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I thank the organizers for the invitation to share in the Official Launching of the Geraldine Doe Sheriff for Senate Campaign. Even as we participate in and enjoy the fruits of our juvenile democracy, we must forever remain grateful and never forget that many have been the sacrifices that brought us to today. We will continue to owe a debt of gratitude to those who voluntarily and involuntarily offer themselves so that we will gather, as often as we can, and absenting violence, commit ourselves to the healthy exchange of ideas as to who or what political party organization might present the best alternative to meeting the aspirations of our people. And where promises made become promises not kept, in due season, we can again assemble, as a matter of obligation to self, to family, and to country to again decide the direction of our country.
I can only hope that whenever we do this, we will continue to do so guided by the simple principle that it ought not to be necessarily about whom we like personally but who is best for our country. It ought not to be about the cause of the party to which we may hold membership but the cause of the country to which we must hold loyalty. It ought not to be about me or him or her, it ought to be about you, about us and about them. It ought to be about the people. Ordinary people – old as well as young; rich as well as poor; educated as well as uneducated; and Congo as well as native.
It ought to be about that boy or that girl; that man or that woman whose mind is filled with dreams and heart with hope. And yes, it ought also to be about that boy or that girl; that man or that woman who has nothing for which to dream and little for which to hope. Those for whom yesterday, today and tomorrow are the same – the same choking nightmare of inopportunity and the same choking nightmare of hopelessness; those whose screams cannot be heard; those whose pains go unnoticed; those who cannot imagine life beyond today; those who must drag themselves in the rain and in the sun for school fees, for rent, for food, for candle and for mosquito coil; those who must hustle by day and hustle by night; those who seem cursed because they remained here and could not afford to go to travel to the United States; those who went, struggled and have returned and dare to think themselves better than those they left behind; those who are corrupt because they were here and those who are even more corrupt because they came; those who have come to sacrifice and those whose sacrifices also include the pleasure of determining their unequal pay for equal work. Yes, this ought to also be for all those we may know and those we will never know who sacrificed in blood, in sweat and in tears to offer us the possibility of freedom and blessing of democracy.
It ought also to be about those who are blamed for everything and yet were given nothing; those who want everything but deserve nothing; those who for a decade have labored under the persecution, vilification and mental torment of restriction to their freedoms and denial of their rights without constitutional due process as well as those who continue to believe, act out and pretend that it is okay to arbitrarily violate rights and impair freedoms without due process. It ought to be about those for whom JFK, Phebe and JJ Dossen Hospitals and clinics exist as well as those for whom checkups are available in America, South Africa and Ghana. You see, this election is about all of us – as well as it ought to be.
And yet there are other reasons for which this by-election is especially important. Everyone, from the international community to local actors, knows that this election is the precursor to the General and Presidential Elections in 2011. As such, I urge you to make no mistake into thinking that this is just another by-election that anyone can win and it would not mean much. Over two thirds of the way into the life of this administration, this senatorial by-election, in the melting pot that is Montserrado, is in fact, a referendum on both the current administration and the opposition. And yes, it is a test of how far we have come.
As to the opposition, I will be the first to admit that it is faltering. Driven as we are only by personal ambitions; the lack of leadership or a strangle-hold on the leadership of our political party organizations, we continue to demonstrate our inability to focus on the larger interest of the people or their yearning for democracy. We know that democracies in all of its forms have never being built or strengthened by weak opposition forces. We know that we ought to come together to provide the Liberian people who are really catching hard times, a clearer alternative for the future development of our country.
Today, we hear of those crossing carpets or having carpets crossed over them. We also hear of internal squabbles and confusions, orchestrated in large measures, to further weaken opposition political party organizations. We know that the opposition is strained and disadvantaged by the divisions within our ranks and the lack of resources – that either we go together or none of us will go at all. And we ought to know that by a combination of hopelessness, complacency and lack of resolve, we risk a return to the dark days of a one-party state, which a few would like to see only for personal gains and the “last laugh” at those who sacrificed to give us multiparty democracy. We know that we cannot wait and complain. We know that we must work; we must imagine, and against the rising odds, we must provide hope to our people who are swimming in a sea of hopelessness.
