A Constitutional Rewrite, not an Amendment; That’s What Liberia so Desperately Needs.
By Wonderr K. Freeman, Attorney, CFCS
About a month ago, I wrote the article: Liberians must demand a new constitution before 2029 to end the naked greed of the budget mafia clan (https://wonderrfreeman.com/liberians-must-demand-a-new-constitution-before-2029-to-end-the-naked-greed-of-the-budget-mafia-clan/law-governance/07/). It’s been exhilarating to hear chatters in the media about the need to relook at our Constitution. However, in these chatters, I frequently find that ‘constitutional amendment’ gets mixed up with the call for a ‘constitutional rewrite’. In this article, I go back into history to show why, if anyone wants to see a redo of Liberia’s governance systems, your best bet is to rewrite the Constitution. A peek into history reveals that reworking our Constitution via amendment is disadvantageous on many grounds and more prone to failure.
Liberia: A Damaged Past and Pillaged Present.
In the past couple of months, happenings in Liberia’s political and economic governance space reechoes my core argument that the 1986 Constitution has failed miserably. Within the space of a few months, we have seen some of the worst abuses by our political leaders ever. Let’s underscore a few of the currently reported scandals to make the point.
Okay, let’s not attempt to list all the scandals because, as you can see, the list could go on and on. The current top five listed alone (here) amounts to nearly USD 400 million in graft scandals (USD and LRD, combined). And if you add in President Joseph N. Boakai and his no-name good friend’s USD 80m illegal yellow machine deal (which is still in limbo) and you add Roland Lafayette Gidding’s Public Works illegal USD 22m scandal plus the additional broad day robbery from National Security Agency(NSA), Executive Protection Service (EPS), plus the broad day robbery by Miatta Fahnbulleh’s inauguration fiasco, plus Reverend Luther Tarpeh/UP Executive’s theft, you are staring at (at least) USD550m corruption scandal. This is an abomination. And so far, nobody is yet to serve jail time for half a billion US dollars of losses due to corruption and sheer theft. And while all this is happening, Mr. Boakai is mostly concerned with replacing CDC people with his UP people. Investigation, prosecution, and restitution are the furthest things on his mind.
When you add all Joseph Boakai and his Unity Party’s illegal acts, all George Weah/McGill and CDC transgressions, past violence and impunity, and our National Legislature’s leaders, who have spent at least USD750m of the Liberian people’s money – all without annual financial report or audits, you get my point. Liberia’s past is damaged; its present is being pillaged. Just imagine six months into the Unity Party’s regime, and Mr. Nathaniel McGill is still calling press conferences – instead of standing before a judge to account for his crimes against the Liberian people. The same can be said of Jefferson Koijee. This dude is writing speeches and making public commentary despite the myriad of crimes he was alleged to have committed – many of which were committed against the very Unity Party. But that is the least of Mr. Boakai’s concerns right now. I can understand the CDC’s reluctance to investigate and [possibly] prosecute the McGill and Koijee, but what is Unity Party’s excuse for not investigating? What is their excuse? Except for the fact that their much-vaunted “Rescue Agenda” mantra was never about justice or about Liberia’s prosperity. It was never about ending impunity. Yes, it was all about taking power to preside over the distribution of GOL jobs and freebies. It was just pure hunger for GOL jobs and the associated opportunity to loot the state’s treasure. Just that and nothing more!
So, it is very clear to me that Liberia’s past is wasted. Its present is being pillaged; while its short-term future is mortgaged to a heartless bunch of “leaders” who are hell-bent on looting our treasury, amongst other illegal activities. Our only hope of truly rescuing Liberia is in the medium to long term. And this brings me precisely to my point. Only by writing a new constitution can we preserve and secure Liberia’s medium to long-term future. Many are in agreement, but they seem to think that we should do this quickly and easily through constitutional amendment(s). And to this, I say not so fast. The history of constitutional amendments in Liberia is bleak. We have to thread this path tactically and strategically!
