Editorials

 

Madam President: Take Decisive Action Against Corrupt Vampires in Government

 

The road to defeating corruption which is labeled as a societal menace may seem too long and unsteady, but with collective courage and determination, we are convened the battle can be achieved. We are fully aware that corrupt vampires will put up strongly resistance but they can be defeated if decisive action is taking against these corrupt vampires.

 

          Madam President, corruption is not a new phenomenon to the nation and its people, it has been eating up every sphere of our nation for 167 years now, this systemic pandemic which you once described as public enemy number one and Vampire is negatively impacting your administration despite of numerous gains both domestically and internationally.

 

      The effect of corruption in our country is more devastating than cancer and other deadly sicknesses. The fight against this virulent social disorder did not just begin today, but long before its colossal maturity. The issue of legacy of public ill-transparency and dishonesty needs to be routed from the system by instituting decisive action across your administration without fear or favor.

 

     Madam President, please be reminded that when political vultures and economic vampires embezzle and misuse state resources, they are not made to account for these resources simply because of their high-ranking statuses or connections with influential people in your administration; this is one of the major reasons while these vampires continue to drink public resources. While the culture of impunity has been a contributing factor to the sharp increment in vampirism and a huge number of new corruption cases.

 

      It is an obvious that cases of corruption with sufficient proofs are compromised as a result of strong political connection and ties or bribery since courts and judges are vulnerable to bribes and all forms of inducement despite of the huge monthly salary and other benefits to go with their respective portfolios.

 

       The another factor that greatly impeding the fight against corrupt vampires is the issues of selectivism when indictees of corruption are made known and being persecuted, while we want to again remind you Madam president that enough effort not being made by this regime to vigorously tackle the issue of corruption.

 

     Some of judges and law enforcement personnel especially court officers and police are money-driven and integrity-drained. As a result of this, corrupt vampirism practices become ‘not guilty’ even though there are available facts to prove otherwise.

 

      The weak and corrupt legal system of our country is providing a fertile ground for corruption and if rapid interventions are not made to overhaul our judiciary sector, corruption will forever remain a major enemy to reckon with. While the lack of political will has been a major challenge to our current warfare against corruption. If we truly intend to promote a society of integrity and honesty, we must begin to impartially prosecute all corrupt officials of government who are instigating this act.

 

       Corruption cannot be fought or dealt with through rhetoric-with judges and law enforcement personnel being opened to bribery to compromise cases. The fight against corruption must come along with sincerity, commitment and loyalty.  This unethical practice has grown even larger to an extent it is not only hampering development but it is also hunting men and women of honesty and integrity who have made it their lifetime duty to blow loud whistles against it.

 

       Our nation can never win this fight through unfilled words but through concrete actions. There is multiplicity of genuine corruption cases lingering without prosecution as corrupt vampires move about freely.

 

The Ebola Outbreak Much be Managed

07-03-2014

 

        AN ALARMING REPORT released last week by Doctors Without Borders said that West Africa’s current Ebola outbreak is “out of control.” That should shock the governments of Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia into action. It marks a frightening moment for a disease that has been contained numerous times before.

 

     A STATISTICAL BREAK-DOWN has shown that the number of deaths have increased from 35 to 46 while suspected cases jumped to 70 at present. “The confirmed and suspected cases in Lofa are 49, Margibi 3, Montserrado 18. The total number of people currently in treatment unit are 33, total number of deaths in the past of 37now it stands at 46; 25 in Lofa, 1 in Margibi, 20 in Montserrado.

       THE NEW CASES are coming from Lofa, Margibi and Montserrado.”  In Liberia, traditions of waiting to bury bodies for months and touching the dead have made controlling the spread harder, Tolbert Nyesuah, assistant minister for health said. Denial that that disease exists has also complicated containment, he said.

 

       At the John F. Kennedy Medical Center, Liberia’s biggest referral hospital, the Cholera Unit at the facility has been turned into a center for Ebola while the ELWA and the St. Joseph Catholic Hospital are the latest recipient of Ebola cases, both reporting deaths.

         THE OUTBREAK, ALREADY the deadliest in history, had killed almost 400 people as of Thursday. It began in March but then slowed, causing the Guinean president to declare to the World Health Organization (WHO) in April that “the situation is well in hand.” But all was not well, and complacency led to relaxed measures and a second surge. More than 600 cases have now been reported, with the patients experiencing headache, fever and internal and external bleeding. The virus kills up to 90 percent of the people it infects, but it leaps from person to person only through contact with bodily fluids.

