"Some animals are more equal than others"

During the years I have often reverted to this novel by George Orwell, Animal Farm. For those of you who have never read it, I can summerize it as follows: The animals on a farm oust its "owners" the farmer and his family and take over the day to day running of the farm. Very soon, the revolution is hijacked by the pigs on the farm that start to oppress all the other animals. Not long after, the pigs start dressing up in the farmers clothes, eating his food and drinking his wine behind locked doors. The other animals peek in at the windows at their nightly feast. This describes the events in our country once again.

Supply of money

L$190.4475/US$1.00 When a country prints new bills, they are usually meant to replace older damaged notes. It is the job of the Central Bank to collect the old bills and destroy them and infuse the new ones. If you do not replace defunct currency, but just adding to money supply, you undermine the currency. We saw this in the Weimar Republic in the 1920s. In Zimbabwe, Mugabwe thought he was smart and started printing money to be able to pay govenment employees. In Venezuela today, Madouru is doing the same thing. In the short term, you may seem to solve a problem, but very shortly after, the currency is soon not worth more than what it actually is, paper. At this stage, when a country issues more money than it has backing for, you get increased inflation. Inflation is the increasing of prices, or really the decreasing of the value of the currency. In Weimar, Zimbabwe and Venezuela the printing of "new" money just kept on and on. This caused HYPERINFLATION. In the end, to buy a loaf of bread, the equivalent amount of money had to be carried in a wheelbarrow. Luckily, we are not here yet, but the tendencies seem to be ther. Wake up now, and smell the coffee.

Another one gets a bank

L$189.4508/US$1.00 Lo and behold. The Central Bank of Liberia has allegedly inflated its payroll by almost 300 people. For what? Are we going back to becoming a banana republic?

Supply and demand

L$187.6225/US$1.00 The more demand for any product, the more will be the price of it. The less the supply of something, the more the price. These are the two major facts in economic theory. The important lesson here is that to solve the problem you have to supply more of the scarce product. Or find a way to decrease the demand of the scarce product. There is unfortunately no piece of legislation that can do anything about this. Solution: Find a way to make the flow of US dollars into the country increase. Produce things that can be sold abroad to bring in foreign currency.

Our neighbor

L$182.6281/US$1.00 Meanwhile in Sierra Leone. After eleven months in office, the new Sierra Leonean president has put measures in place to encourage a boost in agriculture. They have also implemented a central govenment account for the collection of revenue. These measures have gained approval from the IMF and World Bank. Things are looking up for our neighbors, for us, not so much. We are concentrating on building mansions for ourselves.

One, two, three

L$172.5305/US$1.00 One, two, three.

In this day and age

L$177.8284/US$1.00 In this day and age we are still writing checks? An employee of the Revenue Authority has managed to cash a check for USD 450 000 and make off with the amount. Are we surprised?

Aint you see it ehn!

So my friends "The time has come, let´s raid the rules and have som fun." Exactly what we were expecting has now come to pass. No one can tell me that they are surprised. There is no surprise there at all. As George Orwell so pleasantly put it, "Some animals are more equal than other animals." And that it what we are now seeing. Press freedom. The first casualty in the Weah regime is now a fact. As Donald Trump would put intricately describe it, "Sad!"

All of us

What ever you say. I will say, "All of us!" to it. Who is responsible for our shortcomings? Who will benefit if we manage to overcome them? Whose responsiblity is it to condemn corruption? Who does this affect? Enough of the "It was not me attitude!" It is too easy to make excuses and blame eveyone else. Remember this. All of us.

Pure and utter bull

Accusations and counter-accusations hail the office of the General Auditing Commission. To top it all, National Security attempted to arrest its spokesperson for making accusatory remarks against the office of the president. I mean come on. How childish is that? And like the guy points out in his statement, how come those accused of corruption are not the ones being arrested and threatened?

Grow up minister Fombah.

The shit has finally hit the fan!

"Please declare your assets."

This is the phrase that has our legislature screaming FOUL. All focus on the messenger, forget about the message. Seriously lawmakers, what is wrong with declaring what you own. Are you afraid of the Liberian people or what? There is nothing strange about this. It is not like you are being asked to shed light on you sexual preferenses or the color of your underware. You are just being asked to declare you financial standing. What do you own and what do you owe. THATS ALL.

OK, now I understand. You fear that those that voted for you will find out how well off you are an the typical Liberian envy will prevail? No. Then explain it to me.

sumo_pipe@hotmail.com

Here we go again

Our honourable ladies and gentlemen have barely begun their new term, when the holabaloo starts again. Why all the pride? You people are lawmakers, so please do just that.

Even considering the county developement funds that have largely been misused in the current form of management. Take heed of your own incompetence and let the funds be administered by someone who has no interest of lining their own pockets.

Corruption

Whatever you may call it, corruption, graft, kickback, stealing, coldwater, greasing, appears just about everywhere.

What is new, is that the media nowadays is free to report and investigate on it. This is a huge step in our country. What I would like to highlight is the smalltime corruption that is taking place.

In most societies, information is critical to curbing these practices. What I would like to focus on is fees, govenment fees.

Many government bodies do certain tasks for a fee that should go directly to the government coffer. What I have not seen here in Liberia is any pricelist for fees. (With some exceptions like the NPA)

Example:

You go to the Ministry of commerce to register a company. What does this cost? It depends on who you ask. But, why not put up a big signboard with the different fees for the different forms of companies. (This is free information that cannot be misinterpreted)

Immigration fees. Same thing. Put up a signboard with the regulated fees so that anyone entering the reception area imediately sees how much their business costs. Then you would not have the employees taking 300US dollars and giving customers a receipt for 50 US dollars.

Eh my people

So much has transpired since I wrote last. A lot of good things have gone down, and many scandals have surfaced. As time passes by these things will gradually be resolved. This is normal in any emerging society.

However, one thing has caught my attention recently. This incident is so annoyingly typical of Liberian society, that it is one of the causes of the war in the first place. The Senate suspended its leader and he was recently reinstated by the Supreme Court of Liberia. But in a very Liberian manner, the acting leader of the Senate is now refusing to honor the ruling of the highest court in the land. This above-the-law mentality is really evidence of the level of ignorance in our society today.

I really could not give a flying f..k over who leads the Senate. Abide by the law and get on with your work, or step the f..k down so that someone with a brain and who cares for his country can step up and do the work instead.

Can you imagine that we are stuck with these selfish parasites for NINE YEARS!!!

I break my silence

Up till now, I have been quite content with the various developments in our country. When I am pleased, there is not so much to write about. Right now that is changing so fast that you can be sure to be hearing from me a lot over the next few weeks. Our "honourable" legislature is at this moment trying to change their own rules of engagement. It is just as bad as when their predecessors passed laws that entitled them to public property at the end of the transitional period.

When the race for office was on, when money and rice was used to buy votes in the various constituancies, all those that allowed their votes to be bought should be turning in their beds. These same men and women that they voted into lawmaking power are now showing their true colours. Let us not forget that not all of them are involved, but there is a worrying amount of these "honourables" that do not want their affairs to be subject to public scrutiny. The media reports of 600 cooks and 43 drivers in the employ of the legislature. Does not the Liberian general public deserve the right to transperency even here? They want to audit themselves? What an outrage. Here we as a nation are trying to crawl back onto our feet, and we have a bunch of scoundrels that want to place themselves above the law. One law that should be passed is the shortening of their tenure to four years. I can go on and on but I think you get the general picture. Especially, what message does this send to potential investors.