On Tuesday 19 December 2023, President-elect of Liberia Joseph Boakai gave an interview to the VOA in Washington DC and said that his administration will “make sure that we are prepared to audit the outgoing government, so that they tell the Liberian people about their stewardship”.
By Fidel Budy, [email protected], Contributing Writer
When asked by the interviewer about the potential of his intention to audit the outgoing administration having the semblance of politically “targeting” soon-to-be ex-officials as a way of tarnishing their reputations, the President-elect responded that “we are aware of that, and when we talk about auditing, it’s not going to be a Liberian auditing. We are going to make sure our international partners work with us for a public tender, for competent and renowned auditing firm that will be qualified at an international level to come in and do the audit”.
This comment as sent alarm bells ringing in my ears for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the President-elect’s comments seem to suggest that he intends to undermine competent Liberian accounting, auditing and financial experts and institutions in favour of a ‘competent and renowned’ international firm. This for me is the wrong footing on which to start his administration that has promised so much to the Liberian people. This is because one of the things that I have applauded his former boss, madam Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, and by extension, him for, was the significant investment that they made in educating Liberians to ‘international standards’ during their 12 years in office. There are multiple Liberians, including some who worked for Mr John Morlu at the General Auditing Commission (GAC), who benefited from foreign scholarships to study accounting and forensic auditing at this so called ‘international standard’. That the President-elect will think that these people are now incompetent is worrying. If we take a step back, the Kroll audit on the so-called missing 16 billion and the 25 million US dollars mopping up fund drew similar conclusions to the investigative committee of Liberians put together by President Weah and the GAC. Furthermore, the just ended elections in Liberia that is going to bring President-elect Boakai to office was conducted by people whom his comments would label as incompetent. Does that mean he thinks that his victory is invalid because a group of incompetent Liberians conducted the elections?
I have mentioned Mr Morlu, whose work we witnessed in Liberia and can accept as ‘competent’. The former head of the Internal Audit Agency (IAA) under madam Sirleaf and President-elect Boakai, Paul Collins, is competent. I could go on and name many more ‘competent’ Liberians who are ‘internationally renowned’ for their auditing capabilities. So, why will the President-elect think that just because he hires a company with a foreign name and foreign employees that the audit will be credible? Will he appoint foreign, internationally competent people to run the government over Liberians? Does he think that the years of audit reports compiled by the GAC, IAA and Liberia Anti-Corruption Commission (LACC) lacks credibility because they were compiled by Liberians? This could be the first misstep by President-elect Boakai, which would not fill those of us who are sceptics of his stamina to keep his goons in check as he is promising with confidence. Saying that the multiple auditors and accountants that we have in Liberia are all incompetent is not a good look for him, because these are the same people, he would expect to work with him to stamp out corruption as part of this s0-called ‘rescue team’.
Onto my second concern. Hiring a ‘competent and renowned’ non-Liberian firm to audit the outgoing officials will do two things that are bad for the new administration. Firstly, it will continue to feed into this ‘white saviour’ mentality that many westerners have when dealing with African countries and enhance the neo-colonial grip that they already have on how we exist. Basically, the President-elect, if he goes ahead with what he promised in his interview with the VOA, will be saying that if a western firm says A, that is the only way that A can be correct. That is detrimental for our country, because it means he will have to continue to do the dance of western elites like a puppet throughout his time in office. Collaboration is one thing, being controlled by the interests of western elites is something that he should know did not work under his and his former boss’ administration. Our resources were auctioned out to neo-colonial grabbers whilst ordinary Liberians struggled. Secondly, it will be a waste of limited resources to hire a ‘competent’ foreign firm to undertake work that the Liberian taxpayers are already paying three agencies to do. That is poor financial stewardship, Mr President-elect.
My advice to President-elect Boakai is to avoid undermining the confidence of the Liberian people and some of our international partners in the GAC, IAA and LACC by continuing down this path of thinking that westerners are better than us simply because they are non-Liberians. If he does not change trajectory, fast, this could be the first misstep of his administration.