 

        UNLIKE SOME VIRUSES — including the one causing Middle East respiratory syndrome — Ebola is not new. It was discovered in 1976, and small outbreaks have been recorded occasionally since then. No cure exists, but medical teams have always effectively segregated infected areas and stopped the virus’s spread. The method is understood: treat the patients, trace their contacts and isolate those people.

 

      BUT WEST AFRICA had not seen a major Ebola outbreak and was unprepared. Its public-health infrastructure is weak. There was no quick incident response system with a command-and-control structure, and no comprehensive public health plan for a mobile population. In the early stages of the crisis, Guinea buckled under economic and political pressure. To this day, the health ministries of the three countries lack effective ways to build public awareness.

 

     AMONG THE BIGGEST challenges is the public’s reluctance to cooperate. A stigma attaches to those who are infected, and so families hide the sick, making it more difficult to trace contacts. Some run away and in so doing spread the disease. A death can lead to a dozen more infections among those who clean and prepare the body for the funeral.

 

     INTERNATIONAL GROUPS sometimes have difficulty discouraging these behaviors. In April, an angry crowd attacked a Doctors Without Borders clinic in a town in Guinea. The locals charged that the health workers were bringing Ebola to the villages. Mobs not infrequently have thrown rocks at medical workers.

 

     THE WHO IS CONVENING an 11-country meeting this week to coordinate a regional response. It plans to recruit more village heads and local chiefs to participate in the public awareness campaign. This meeting is promising. But there is a real risk that Ebola will spread. Other West African countries must heed the lesson of Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

 

    WE WANT TO USE this medium to remind our leaders that more deaths can be prevented if they institute several sound measures including a well organized outreach instead of crying for lack of money. In the absent of the involvement of community leaders especially in the most affected counties like Lofa and Montserrado, the number of deaths is likely to increase in days to come.

 

 

 

Madam President, Weed Out Corrupt Officials

 

DISHONESTY IN LIBERIA, especially among public officials and civil servants, is a perennial problem that cut across every sectors of our country. It has become a menace that continues to undermine the Country’s progress and development.

 

OVER THE YEARS, people who are greedy for money and have weak allegiance to the State considered government not as a place to render due service to their nation but as a source of rapid personal enrichment. The effect is a declining society saddled with economic and political crisis.

 

CORRUPTION HAS DANGEROUS consequences and is unsafe for our emerging democracy, because it undermines the principle of democracy which are based on the equality of the citizens’ rights and the transparency of the political decision making process.

 

THE MISUSE OF public funds by public officials and certain individuals within the corridor of power is not helpful and hampers productivity. As dishonesty spreads, the rights of the citizens are transformed into favors by these corrupt state bureaucrats and capitalists.

 

MADAM PRESIDENT, WE want to encourage your effort to forcibly confront corruption, fight it and bring to book any of your subordinates caught in such an ugly act. So we trust public officials and those in the private sector would cultivate the basis of loyalty that allows for a change of behavior and help accelerate the process of remaking Liberia under rule of law where people will not abuse public resources for their selfish gains.

 

MADAM PRESIDENT, THESE measures, we believe would help your Administration to tackle corruption to a zero degree as you march towards your final stage of your second term. These weak, unproductive and dishonest bureaucrats in various sectors of your administration will be chase out of their respective offices and replace with honest Liberians who can help you achieve your goals for a better Liberia.

 

WE AT THE NEW VISION have no qualms that these corrupt officials will give way to productive, sincere and devoted Liberians who are ready to serve their nation and people with a high degree of commitment and honesty. Madam President, please act now.

 

 

Vote Out Failed Senators In October

 

TODAY, OUR NATION – Liberia, the onetime beacon of hope on the African continent is at a critical junction in its national history. A fourteen- year bloody upheaval has ended and the nation is currently experimenting democracy at all levels across the country.

 

IN LESS THAN seven months’ time, we will be at the polls to elect 15 new Senators who are expected to institute good laws in the interest of the masses and those greedy individuals who only care for the pockets.

