By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives
MONROVIA, Liberia—It’s a mantra repeated by government officials, activists and the international community: Liberia’s victims and survivors must be at the heart of efforts to bring justice for crimes committed in the country’s long civil wars that ended in 2003. But now the office to establish the War and Economic Crimes Courts is finally taking shape, victims and survivors say they have been excluded from the process.
Victims groups say they were not consulted in the Legislature’s passage of the resolution approving the courts. Neither were they consulted when President Joseph Boakai issued an executive order to establish the Office of the courts. They were excluded, along with all outside players, when President Boakai appointed Jonathan Massaquoi to head the Office for the courts. And, when that lack of inclusivity prompted an outcry that forced the president to rescind Cllr. Massaquoi’s appointment, victims groups were again excluded from the “inclusive” committee to appoint his successor.
Victims are angry and they say their continued exclusion threatens to undermine public support for the courts.
“The process is about us. Why couldn’t we be at the table?” asks Mr. Sonyah. “They intentionally did it so that we couldn’t be part of this whole thing. We will still make our cry that our voices should be heard.”
Mr. Peterson Sonyah, executive director, Liberia Massacre and Survivors Association, claims they have been left out of the country’s transitional justice process. Credit: Anthony Stephens/New Narrtives.
Because of the long duration of the conflict, Liberia has an extraordinarily high number of victims and survivors. About 250,000 died and hundreds of thousands more were injured. Half the population was displaced. Hundreds of thousands fled overseas. No Liberian was left untouched by the conflict.
Opponents of Liberia’s transitional justice have repeatedly threatened to incite violence and sought to stoke public fear that conflict will rekindle if a court takes place. Two successive presidents cited that fear when refusing to follow the advice of the 2009 Truth and Reconciliation Commission Report to establish it. Experts say it will be essential that Liberia’s victims feel that they are central to the process if support for the courts is to be maintained. It will also be key to encouraging witnesses to testify. Earlier efforts to prosecute accused war criminals under Liberian law were abandoned in part because of witnesses’ fear of testifying.
A young NPFL fighter maimed by Lurd rebels. Photo by Tim Hetherington, from Long Story Bit By Bit: Liberia Retold
“We bear the greatest pain,” says Mr. Peterson Sonyah, executive director of the Liberia Massacre and Survivors Association, the largest victims’ and survivors’ group. “So, if you get us involved you are heading somewhere. But if you just exclude us from the whole process, and we don’t know anything that is going on, we will not feel fine.”
In a phone interview, Atty. Siaffa Bahn Kemokai, head of secretariat of the committee to appoint the head of the Office of the Courts, denied the exclusion of a victim’s group member from the committee meant they weren’t at the heart of the process.
“They are the ones we are fighting for. They are the ones we are seeking this justice for,” said Atty. Kemokai. He said Adama Dempster, a leading human rights advocate, was appointed to the committee to represent victims and survivors along with other human rights groups. “So, by that fact they were there is a clear representation.”
Mr. Sonyah rejected that explanation saying a representative of victims’ should have been in the room.
Victims groups may find some comfort in the first words of the newly appointed head of the Office of the War and Economic Crimes Courts (known as WECC), said Cllr. Jallah Barbu. He has pledged to work with them.
Cllr. Barbu talks to journalists during his first press conference after being appointed to head the office of the courts.
“It will not be proper for me or anybody working with me in this office to set aside or to exclude any victim or interested organizations that are representing victims or have interest in the functions of the WECC Office,” said Dr. Barbu in a phone interview. “We are firm on inclusion rather than exclusion and the very purpose of establishing the office, as well as the court, is to ensure that victims are given redress, those will be accused are given the opportunity to vindicate themselves once indicted and tried and our country will have a greater sense of justice.”
The extraordinary trauma caused by the war has had a deep impact on all Liberians and on Liberian society itself according to experts. Mental health advocates say that beyond ensuring victims and survivors feel included, court leaders will need to consider the rekindling of trauma that the courts will provoke for all Liberians. They say that concern should be central to the process. Keeping victims onside will be key.
“The victim groups are very important,” says Mr. Seidu Swarary, a Liberian psychosocial counselor, whose organization the Liberia Association of Psychosocial Services, provides counseling to victims among its clients. “Their perspective is highly needed. In a psychological sense, in the way they interpret, the way they see it, the way they see the situation. So, I strongly suggest that they too be talked to and their information, their suggestions be included in the design of this upcoming war and economic crimes courts for our country.”
This story was a collaboration with New Narratives as part of the “Investigating Liberia” project. Funding was provided by the Swedish Embassy in Liberia. The funder had no say in the story’s content.