Liberia is a tough place. The homeland of indicted warlord Charles Taylor is even tougher to govern. This West African country of 3.8 million inhabitants, founded by freed American slaves in 1822, is only now rebounding from a devastating 14-year civil war that decimated 250 000 of its citizens.

Today, the country endowed with vast deposits of diamonds – often a source of conflict rather than a blessing – resembles a construction site of gigantic proportions.

Much of this reconstruction can be credited to a turnaround in the country’s political fortunes.

The guns have long been silenced; now graders and cranes work the fields where military tanks and warlords once roamed.

But not until Ellen Johnson Sirleaf assumed the reins of power on 16 January 2006 – becoming Africa’s first female president – did this picture begin to emerge. Slowly, Liberia is showing some semblance of normalcy.

Prior to that, it was the epitome of a failed African state, which offered little, if any, civil services to its citizens. On paper, the country’s challenges looked insurmountable.

It was a nation on the precipice of complete collapse as characterised by:

• A crippling external debt amounting to $3.7 billion;
• Lack of functioning public facilities such as electricity, water and basic sanitation
  or healthcare;
• Lack of roads and bridges to open up markets;
• A dysfunctional educational system bereft of qualified teachers and resources to renovate school buildings;
• Absence of an effectively functioning judiciary;
• A debilitating brain drain, as essential skills had fled the country en masse; and
• The burden of resettling 314 000 internally displaced persons and 340 000 refugees.

Only a brave (or demented, dare you say) man – in this case, a woman – could wade into a mess of such magnitude in broad daylight. Johnson Sirleaf did, when she entered the Liberian presidential race in 2005, subsequently winning a run-off against retired international soccer star, George Weah. She garnered 59% of that vote.

The making of Africa’s Iron Lady

Today’s Liberia is a distant memory from its past: According to the United Nations, electricity has been restored to most parts of the country, roads have been repaired, the UN has lifted sanctions on Liberia’s lucrative diamonds and timber sectors, the International Monetary Fund supported cancellation of the country’s $4.9-billion debt and increased the size of its budget from $80 million in 2005 to $350m in May 2010.

Importantly, the country is back in the community of nations – thanks to Madame President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

Born on 29 October 1938 in Monrovia, the divorced mother of four and granny of six (presently) has overcome many obstacles, the kind of tribulations that toughened her for the responsibilities she ably shoulders today.

Denied the luxury of a proper childhood, she married James Sirleaf at the age of 17 before studying Accounts and Economics at the College of West Africa from 1948 to 1955. A quest for further education led to the United States in 1961, where she obtained a degree at the University of Colorado.

After a stint at Harvard University, armed with qualifications in Economics and a master’s degree in Public Administration, Johnson Sirleaf headed straight back home to join President William Tolbert’s government.

She was appointed Liberia’s Finance minister from 1972 to 1973, but fell out of favour following disagreements over public spending and she left the government. In retrospect, this decision ranks as the most important she has ever made because not in her wildest dreams could she have imagined the fate that befell her Cabinet colleagues seven years later.

Turbulent times

On 12 April 1980, a rugged youthful soldier, Master Sergeant Samuel Kanyon Doe, seized power in a bloody coup. President Tolbert and most of his ministers were executed by flying squad, under the glare of live television cameras.

History was to repeat itself as Doe suffered the same fate, if not worse, 10 years later when the forces of rebel leader Prince Yormie Johnson captured and tortured him to death in the most gruesome fashion. And it was captured on video – available to this day.

In the aftermath of her lucky escape, Johnson Sirleaf fled to Kenya, taking up a position with Citibank in Nairobi as director. She holed up there from 1983 to 1985, before hitting the road again back to Monrovia.

Bravery has always been a hallmark of her entire political career, a quality that dared her to bash heads with some of Liberia’s most dangerous political thugs masquerading as rebel leaders. Notwithstanding the lawlessness of the country then, she campaigned against President Doe in the 1985 elections, a feat that earned her a 10-year jail sentence.

However, after serving a brief term of her incarceration, Johnson Sirleaf was released into exile, only to return to Monrovia in 1997 to contest elections against Taylor, which she lost miserably – managing 10% of the vote against the incumbent’s 75.3%, from a field of 14 candidates.

Later, she was to pay the ultimate political price for such intransigency. She was charged with treason for her brave challenge against strongman, Taylor.

In a country that spawned warlords faster than one could count to 100, Johnson Sirleaf’s actions could be likened to those of a demented person. But her steely resolve never deserted her.

In 2005, she contested the presidency yet again, beating retired international soccer star Weah in a run-off.

On 16 January 2006, in the presence of former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and former first lady Laura Bush, Johnson Sirleaf was inaugurated Liberian president, making history as Africa’s first female head of state.

“I am excited by the potential of what I represent – the aspirations and expectations of women in Liberia, African women and women all over the world,” she said on inauguration day.

Asked by TIME magazine what it meant to be the first woman elected to head an African country, Johnson Sirleaf replied: “It means I have a great responsibility to meet the expectations of Liberian and African women.”

Not infallible

Politics being what it is, however, cracks have begun to show in her amour lately: She has been accused of developing a soft underbelly toward corruption – Liberia’s number-one nemesis. Allegations have surfaced that despite earlier promises of a ‘zero-tolerance’ approach against this scourge, she has not shown a firm hand in dealing with those implicated in wrongdoing.

“The agenda before the legislature is so large that I needed to calculate where I put my weight. I have to cut my losses,” Johnson Sirleaf confessed to Foreign Policy magazine.

In so doing, she has detoured from a broader reform agenda, lest a legislative rebellion were waged against her, were she to muscle through a good number of anti-corruption laws too early in her presidency.

In addition, Johnson Sirleaf has reneged on her word by declaring an intention to stand for a second six-year term, precisely because she wants to finish the job of cleaning up the government.

However, critics view this as yet another attempt by a power-hungry African head of state to cling onto power. This, despite her ambitions being within the letter of Liberia’s constitution, unlike her peers who have actually amended their constitution to run for a third or indefinite term.

In spite of this blemish on her otherwise impeccable record, it is generally accepted that Johnson Sirleaf is the best president Liberia has ever had.

Liberia, one of only two African countries – the other is Ethiopia – not to have been colonised by European settlers during the infamous Scramble for Africa, was the first independent republic in Africa, having been founded in 1822.

For Johnson Sirleaf, the journey to the top has been a lesson in endurance. Born to a poor family, this former World Bank economist, assistant Secretary-General of the UN, who waited tables to finance her studies while in the US, symbolises the resolve of many of this continent’s poor women who toil under the scorching African sun to feed and send their children to school.

“When I was a small girl in the countryside, swimming and fishing with twine made from palm trees, no one would have picked me out as the future president of our country,” she told the US Congress on 16 March 2006.

It is these humble roots that make Johnson Sirleaf’s affinity with African women unshaken, hence her determination to use her presidency as a benchmark for women to aspire to loftier heights.

“The women of Liberia and the women of Africa, some in the marketplace and others at higher levels of government, have already shared their trust and their confidence in my ability to succeed, and ensure that doors of competitive politics and professionalism will be opened even wider for them,” she told the US Congress.

“I will succeed, I will not betray their trust. I will make them proud – I will make you proud – of the difference which one woman with abiding faith in God can do.”

If Johnson Sirleaf were to be judged solely on her first term, the verdict would overwhelmingly be in her favour. She has hauled Liberia by the bootstraps of its warlords back into the 21st century.

But the road ahead is the ultimate test.

David Mwanambuyu

Sources: United Nations

“Foreign Policy” magazine