Dear Mama Liberia,
As the pendulum of time swings to another year of living, I thought it responsible and incumbent upon me, a product of your unending love, discipline, struggles and trials, to pen this humbling letter in recognition of 169 years of resilient, courageous, transforming, painful, yet, hopeful living.
I can imagine you laying back in your traditional relaxer, tied to both ends of your many mango trees, with the calmness of sunset and the assuring feeling of the night/early morning breeze, and reminiscing over some of the indelibly hurtful memories of your years of existence.
I can only sense how you want to take that needed nap, but the thought that few of your beloved children marginalized their compatriots for years, cannot allow you to do so. I can feel how you want to relax your “mental tension” but you cannot fathom the fact that for more than a century, your children treated you like a revolving door.
I can only imagine the discomfort in trying to relax because the gruesomeness of fourteen long years of civil unrest cannot give way to the refreshing purpose of sleep.
I am almost in tears now because at age 169, you should be relaxing and hearing more success stories from your children, but you are serving as the judge of a barrage of finger-pointing that is characterized by constant bickering, division, hate-mongering, insults, lies, and the list goes on.
Oh, how you want to relax and think about good times, but the horrors are so many that the good times are like fleeting moments. Yet, you are still trying to hold unto some of those moments.
Oh, whoa! Yes, I just screamed because I am sensing that you are actually smiling even in the midst of all the chaos; why is that so? Oh, I see, I am sure you just took a stroll down memory lane and thought of the happenings of the early and mid-1800s when your children finally returned home and eventually declared a symbolic freedom, which signified the rebirth of your existence.
If that is so, I am of the strongest conviction that you are (also) thinking about the time when you became the beacon of hope for many of your sister nations’ children (and you still are after all those years of struggle).
Mama, no matter your disappointments, no matter your fears, please remembers that our actions have taught us many lessons. As you can tell from our writings, utterances and actions, we understand how much pain we have caused you. We know that over the years, we have done more to hurt you than to help you.
We know no matter how high we raise your emblem, no matter how loud we sing your theme song, no matter how much we give, we cannot pay for more than a century and a half of exploitation, insult, pain and disgrace.
We cannot undo the events of the past no matter how hard we try. We cannot make up for the years the locusts have eaten. We cannot even promise you that we will not hurt you again because many of our actions today reflect the actions that put us in this mess.
What we can promise you is our unwavering commitment to remain a work in progress, to take your remaking one day at a time and to keep hope alive. Many of us may not live to see the day when you will become the envy of the world. The day when you will become a beacon of hope for many.
The day when you will rest on the shoulders of your children and not vice versa. We may not be around to celebrate your lasting prominence among the comity of nations, the rising of your skyscrapers, and the connectivity of your roads. We may not be around to see your entry into the club of nations supplying the world with critical finished products.
Nevertheless, wherever we are when these things happen, we want to sit back and humbly say we set the stage for those unfolding, we laid the ground work and we believed in generations after.
Mama, Happy Birthday. We love you and hold you dear to our hearts. You may be 169 years old, but you are stronger than (some of) your younger siblings.
We Love and Salute You, Mama Liberia!
Alfred Johnson,
[email protected]