 

THERE IS NO doubts that the October 11, 2014 senatorial midterm election is to decide whether or not to entrust the leadership of this nation to a new group of political elites or the old guards. This decisive and cardinal decision rests in our hands and let nothing cause us to make a bad choice.FOR, IF WE truly love our country and we want Liberia to rise again as a unified nation and people, and regain her once ruffled status amongst the comity of nations, then let us not repeat those same old mistakes to entrust our future to those who lack vision for this nation.

 

THE 2014 Senatorial Elections must be a point at which all Liberians of 18 or above can speak with one voice to make a sound decision to elect people who loved and cherished this nation and its people, and not those self-centered individuals who would want to enrich themselves at the detriment of the suffering masses.

 

THIS IS ANOTHER opportunity to decide whether we want a senator that subscribes to good governance, human rights, rule of law, social justice and sound economic policies and who would unite and build a strong and prosperous nation bordered on the country of law and not of one-track-minded men; a country free to and for all wherein all of us can be participants of the wealth and enjoy the luxury of peace, joy and happiness.

 

OUR COUNTRY NEEDS good leaders and sound policymakers who have genuine love for the masses and concern for peace, stability, and national development.THE TIME HAS come for us to make sure that those who violate the trust of the people, lack leadership ability and misuse the nation’s wealth and human resources to promote their own interest are shown the ‘red card’ and never again put in positions of trust to repeat their crimes.

 

THE FINAL DECISION rests in our hands and not the international community. It is time that we make the best decision by electing people of trust and not greedy politicians.

 

AGAIN, THE TIME has come to carefully select the sheep from among the goats, come October 11, 2014, or we will bleed this country to death for other long unforeseeable years. Weed Out Corrupt Officials From Government DISHONESTY IN OUR lives, especially in public sector, is a perennial problem in Liberia that has become a menace that continues to undermine the Country’s progress

 

OVER THE YEARS, people who are greedy for money and have weak allegiance to the State considered government not as a place to render due service to their nation but as a source of rapid personal enrichment. The effect is a declining society saddled with economic and political crisis

 

.CORRUPTION HAS DANGEROUS consequences and is unsafe for democracy, because it undermines the principle of democracy which are based on the equality of the citizens’ rights and the transparency of the political decision making process.

 

THE MISUSE OF public funds by certain individuals within the corridor of power is not helpful and hampers productivity. As dishonesty spreads, the rights of the citizens are transformed into favors.WE IMPLORE YOUR effort to confront corruption, fight it and bring to book any of your subordinates caught in such an ugly act. So we trust public officials and those in the private sector would cultivate the basis of loyalty that allows for a change of behavior and help accelerate the process of remaking Liberia under rule of law.

 

MADAM PRESIDENT, THESE measures, we believe would help your Administration to tackle corruption to a zero degree as you march towards your final stage of your second term.

 

WE HAVE NO doubts that these corrupt officials will give way to honest and dedicated civil servants and public officials who are ready to serve their nation and people with a high degree of commitment and honesty. We Evaluate To Strengthen National Progress

 

TODAY, THE NEW VISION is issuing a midterm evaluation of performances of state actors on the platform of the Unity Party- led government. As the process of evaluation entails, we have matched performances with the overall practical achievements of heads of the government’s three Branches that are under scrutiny in today’s evaluation. In any case, this process of evaluation may possibly be continued in our subsequent editions.

 

HONORING STATE FUNCTIONARIES and personalities at the end of the year for works done in the course of the year is a media tradition that is meant to encourage them to do more than the previous years. Some papers for instance carried their evaluations of officials in the form of personalities of the year. For us, however, we have chosen to do ours by grading sectional heads of government looking at what they have achieved for the first three years of the second term of this administration.

 

ACCORDINGLY, THOSE WHOSE performances we see poor are graded poorly while those who stood up to the task of national reconstruction are graded meritoriously. In the past we received quarrels from bigots and officials for grading them and the grading state of actors at the end of the year or about this time for their past outputs in government is to encourage competition ta their respective assignments. This, we think is part of the democracy we have yearned for. By so doing we hope that those to whom responsibilities are delegated should rise up and perform to expectation.

 

WHILE OUR EVALUATION may not be accepted in some quarters as it is always the case, those who believe that they were not properly evaluated and were not done justice should come forward and present to the public what their achievements or accomplishments are. This will be an eye opening venture not only for the NEW VISION editorial staff but it will also expose their hidden achievements to the Liberian people that we all serve. Such will be honorable for them than being uncivilized in responding to this traditional evaluation exercise.