Here we go again

I thought that the days of closing newspapers went out the window with the rest of the sewage. But somehow, someone has decided to go back to the old ways and "close down" critical media institutions. Up till now it seems that the action is in the hands of the police. When will these fools learn that this is the wrong way of doing things. There is also a right way. If you do not like something that I have said or written, first of all you inform me. If there is no way to reconcile on the issue, you take your complaint to the courts and we meet there and contest the freedom of speech and opinion. If I have done anything wrong, I am punished. You do not go running and calling someone you know in the police to come arrest me and all the rest. But have a hard head and continue with this childish attitude, journalists have the sympathy of their fellow journalists. The repercussions of these kind of things have a strange ability to find themselves reiterated very easily in the foreign press and suddenly all of a sudden, our supposed donors get to hear of them. And these people start to take notice and think; but was not Mrs. Johnson here the other day telling us of the amazing progress that was being made in Liberia asking us to help. Then they might wonder and say but let us maybe wait and see, and not go rushing into things. I do not even have to bring up the foreign investors into the equation. When you praise a white chicken the next thing you know, it will just turn around and roll itself in its own shit, and not be as white and clean as before.

Storm in a glass

Damn, we like politics business oh! What! It has been over a month now that, and all over our various media institutions, and our honourable lawmakers at the various conference centers in the northern suburbs of Monrovia and elsewhere, are still voicing their different opinions of whether or not this person violated the constitution. Blah, blah, blah. According to X.x article of the constitution, this and this. According to the Supreme Court ruling, this and that. And we shouldn´t even mention everytime the Liberian Petroleum Refining Cooperation releases a finacial statement. Ooohh! You just see them creeping out of the woodworks, every last Tom, Dick and Harry voicing their "expertise" on what is wrong and right about this and that, and still getting the facts wrong. Don´t get me wrong, freedom of speech is one of the things I will defend to the end. What I am trying to say is that we need to build up our country and create jobs very urgently, but it seems that most of us are sitting around debating petitesses with such enormous energy. Egos are flying all over the place, our so-called legislators all want to demonstrate their newfound power. A lot of these voices being thrown into these debates are from abroad. Come home, do not just sit there. If you are all that, you should be here, helping. You who knows accounting, come home and demonstrate. You who know law, I am sure that the judicial could use your help. And it just goes on. But no one is interested, everyone wants a government job and as long as they are not given one, our businesses will remain run by foreigners. This reminds me of when in the founding of our nation, land was being handed out to each family that arrived. But still, almost four or five years after the beginning of the settlement, not enough food was being produced because no one wanted to farm. Everybody wanted to trade. It got to a point where some lazy asses just sat and waited for the next boat to come in with supplies. Please funnel your energy into something productive instead of wasting it on nonsense.

Unwillingness to help

Now this is exactly what I was talking about in my last post. The Millennium Challenge Corporation has for months been trying to get basic information for the evaluation of Liberias chances of qualifying for assistance from the Millennium Challenge Corporation from the various ministries involved. The figures availiable date from the days of the Transitional government. But of course, I am sure that the usual "whats in it for me attitude" in the same ministries has put an effective stop to any information gathering, which by the way is one of their primary functions. Once again, the Liberian people suffer at the hans of uninterested government employees. I will therefore repeat my call for the immediate flushing of all ministries up to the ministerial level as was done in the Finance Ministry. Go Ellen. Go get them.