On Assets, Confiscation And Revolutions
Elizabeth Ohene
"Like the people who had declared the earlier programme for a return to constitutional rule, the believers in the assets confiscation also no longer belong in the present government of Liberia and therefore all such confiscated properties should be returned to their 'rightful owners'"Whatever you do, don't get killed in a revolution! Not even if the revolution aims at building a monument in your memory in the centre of the capital to immortalize your name.
The Ghana “Revolution” has proved that point and so has the Liberian 'revolution' and so undoubtedly, will the Nigerian revolution (clean up, restoration of sanity or whatever name General Buhari and his colleagues choose to call their operation).
Mr Samuel Doe, the Liberian leader who came to power with such brutal ferocity claimed and took all the credit in April, 1980. Like the then Sergeant Eyadema of Togo in 1963, who was proud to announce to the press that he personally had killed the country's elected leader - Sylvanus Olympio, the then Master-Sergeant told the whole world that the vermin that was Tolbert had been personally dispatched to hell or wherever it is that political leaders go when they die, by himself. In much the same way it was recorded for posterity and the whole world that Master-Sergeant Doe personally supervised the public execution of Liberia's elected leaders.
It is quite true that Mr Doe has become very adept at disclaiming responsibility for words and actions that he had been quite happy to take credit for in the past. He demonstrated that very ably recently when he announced the change in the programme for a return to civil rule.
The original programme, he alleged, was the result of a speech written for him by some people who used to be in his government and who had their own political ambitions.
The moral at this stage is quite clear - Africa will have to find leaders, who, if they cannot write their speeches themselves or at least communicate to their speech writers exactly what they want to tell the people, should at least be able to understand what they are reading.
Now an even more fundamental change of policy in Liberia has been announced by the Liberian leader by the restoration of confiscated assets to their former "rightful" owners including those who were executed in 1980 because some of the people in his government ascribed to a philosophy of confiscation of properties!
Like the people who had declared the earlier programme for a return to constitutional role, the believers in the assets confiscation also no longer belong in the present government and therefore all such confiscated properties should be returned to their "rightful owners".
It is important to recall that back in 1980, there had been no suggestion whatsoever that the idea of confiscating illegally acquired properties from the politicians was the idea of Mr Doe's advisers - on the contrary all his speeches (and they were not all written) had the same rhetoric of how the politicians had looted the country and acquired wealth illegally.
One of the scenes that made the rounds in the world was when the then still Master-Sergeant Doe took the US Under-Secretary of State around to see what used to be his very humble dwellings and was then followed by shots of the opulent homes of the just executed politicians. The long-suffering and abused people of Liberia were to be finally given some justice in the form of a just retribution against their former oppressors.
The people cheered and cheered. At long last, a leader had appeared on the Liberian scene who cared about the plight of the ordinary and downtrodden people and some of them at least would now have the opportunity to actually live in these homes they had previously been able to admire only from the outside.
LESSON
Now, Mr Doe wants those properties returned to their "rightful" owners. The question will have to be asked - has it now been established that those politicians, the True Whig party officials acquired those assets legally? For, if they are still deemed to have stolen those monies from public funds and abused their positions of public trust, no amount of "national reconciliation" can make those politicians the "rightful" owners. The state might be doing them a favour and giving them presents of these houses and other assets but "rightful" owners, they never can be.And what is even more peculiar, why stop at the farms and agricultural projects; why are those not being given up? It is not enough to say that "they had already been contracted out in the interest of the government". Surely, the suggestion is not being made that the houses and other properties had not been given out in the interest of the people, or that politicians were not the "rightful" owners of the farms and agricultural projects. At the very least the argument can be made that those of the politicians who spent their monies (ill-gotten or legitimate earnings) on farms and agricultural projects were contributing more positively to the good of the country than those who built big mansions with gold chandeliers and therefore more deserving of their properties being returned to them.
Is it possibly too much to expect that Mr Doe will indicate in which way these farms and agricultural projects have been contracted out and then leave the good people of Liberia to judge for themselves whether it is in the interest of the government or the people or not?
But what gives most cause for unease in this incident is the fact that it is not explicitly clear whether this new policy is the brainchild of Mr Doe or not, or whether again, some of the people in the government now happen to be people who do not believe in the philosophy of confiscation of assets and have now managed to get their point of view translated into official policy.
In 1980 there were people close to Mr Doe who believed in confiscation of properties (at least, that is what the world is being told today) and that became the official policy. Now that policy has been reversed with a clear attempt at dissociating Mr Doe from the earlier policy. What guarantee is there that the earlier group of people will not get back into a position of proximity to Mr Doe and therefore get the original policy restored? Can it be taken that the current policy represents the thinking of Mr Doe himself and not his advisors and even more important, did the policy emerge in a speech written for the Head of State?
It is particularly important that the government of the PRC clarifies the position about the legality or otherwise of the acquisition of those assets, because since those heady days of 1980 when some people argued that the "ferocity and vengeance of the revolution" would have the effect of making Liberians appreciate forever the sanctity of public life and never abuse it again, things have changed somewhat.. New assets have been acquired by new sets of people and the concept of reckoning has receded in people's memories.
Will public officials be accountable to the people for their behaviour or can they look forward to keeping their assets whether legally or illegally acquired? One can hardly look forward to a period in time when the people or the government of Liberia will not want "national reconciliation" and if properties are to be returned because of "national reconciliation" without any attempt at establishing the mode of acquisition. The lesson is not likely to be lost on others.
The moral must be quite clear: whatever you do, don't get killed in a "revolution" for the lesson now appears to have been aimed at those who were executed and dead men who we can all safely assume, learn no lessons. In much the same way asmeaningful retribution can be made on their behalf, it does not help the executed True Whig Party officials today that they have been declared the "rightful" owners of properties they were deemed to have acquired illegally and while a statue erected at their execution sites might interest students of Liberian history, the nightmare death suffered by them would remain their last memories on earth.
Possibly, there is yet another lesson: those who serve as advisors to military dictators, should beware of the responsibilities they carry; who knows, in a few more months or years or possibly around the time that C-in-C Doe might be transformed into 'President Doe', there very well might be an announcement that the late President Tolbert and his colleagues were killed as a result of advice from those who were close to Mr Doe in April 1980!
There might yet be even another lesson for those currently engaged in sorting out ill-gotten wealth from legally acquired wealth in Nigeria. Time does tend to put a different colouration on the crime of those who were said to own 44 houses in 1980. Today they are the rightful owners - too bad they are not around to pay back taxes owned on them.
The Liberian military ruler, Samuel Doe, arriving in style at his first OAU Summit in Nairobi, 1981.
