vehicle, stopped same, got out of it, pulled out his 9 mm Israeli pistol, and fired a round of ammunition in the air for no justifiable reason."

Discharging firearm without justifiable reason constitutes a violation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice in Liberia, but that was not the focus of the report.

It instead of dwelling on that, the report noted that Peal's supposed scoffing of Massaquoi, added to the subsequent discharge of his unregistered and unassigned 9.0 mm Israeli made pistol into the air, amounted to unethical and unprofessional attitude, but not possible conspiracy to commit murder.

It noted similarly: "Following the recording of all pertinent statements in this matter and a thorough review of all the facts among the investigators...the investigators have resolved that Defendant Darlington Bleh be charged with the commission of the crime of 'Negligent Homicide'," the report noted.

If Williams were alive, the panel would have probably held him responsible for what happened to him; because it said, Bleh shot him because he had no way of knowing whether he was an enemy or not.

"The investigation arrived at a reasonable conclusion that the action taken by Darlington Bleh was predicated on the firing of the weapon of Col. Peal, his (Bleh's) state of mind due to his deployment briefing and the alleged armed defense approach of decedent Williams.

These factors resulted in the mistaken belief of Darlington that decedent Williams, who was in civilian clothes was an armed intruder, thus leading to Darlington shooting first without questioning the person he perceived to be an intruder," it said.

"But was Williams armed? If so, did he fire in return? Did he or Massaquoi know that Bleh and Geleplay were on duty in the compound? What does Peal know about the two men prior to shooting into the air?" were questions the report chose to ignore.

It however acknowledged the fact that the shootout took place in the home of the Col. Chris Massaquoi, Director of the Special Security Service (SSS) and in his presence. But it saw no reason to hold him for any wrongdoing whether by omission or commission.

Incidentally, the SSS is an elite presidential guard to which arms were issued to consolidate security following the July 26, 2006 fire incidence at the Executive Mansion.

Security and UN sources said the issuance of arms to the SSS, which followed the partial lifting of UN arms embargo on Liberia, was intended to gauge the ability of Liberia's newly-formed security units to apply firearms professionally in their lines of duty without turning them into instruments of suppression, fears, and death.

The death of officer Williams in the presence of the full detail of the authority of the SSS, observers say, tells a whole lot about the capability and state of mind of those currently heading the security services.

But again the reports saw things from aloft, mindful of portraying Director Massaquoi not as chief in command, but as a passive, innocent, and helpless figurehead whose home was left vulnerable and therefore cannot be held liable for anything that happened in his presence.

"Commanders take responsibility for the unruly behavior of their men," said retired SSS officer Solomon Teajah. But in the case of Massaquoi, the panel seems to suggest that that cannot and should not apply.

'Why is that so?' remains one of those puzzles of public probes into the conduct of individuals believed to be close to the power corridors in Africa.

Analysts say the report raised even more questions when it said that after Col. Peal allegedly refused to assign men to Director Massaquoi's home, Police Inspector General Beatrice Sieh complied but fell short of saying whether the movements of men were coordinated to avoid the likelihood of a friendly trooper seeing the other as "intruder".

Besides, they say, the report's earlier claims that the police corps detailed at Mr. Massaquoi's compound was headed by one Maj. T. Edwin Swen, Jr., who is the Chief of Special Task Force, was not collaborated.

"The report made no mention of Maj. Swen or any of his officers at the scene of the shootout where they were reportedly detailed prior to the arrival of Massaquoi's convoy accompanied by Peal.

So where were they when Massaquoi and Peal arrived at the compound and when the shooting started and ended?" one analyst wondered.

The only other officer said to have been on guard when Bleh shot and killed Williams was an officer of the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization Lt. Moses Geleplay, making observers to wonder what the immigration officer was doing serving guard at the home of the director of the Special Security Service when it was police that was said to have assigned officers there.

Medical examination at the St. Joseph Catholic Hospital where Mr. Williams was taken shortly before he gave up the ghost indicates that his body was ridden with multiple bullet wounds inflicted by the M-4 rifle Bleh used.

"The investigating team then observed what appeared to be three bullet holes in the fence wall.

The body had what appeared to be a bullet wound to the right side of the neck which exited through the back of the neck; a bullet wound to the upper right side of the chest which exited through the center of the back and a bullet would to the right arm," the report said.

Observers said the three bullet marks on the fence plus the three that entered the body of Williams amounted to a total of six bullets discharged, something they say did not corroborate earlier accounts that Williams died from a single inadvertent bullet.

Again the question they are asking is, "Where were Massaquoi and Peal during this shooting? Were others involved in the arbitrary discharge of firearm in clear breach of the law that residents claimed lasted for well over an hour?"

The report could not say, neither did it hold anyone responsible for desertion of post or the illegal discharge of firearms.

Meanwhile, observers say besides being shallow, the report has strongly indicated that the Johnson-Sirleaf administration has yet to put into place policy and stringent administrative measures that will deter security breach of etiquette and arbitrariness, promote justice, and guarantee good governance.

In this case, they fear, rearming the police and the SSS would be disastrous unless principled-minded and professional Liberians were recruited to replace the current corps of party stewards who believe they are being justly compensated for their roles in the "making of the king" and therefore owe no one any obligation to act professionally.

How right they are in their judgment cannot be said, but analysts say the current report needs to be revisited in view of the critical and crucial questions being raised in political, public, diplomatic, and professional circles.

Otherwise, they said, the report would amount to zilch, only adding to the woes of the state and the government.