Constitutional Amendments in Liberia: A Short and Bleak History (20011 & 2020)
The Accra Peace Accord brought a definitive end to Liberia’s prolonged and intermittent civil wars and ultimately paved the way for our return to constitutional democracy. In 2006, Mrs. Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf made history as Liberia’s first post-war president and Africa’s first elected female president. Since then, there have been three election cycles and two referendums, targeting multiple attempts to amend our 1986 Constitution. What have been the results of these amendment referendums? Let’s look at the data.
- The Johnson-Sirleaf Unity Party-Led Proposal (2011)
The Unity Party, under the leadership of Mrs. Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, conducted a referendum on proposed constitutional amendments in 2011. The core proposal included:
| Constitutional Clauses | Proposal Details |
| Article 52C | Should we shorten the 10-year residency clause (i.e., prior to election) for Presidential & Vice-Presidential Candidates? |
| Article 72B | Should our Supreme Court judges’ tenure currently capped at age 70 be extended to age 75? |
| Article 83A | Should our general elections, which are held in October, be extended to November? |
| Article 83B | Should our absolute majority voting system apply to both the presidential and legislative elections, or should the legislative and municipal elections be simple majority only? |
Pursuant to our constitutional requirement, each amendment needed a 66.7% (two-thirds) majority to pass. Ultimately, for the 2011 Referendum, only the proposal to make legislative and municipal elections a matter of simple majority vote passed – a success rate of 25% only. It is left to historians to ponder why 75% of the amendment articles were rejected. By all counts, this referendum was a failure.
- The George Weah, CDC Coalition-led Proposals (2020)
About nine years after Johnson-Sirleaf’s proposals flopped, the Congress for Democratic Change, the erstwhile main opposition party, now the lead party at the helm of a three-party coalition government, made a new set of proposals. This time around, the success rate was zero (i.e., 0%). All proposals failed to reach the required 66.7% threshold.
Here are the proposals:
- Article 28: Allow dual citizenship rights with extensive limitations for dual citizens
- Article 45: Reduction of the senatorial term from nine to seven years
- Article 47: Reduction of the presidential term from six to five years
- Article 48: Reduction of the Representatives’ term from six to five years
- Article 83[a]: Change the date of the general elections from the second Tuesday in October to the second Tuesday in November to avoid the rainy season
- Article 83[c]: Extend the time the National Elections Commission (NEC) must complete the investigation of complaints from thirty to fifty days
Liberian Voters’ Penchant for Reducing Their Options to Either A or B (Binary)
Liberia has had at least three election cycles, from which we can deduce that, quite to their detriment, they have had a multiplicity of choices presented to them but have always interpreted their options as binary. This was how the 1997 election was presented as a choice between [only] Charles Taylor (A) or Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (B), even though there were at least a dozen other very good candidates. Regarding the 2005 and 2011 elections, there were again no less than a dozen very good candidates, but the electorate billed the choices as a contest [only] between Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf (A) and George Weah (B). One would have thought that in 2017 & 2023, Liberia would have had enough of disasters. But no. They again billed the election as a binary choice between disaster number 1 (UP of Joseph Nyumah Boakai) and disaster number 2 (CDC of George Weah). It is worth noting that the 2023 election did have some fresh faces and persons of national and global repute. But sadly, Liberians see things only in binary mode – it must be [A] or [B], Yes or No, Ying or Yang – and nothing else. So again, whereas in 2017, they abandoned disaster number 1 (UP) for disaster number 2 (CDC), in 2023, they decided they liked disaster number 1 (UP) better than disaster number 2 (CDC); even though there were other options on the ballot was worth considering. Of course, the second coming of Joseph Nyumah Boakai and the Unity Party has not disappointed. It’s been a roller coaster ride of constitutional violations, statutory violations, regulatory violations, and industrial-scale corruption scandals occurring weekly – led by none other than President Joseph Nyumah Boakai himself. The sheer incompetence of UP 2.0 is enough to make Mr. George Weah and his CDC regime look like pros. Liberians are getting a complete dose of the disaster they said they wanted.
