IN THIS WEEK'S ISSUE
Liberian dreamer
Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, the country's first female president, is attempting to recast a nation.
- By Ruthie Ackerman, Christian Science Monitor
- Published: 00:00 January 18, 2007
- President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf visits communities and schools to discuss public interest priorities.
- Image Credit: Ruthie Ackerman/Christian Science Monitor
Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, the country's first female president, is attempting to recast a nation.
At the First United Methodist Church in downtown Monrovia, President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf sits in the front row for the Sunday morning service, wearing a golden robe and headdress befitting a queen.
Hours later, she wears white sneakers and a baseball cap as she dribbles a soccer ball across a soccer stadium, showing off some of the moves she learnt as an 8-year-old girl on an all-boy soccer team.
"This is reconciliation," she says, aware that most people in the crowd probably voted for her opponent, soccer star George Weah, in Liberia's 2005 presidential election. But her presence at the soccer game proved something more than just her athletic prowess. It showed her willingness to try to bridge the gap between opposing political parties and bring strong leadership to Liberia, a country still devastated by a 14-year civil war that ended in 2003.
These dichotomies - athlete and intellectual, fierce fighter and nurturer, Harvard-educated economist and African leader, technocrat and feminist - are what give Johnson-Sirleaf a unique perspective, both as the leader of Liberia and as the first democratically elected female head of state on the continent.
She walks a fine line, but these seeming polarities are what make Johnson-Sirleaf appealing both to the donor nations who support Liberia's reconstruction and to her fellow Liberians, who are relying on her to bring about change. With so many challenges - an 85 per cent unemployment rate, a 70 per cent illiteracy rate, lack of running water, electricity, and sewage systems - it is difficult to know where Johnson-Sirleaf should begin. Now, after almost a year in office, she says that slowly but surely she is seeing change come to this West African country of 3 million.
"I still wish we could accelerate the pace, but it's happening," Johnson-Sirleaf said in a recent interview at her house in Monrovia. "Changing to the art of positivism, getting [Liberians] to think that 'yes, after all, we can do it, the country belongs to us, and each and every one of us can do our part; we can play our role'. That's what we're working on."
Difficult road ahead
But the road to reconciliation has not been easy. To win the recent election, Johnson-Sirleaf sent women supporters to markets and rural areas to register other women to vote. Shortly thereafter, the number of women registered, skyrocketed from 15 to 51 per cent. Even so, fighting the rigid cultural beliefs that dictate that women cannot be leaders has proved difficult, says Kagwiria Mbogori, the Liberian Programme Manager for the United Nations Development Fund for Women. There has been a backlash: An article in a local newspaper stated that women are hungering for more and more power while a general scepticism is growing among men about a woman's ability to lead the nation out of war.
"Rape is a national pastime for Liberia," Mbogori says, pointing out that sexual violence didn't end with the war. But Johnson-Sirleaf's election in the first place is a sign of changing attitudes. Clearly, without the votes of men as well as women, Johnson-Sirleaf would not be president today.
The NV Massaquoi School in Westpoint, Monrovia, is an example of some progress that has been made during the president's first year in office.
The fact that the boys now cut their hair and the girls are wearing theirs in braids is a sign of hope, says the school's principal, Demore W. Moore. Another improvement - a girls-only bathroom was added a few months ago.
But even so, Moore says the needs are many. Rats eat through schoolbooks because there are no shelves, and Moore has to walk more than three miles to school, leaving his house at 5.30am because he doesn't have a bicycle.
Alomiza Ennos, the representative for District No 1, where the school is located, empathises with the problems of the constituents in her district.
"It's not easy to be a bureau representative in this place," Ennos says. "When people ask for things, I have to use my own money. Where do you get the money from?" Some of the budgetary problems stem from the fact that the president's party - the Unity Party - has a minority position in the legislature, with the other parties holding 90 per cent of the power. This has made freeing up the money to begin some of her initiatives difficult.
Education and healthcare
The United States Peace Corps is one way the president says she hopes to recruit teachers to teach the 50 per cent of Liberian children who aren't attending school. She also would like to see the 450,000 Liberians living outside the country - a group she calls Liberia's biggest national asset, to return home.
But the president is aware that there are still many impediments for Liberians wishing to return: lack of good schools and good healthcare, to name two.
Johnson-Sirleaf's suggestion: "You go into a community and instead of telling them 'we're going to build you a school', we ask them, 'what is your priority?' Maybe they prefer a well, because they want clean water for their children. Or maybe they prefer a clinic as their first priority. So even if we want to give them a school, let's work with them. And most times they have their priorities right. Most times it is a school because they want their children to be educated." At the end of her first year in office, she says she is surprised by the enthusiasm of the children. "Everywhere I stop the children are smiling and I say 'hey, that's it, that was the No 1'."
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