Monrovia – The National Bureau of Concessions is deeply saddened by the erroneously false allegations levied against her particularly by the Management of JOY FM 101.5, in a way and manner that shows heinous disregard for the truth and the journalist’s code of ethics.
The National Bureau of Concessions would like to categorically state that at no normal point in time under the current leadership have this institution changed the payroll system where instead of employees’ salary going directly into their personal bank accounts, they are rather diverted and paid through checks where often their salaries are cut. This information is unfounded, maliciously conjectured and baseless – as it only shows the latitude and length to which some of our should be friends in the media are desperate in their proxy war to drag this institution’s credibility and that of well-meaning employees and volunteers high-earned characters in the mud for little or nothing.
The hired talk-show host who has failed to abide by the Journalist’s Code of Ethics made zero effort to reach out to the requisite authorities to find out the truth against the so-called information given to him, but rather elected to broadcast mistruths and outrageous lies as statement of facts on air. His reportage which was highly defamatory, has been aired on JOY FM 101.5 without any regard to the people and institution it will affect.
It is of no mistake when the veteran Kenyan professor of law, Patrick Loch Otieno Lumumba eloquently indicated and I quote verbatim, “when the press is not the carrier of truth the society becomes doom”. While this statement does not cover the entire body in Liberia, yet it remains of concerns by the virtue of fact that we have to be addressing an issue of such.
We welcome our activities at NBC to be mirrored by the media as well as supporting their right to free speech, but these outlandish lies of a hired journalist go far beyond the belt of evidence-based advocacy and the exercise of free speech and should be brought to check by the parent body governing the conduct of journalists in Liberia. The Press Union of Liberia should not sit idle and allow some of its members to spew out slanderous statements that have the proclivity of undermining the integrity of public institutions in the name of exercising free speech or press freedom. There is a huge wave of difference between blackmailing, defamation of character and free speech. Journalists are at liberty and also protected by our Organic Law to serve as watchdogs in reporting graft and other sociopolitical and economic malaises in our society, but not to dabble into mercenary journalism and blackmailing with the willful intent to destroy government’s agenda. Good journalism should be at the service of country and people and not to the propagation of misinformation.
In this same vain, the talk-show mercenary and his gang of hired Facebook propagandists inferred that tons of ghost names have been placed on the payroll of the NBC; thus criminally defrauding government of needed revenue to invest in public sector programs.
It is unfortunate that we have to even respond to such baseless accusations by a journalist who is embellishing lies, however; we believe it is necessary to prevent this cowardly attack from creating further damage on the image of NBC. We would like to emphatically state that at no point in time have the NBC’s payroll ever been bloated with ghost names.
In our honest and sincerest effort to promote transparency and accountability at the National Bureau of Concessions we have made a representation to the Internal Audit Agency, requesting the conduct of a full-scale audit of the agency’s financial activities.
Lastly, we would like to admonish employees at the National Bureau of Concessions to continue cultivating the habit of workplace decency.
With this now behind us, we will continue focusing on the more important task and onerous responsibility to ensure that we monitor and evaluate compliance of concessionaires in collaboration with concession entities and serve as a source of technical expertise to support all aspects of concession process, as well as assisting agencies of the government that have oversight responsibility over the granting of concessions.
We greatly appreciate the confidence and support shown to us by His Excellency, President George Manneh Weah and we remain dedicated in implementing the responsibility and mandate given us by the Act establishing the National Bureau of Concessions. We look forward to discussing the progress made thus far in our next press briefing.