Monrovia – The United Nations (UN) has told the ruling Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) that it bears the biggest responsibility to ensure that unnecessary tensions and disputes are avoided in the country.
Speaking Monday, August 20, 2018 at the UN Headquarters in Monrovia upon receiving a statement of condolence from the Youth League of the CDC, Mr. Yacob El Hilo, Resident Coordinator of the UN System in Liberia, urged Liberians, especially the youth, to emulate the legacy of late former UN Secretary General, Mr. Kofi Annan by maintaining the peace.
However, he said while all Liberians have a responsibility to protect the peace of the state, which is owed greatly to the effort of the late Annan, the ruling party (CDC) bears the greatest task on its shoulders.
“All of us; including you, Liberians in particular, have a responsibility to live up to the legacy of Kofi Annan, a man of peace and a proud son of Africa and the world. As you can recall, he was instrumental to the peace you have today,” said the UN boss here.
“Looking at the legacy of Kofi Annan, it’s a legacy of peace. Youth, especially you coming from the ruling party have big responsibility to ensure that unnecessary tensions and disputes are not allowed,” he tasked.
The top UN official pointed out that in order to follow the good the examples of Kofi Annan one must use the ‘force of logic’ and not the ‘logic of force’ that has the propensity to create tension.
He recalled that the late Annan, who died at age, 80, was confronted with lots of crisis in Africa and the world at large, but he didn’t use the logic of force, rather he used the force of logic to resolve those issues.
Predicated on this, he urged the party that in response to the many confrontations, the governing party must use the force of logic.
Mr. Emmanuel Mulbah Johnson, National Secretary General of the CDC in a statement of condolence read on behalf of the party’s Youth League, said Liberia owes its gratitude to Kofi Annan, most especially the youth of the country.
He stated that the late UN SG was indeed a great son of Africa, who left behind a clear path of conflict resolution.
“The peacekeeper in Chief, Mr. Kofi Annan went to the extreme to ensure that the largest peacekeeping force ever assembled in the world came to Liberia during his terms as UN Secretary General from 1997 to 2006. When the United Nations Mission in Liberia was established in September 2003, our country was in turmoil, oversupplied in armed mercenaries and with no functioning countrywide authorities,” the CDC youth league stated read.
“Since then, with UN assistance, tens of thousands of gunmen have been disarmed and reintegrated into society, hundreds of thousands of refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) have returned safely to their homes, and the country’s destroyed infrastructure, including roads, bridges, schools, health facilities and police stations, are all being restored gradually,” the statement continued.
The CDC youth then called on all well-meaning Liberians to mourn the passion of the late Annan.
“We will forever treasure the Kofi Annan Institute for Conflict Transformation (KAICT), an institution that envisions a future where public dialogue and rigorous research and analysis are endemic to policy making and implementation in Liberia,” the CDC Youth League’s chief scribe among other things added.