PHILADELPHIA, Pa – It was a day seared in the 66-year-old man’s memory. July 12th, 1990. Hundreds of men from his town in Lofa County were crowded into the townhall by child soldiers with the NPFL he told jurors here. The Loma and Kpelle were called out. Only Mandingos were left. The rebel leader handed out bullets to the small boys. He gave the order to open fire.
Report by Adrienne Tingba and Tecee Boley
When the shooting died down, the witness said, “127 persons were killed on the spot” including his mother, father and older brother. His mother had been the only woman in the townhall. She was told to stay because she was blind.
In a soft voice the old man told the jury he only survived because he pretended he was dead. Court photographs showed where one bullet had entered his left leg. Another entered his left hand. A third had grazed his head. He only survived because a brother had hidden in the bush and come to retrieve him. The pair eventually escaped to Guinea.
The witness said a white man had warned them that the NPFL was coming to kill all the Mandingos.
“When the NPFL entered the town. They asked what we had to say to them. They took three thousand Liberian dollars with a cow was given to them as white kola (peace offering).
But, the jury heard, it was not enough to satisfy them. The NPFL had come to kill all Mandingoes and Krahn and anyone who had had served in the government of Samuel Doe.
The major theme of day 7 testimony in the trial of Thomas Woewiyu turned to focus on the NPFL’s targeting of ethnic Krahn and Mandingo people during Liberia’s civil war. The prosecution’s goal is to prove that Woewiyu commanded a force that oppressed a group based on their ethnic group. The government case is that Woewiyu lied on US immigration papers when he answered questions that asked if the applicant has ever oppressed, discriminated or suppressed a person based on their ethnicity. If convicted of the prosecution’s charges against him, Woewiyu faces a maximum penalty of 110 years in prison, and $4M fine.
The government argues that one of the NPFL’s main goals at the time was to kill all Mandingoes, Krahns and supporters of Doe. As second in command to Charles Taylor, the government says, Woewiyu clearly participated in targeting those groups.
Earlier in the day brother and sisters – whose father had been Krahn – also gave evidence of multiple times they and their family were escaped death at checkpoints because of their ethnicity. Both brother and sister recalled hearing Woewiyu on BBC’s Focus on Africa at the time saying: “The one good Krahn man is a dead Krahn man.”
“It turned me off for a while after hearing him say that. Because we were all Liberians, and we did not believe in division. Hearing him say that just turned me off,” said the sister.
The sister had been the first Liberian woman witness to appear. She engaged the jury with her testimony of being subjected to duck fah tarpeh, the memory causing her to break into tears.
“His name was Emmanuel Gonpu,” she told jurors of the man who subjected her to that torture. “He was with the NPFL. He said he heard that the owner of the farm [where the children were hiding] was keeping Krahn children. He said he was going to tie us up like he did the lady in the back of his car. Eventually, he tied me and my sister. My spirit left my body and I felt empty,” the witness said, showing the scars on her arm from the incident.
People belonging to the Krahn ethnic group were now the sole civilian target of NPFL soldiers. As the hunt of the Krahn ethnic group intensified, friends and families were torn apart, and neighbors could not be trusted, as described by the witnesses.
The jury heard of NPFL atrocities committed in Harbel during the time that had prompted ECOMOG peacekeepers to bomb what was believed to be an NPFL base there.
Defense lawyers tried to argue that Woewiyu had not been in Harbel. The witness was unable to confirm this. But the prosecution then undercut the defense case in dramatic fashion by playing a clip of the voice of Mr. Woewiyu in an interview with the BBC. He was eloquently heard saying: “Nigerians ECOMOG are bombing Harbel. Harbel is not a frontline. The frontline is in Monrovia. But they are bombing pregnant women and children Harbel. Harbel is a business area where firestone operates that is why we have on soldiers there.”
Targeting of the Mandingoes was the focus of the afternoon’s testimony. A Mandingo witness described the first time he saw child soldiers murder someone.
“We woke up in the morning and heard a lady crying. She was crying saying that the NPFL soldiers took her husband. Soon after, they shot and killed him in front his family because he was Mandingo.”
He described going through checkpoints which were adorned with freshly severed heads and intenstines.
“They were asking if you were Mandingo or Krahn or AFL soldier. They took a lot of people from the line. They gave people VIP treatment – that is they tied you, rolled a drum over you or place heavy iron over you. At the end of the day you will die.”
Showing the jury scars of injuries, the witness told the jury of how he narrowly escaped death multiple times. This witness was the third to mention Martina Johnson, the NPFL leader who is facing charges in Belgium for her role in the civil war.
“When Martina shot me. I felt down. I thought I was dead. There was a small boy who pricked me with the knife. And ordered me to move in line with the rest of the people. They saw Mandingo man like their pepper soup to kill.”
To the court’s surprise, the defense remained silent as the prosecution finished with each of these witnesses, one after the other. Their silence was surprising to court observers, as these testimonies are a key part of the prosecution’s case against the defendant.
This story was produced in collaboration with New Narratives. Funding was provided by Civitas Maxima. The funder had no say in the story’s content.