We Want a Liberia Project, not a “Weah Project” or a “Boakai Project”
After back-to-back failures of constitutional amendment attempts, it would be foolhardy to attempt to change the Constitution by another amendment. So, when people talk about changing the Constitution via another amendment, I ask myself: what are they thinking? You will have to put only two options before our voting populace – to stand any chance of succeeding. As I have ably narrated, anything beyond two propositions runs the risk of being ignored or rejected (collectively). The George Weah/CDC and the Johnson-Sirleaf/Unity Party amendment fiascos are contemporary examples of the reality. In fact, Mr. Weah and the CDC even sowed the seed of this rejection by treating the amendment process as a sort of “Weah Project”. If we go the same route (i.e., amendment), and given Mr. Boakai’s penchant for copying all Mr. Weah’s transgressions, I have no doubt in my mind that Mr. Boakai will, similarly, treat any amendment attempt as a sort of “Boakai Project”, thereby elevating the risk of rejection. But if we, the citizens, approach this as a “Redesign Liberia” project, then, of course, our chances of success shall be greatly enhanced.
The fact remains that there are so many things to change about the 1986 Constitution that, if any articles of amendments are to be drawn up, it will, definitely, be about two dozen changes. Given the history of amendments and voting attitudes, any vote with more than two articles of amendments is very likely to fail, as shown by the history of amendment proposals (2011 & 2020). To me, it’s clear-cut – looking at history – it would be futile to attempt our constitutional change via an amendment. It’s not worth repeating such a dismal history!
The Merits of Rewriting the Constitution.
I reemphasize that Liberia will need at least two dozen changes to its current constitution – to solve all the limitations that we have observed. As we have learned in this article, Liberian voters only have space to consider [options] A or B, Yes or No. So, from a purely strategic point of view, our chances of success are much better if we rewrite and present the choice as a YES or NO option to the voters. If we take this route, Liberians will only have to vote YES or NO, just the kind of ballot they prefer. If they want any of the proposed changes, they must vote “Yes”; if not, they must vote “No”. In my opinion, we stand a much better chance of success by presenting a Yes-or-No ballot than by presenting ten or twelve amendment articles. Moreover, there are many structural issues with the current Liberian constitution that must be addressed – and which cannot be done via just tinkering. This is a chance to rethink and redesign. It is an opportunity to do the kind of rethinking that our forefathers declined to do since 1847. Certainly, the scale of the changes being proposed can never be done with just a singular change. It can only be achieved by rewriting the Constitution. That’s why, in my view, if we seriously want fundamental changes to the way our country is being managed, then the only logical option is to rewrite the Constitution.
I do agree rewriting is more challenging than amendments. But the stakes are so high that I believe this is a once-in-a-century opportunity to “Redesign Liberia” for effective governance and economic prosperity. I would rather we take the most comprehensive and, howbeit, arduous path. As I stated earlier in this article; Liberia’s past has been wasted; the present is being pillaged. And its short-term future has been mortgaged to the current cadre of cruel and wicked politicians. We only have the medium- and long-term future to salvage. We have seen enough already to conclude that our current group of political leaders will never deliver the Liberia that we all want – a prosperous nation where accountability is the rule and impunity is not tolerated. It’s up to us to demand the change we want. It is up to us to lead the charge to “Redesign Liberia”. To save the state, I propose that we rewrite our Constitution. We must save the state – if not for ourselves, at least for the sake of our children and for the next generation(s).
About the Author
Wonderr K. Freeman is a Liberian Investment Attorney, Political Economist, Accountant, and Certified Financial Crimes Specialist (CFCS) currently based in Minneapolis, USA. Mr. Freeman’s professional interests span the intersection of law and economics, including the political economy of development, economic justice, international trade/investment law, and financial crimes law. He can be reached at [email protected]. He blogs at https://wonderrfreeman.com