And yet, as we face what we know, and as we look to meet that responsibility, we are lacking in courage to look beyond ourselves and to see the greater good. We wrap ourselves in the seemingly enviable but temporary garments of tribe, important as it may be for the meeting of our personal aspirations, and by so doing recklessly rip apart the enduring cloak of country. It does not seem to matter that we risk transforming our democratic aspirations to a tribal contest, and that we could lose all by the narrowness of our aspirations and the methods we currently employ to attain it. We manipulate for leverage that none of us can have. Our manipulation leads to mistrusts and our mistrusts into dissent and our dissent into divisions and our divisions into failure. It would seem okay if we could fail alone. But if we fail, the Liberian people fails.
This is why, while I believe that the Liberian opposition leadership is undeserving, you, the Liberian people cannot afford to fail. You do not deserve to fail. The price that you have paid and continue to pay to keep the flames of our democracy burning should not be ignored. I hope that you, our people, angry, frustrated and destitute as you ought to be, you will look kindly upon us as work in progress, and that you will motivate and inspire us, by a positive outcome to these by-elections in favor of the opposition, so that as opposition leaders, we will come to know that it is not about us but about the people that we aspire to lead.
Then there is the ruling party. Drained of ideas and imagination, they have settled on the tactics of the decadent past. That the country is not about all but about some; that the law cannot equally apply to all; that it is okay for some to be corrupt; that commissions can replace executive actions and decisions; that the strategy to reduce poverty is to steal from the poor and make the haves have more; that we can lead where no one follows; that electoral victory offers the winner a country that can be run as they like, divided as they wish, and disparaged against as they feel. A country where to have a say, you must part with your conscience. That incompetence, nepotism, corruption and patronage can cause the government to slip out of control and the administration to squander the hopes of the people and the goodwill of the international community.
And so while Liberians are getting poorer; while more and more Liberians are being unemployed the ruling party and this administration believe that it can count the assistance and benevolence of the Chinese, European and American Governments to the people of Liberia as their accomplishments and claim that they have fulfilled their promises to the people. How can you hope that the Liberian people will not know that more and more young Liberians are being overtaken by drugs, alcohol and prostitution; that our schools are reporting massive failures and are in free fall; that we look to the real prospect of the inability of our children to compete in the global marketplace; that more Liberians cannot better their parents; that our politics have become mean-spirited and petit; that more Liberians are being pushed out of business; that more Liberians are being haunted by the fear of insecurity and armed robbery; and that more Liberians are applying today for the US Diversity Visa Program because to them, it is still better to live as an alien in the country of another than to be a citizen in Liberia? You see, this by-election is the clearest way yet to remind this administration and this ruling party to borrow the popular saying, you can fool some people sometimes, you might even fool all of the people sometimes but even you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.
Finally, this by-election is about renewal. Life is constantly renewed by procreation. So too is the art of politics and the survival of countries. Every so often, thriving democracies present opportunities for people to confront the reality of their need for renewal. More often than not, the need for renewal comes in the form of challenges and opportunities which aging generations can neither understand nor to which they can readily adapt. Such today is the case.
Ever so gradually, the time has come for one generation to pass the baton of leadership onto the next. The cue is everywhere – from America to Russia – younger people who understand the complexities and changing dynamics of our time are rising to the challenge of assuming leadership for their country and people. Here in Liberia, while we must hasten to admit that some of our young leaders have not represented us quite well, it offers no excuse to the passing generation to hang on indefinitely. The time has come for a change – a change from one older generation to a younger generation; a change from the old crushing politics of personal animosity to the refreshing politics of ideas and methods; a change from the concept that some must necessarily lose for me to win to a new paradigm that all can win for me to win; a change from a leadership that waits for something to happen to the new leadership that enables things to happen; a change in the tired leadership trapped in the insecurity of its inadequacies to a new and vibrant leadership that dreams, that believes, that imagines, that is unafraid of competence and that looks to make things better for all; a change that does not see tribe but sees Liberia; a change that gives hope; inspires excellence and rewards consequences.
Geraldine, march on; go bravely. The odds may be against you but this is our time. They may have more resources than you do, but this is our time. They may have the power of the government behind them, but this is our time. They may bend the rules here and crook the rules there, but this is our time. They will huff and they will puff, but this is our time. They may disagree, but this is our time. They will tell us that we can’t, but this is our time. The time of our generation has come. Go on; march on; God bless you, I thank you.
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