EDITORIAL: Liberia – Nation Fighting the Wrong Battles

Rev. Dr. Samuel Reeves warned on Sunday that silence is not reconciliation and stability is not justice. Two days earlier, a courtroom clash between Judge Ousman F. Feika and Atty. Gbawou Kowou halted an economic sabotage trial and showed how much of Liberia’s energy is spent on battles that leave no one better off.

ON SUNDAY, FROM the pulpit of Providence Baptist Church, Rev. Dr. Samuel Reeves told Liberia something it needed to hear. “The first generation after conflict must not be satisfied merely because the guns became silent,” he said. “Silence is not the same as reconciliation. Stability is not the same as justice.”

IT WAS A sermon about resurrection, but it was also a diagnosis. Reeves argued that a nation can rebuild roads and still need to rebuild trust. A nation can construct buildings and still need to construct character.

TWO DAYS EARLIER, a few hundred yards away at the Temple of Justice, Liberia offered a near-perfect illustration of what he meant.

ON FRIDAY, CRIMINAL Court “C” Judge Ousman F. Feika dismissed a complaint by defense lawyer Gbawou Kowou. Kowou had accused the State’s asset recovery task force of summoning and pressuring defense witnesses. The judge found the allegation “absolutely false and misleading” and referred Kowou to the Supreme Court’s Grievance and Ethics Committee, with a strong recommendation that his license be suspended for a full year.

HOW DID IT come to this?

ON A SUNDAY afternoon, defense witnesses who had already testified ended up at the prosecutor’s offices. The court says that was a mix-up by the group’s own administrator. Their phones were taken at the door. Kowou, alarmed, went to the compound and started filming on Facebook live. Task force staff tried to stop him, and a scuffle followed. That night he took his accusations to a television talk show, despite a court gag order. By Monday, the trial was halted, the jury sent home, and a week of court time was spent investigating the lawyers instead of the case.

THE TASK FORCE is prosecuting alleged economic sabotage involving public money, and Liberians deserve to know the outcome. Instead, the country got a week-long fight about a fight.

THERE IS ENOUGH blame to go around. A lawyer who believes his witnesses are being intimidated has a duty to raise it, but in court first, not on a live stream. A prosecuting office that summons people to its premises on a Sunday should know exactly who is walking through its gate, and should not need a scuffle to sort it out. And a court that finds a lawyer breached its gag order has contempt powers built for exactly that. Recommending that he be taken off the roll for a year, removing him from every client he represents, invites the question of whether the punishment fits the offense.

THE GRIEVANCE AND Ethics Committee and the Supreme Court will decide Kowou’s fate, and they should be left to do so on the facts. But the larger question belongs to all of us. Why does so much of Liberia’s public life collapse into battles that leave no one better off?

WE SEE IT in our courts, where procedural skirmishes routinely outlast the substance of cases. We see it in our politics, where opponents are treated as enemies and every disagreement becomes a war of press releases and radio call-ins. We see it in institutions that spend more energy defending turf than serving citizens. Each battle feels urgent to those fighting it. Added together, they consume the time, money and goodwill a recovering nation cannot spare.

REEVES PUT IT plainly: “God rarely raises a community through spectators.” But a nation also cannot be rebuilt by combatants who mistake every quarrel for a cause. Somebody, as he said, has to forgive. Somebody has to tell the truth. Somebody has to lead with integrity. That includes judges, lawyers and prosecutors, who carry special responsibility for showing that disputes in Liberia can be settled by law rather than by noise.

THE PASTOR ALSO warned against measuring progress by the wrong numbers. “Raising 1 billion dollars in revenue is not the same as human flourishing,” he said. “Institutional survival is not the same as institutional excellence.” Courts that keep functioning are not the same as courts that inspire confidence. A trial that grinds on is not the same as justice being done.

LIBERIA HAS PASSED through its Friday. The question Reeves left hanging over Sunday’s congregation is whether we will keep reliving it in smaller battles, or choose the harder work of building something that lasts.

THE CHOICE, AS he said, belongs to whoever is willing to walk out of the tomb.