By Wonderr K. Freeman On April 24, 2024, The Supreme Court of Liberia ruled that article 56 of the Liberian constitution is no greater than article 89. The Court, in their wisdom, opined that just as article 56 gives the President the power to appoint [officials], article 89 equally gives the Legislature the power to create additional agencies of government and ascribe unto them powers in
Find related articles here
by Wonderr K. Freeman & Marc N. Kollie Over the past years, as regime in Liberia shuffled between Unity Party (UP) and the Congress for Democratic Change (CDC), the country has long been rocked by many corruption scandals – often flagrant and unconscionable. So many corruption cases, but very few cases of accountability[1]. In many cases (and on a sad note too), the culprits have been
Find related articles here
Back to the “Imperial Presidency”: Unity Party’s Unsavory Assault on Ellen Sirleaf’s Defining Legacy
By: Wonderr K. Freeman, Attorney, CFCS In Africa, it is common practice to see a leader purposely trying to undo the legacy of his/her predecessor. Often, that happens when an opposition leader takes the helm of power. If anything spells the legacy of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf’s presidency, it is the plethora of government institutions whose officials were given fixed contractual terms (a.k.a. tenure). This was one of
Find related articles here
Authors: Wonderr K. Freeman & Marc N. Kollie This series tackles the delicate subject of the failure of law enforcement and public prosecution in Liberia, which explains why the US government (USgov), lately, seems to prefer targeted sanctions (much to the liking of the public). Whereas, in part one, we focused on law enforcement, in this part two of the series, we focus on the failure
Find related articles here
Authors: Wonderr K. Freeman & Marc N. Kollie News of additional sanctions by the United States government (USgov) on Liberian public officials have been greeted with the usual glee (i.e., opposition supporters), and scorn (i.e., by ruling party stalwarts). Liberians have a love-hate affair with corrupt politicians. They love to vote for corrupt politicians in a transactional voting system, and then when they do not get
Find related articles here
Wonderr K. Freeman, CFCS, Attorney Fighting corruption is clearly a legal matter. In Liberia, unfortunately, there is a long history of ruling elites “playing politics” with the fight against corruption. In Liberia, the appearance of fighting corruption is far more important than actually fighting corruption. If one looks at the way things play out in Liberia, it’s not far-fetched to say that “to appear” to be
Find related articles here