LIBERIA: TRC BRINGS SOME RECONCILIATION TO COUNTIES

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 MONROVIA 000248 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS STATE DRL FOR SHARON COOKE. E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PHUM PGOV EAID ECON PREL LI SUBJECT: LIBERIA: TRC BRINGS SOME RECONCILIATION TO COUNTIES REF: MONROVIA 30 ¶1. (SBU) SUMMARY: The GOL Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) recently concluded one-week public hearings in five of Liberia's fifteen counties, and will head out again to the remaining counties after a two-week break. The hearings were positively received and the traditional leaders of each county organized reconciliation and forgiveness ceremonies for local citizens to coincide with the TRC's visit, which contributed to concrete healing in many cases. The rugged five-week trip has taken its toll on the Commissioners, however, causing tensions to run high between them at times, although reports of physical fighting are unfounded. The DRL-funded project implemented by Benetech to statistically analyze witness testimony appears to be going well. The TRC intends to hire more staff in order to code and data-enter witness statements more quickly, with the goal of including all 20,000 statements in the analysis for its final report due in December. END SUMMARY. TRC "ROAD SHOW" HITS FIVE COUNTIES ¶2. (SBU) The TRC Commissioners have conducted one-week public hearings entitled "Confronting Our Difficult Past for a Better Future" in Maryland, Grand Kru, River Gee, Grand Gedeh, and Sinoe counties. The Commissioners' schedule has been hectic, as they have essentially worked over twelve hours per day, every day for five weeks, in very rustic conditions. TRC psycho-social teams have followed them to provide counseling to any Liberian citizen wishing to discuss traumatic experiences during the war. Press coverage has been extensive, and of fairly high quality; a recent report by the Press Union of Liberia was basically positive. HEARINGS HAVING SUPRISINGLY POSITIVE IMPACT ¶3. (SBU) The response of people in the Southeast was overwhelmingly positive and exceeded TRC expectations. In many counties, large audiences packed the venues. Often more witnesses came forward to tell their stories than the Commissioners had time to hear. Local citizens walked miles from their villages to the county capitals to participate and then reported back to their neighbors the events of the visit. ¶4. (SBU) For rural Liberians -- especially those who are illiterate and don't understand English -- their county's one week TRC visit constituted the whole TRC process. For many, this one week visit was enough to let them turn the page and move on. Others are benefiting from the TRC's psycho-social teams that are in the counties to help anyone who needs their care. LOCAL CEREMONIES HAVE LEAD TO CONCRETE HEALING ¶5. (SBU) Traditional leaders organized forgiveness and reconciliation ceremonies in each county during the TRC's visit. Though the ceremonies were not officially part of the TRC's program, they complemented the TRC's goals and had a profound effect on many of the local citizens. In at least some cases, the ceremonies provided real healing, and gave communities the impetus to move beyond the past. In River Gee County, for example, a man named Washington Moore served in the National Patriotic Front of Liberia during the war and forcibly took four men who refused to fight away from their families to go to war for Taylor, despite pleadings from their wives. All four men were ultimately killed under unknown circumstances, and Moore has been a pariah in his village ever since. A special traditional ceremony was organized during which Moore apologized to the women, they forgave him, and all the villagers pledged to accept Moore again. Now the women are providing food and helping him to reintegrate into society. ¶6. (SBU) However, Moore's reconciliation ceremony created tension among the tired TRC Commissioners, as the ceremony was announced at the last minute and was planned in a village that was an eight-hour drive and a two-hour canoe trip in the opposite direction from their next assignment. The Commissioners held a heated three-hour closed-door argument to decide whether to attend. The press alleged that Commissioners Massa Washington and Pearl Brown Bull got into a physical fight during that meeting. Ultimately, four Commissioners attended the ceremony for Moore. ¶7. In a meeting with PolOff the following week, the commissioners acknowledged that tensions were high between them due to the stress of the trip but denied any sort of physical violence. Washington and Brown Bull were friendly and joking with each other. The Commissioners decided they MONROVIA 00000248 002 OF 002 needed a two week break in Monrovia (after five weeks on the road) to allow rural officials to conduct the census and TRC staff to reconnect with their families. DRL-FUNDED CODING AND DATA-ENTRY NEEDS MORE STAFF ¶8. (SBU) The DRL-funded project to statistically analyze witness testimony appears to be going well. Implementer Benetech's manager for Liberia Kristen Cibelli moved to Monrovia from California to oversee the TRC employees' coding and data-entry of the statements. Of the approximately 20,000 statements collected thus far, the crew has coded 7,000 and data-entered 3,000. Cibelli said Benetech will run a preliminary analysis of the data they have captured in June to help the TRC plan for its thematic hearings this summer. She is confident that the sample at that point will be statistically significant and lead to meaningful conclusions. The GOL feels, however, that it is politically essential for every statement submitted to be included in the TRC's final report due in December. TRC Chairman Jerome Verdier told PolOff that the Liberian people had opened their hearts in good faith to give their statements and that "no one should be excluded from history." ¶9. (SBU) While Verdier would liked to have had all the statements coded by the June hearings, the TRC does not currently employ enough coders and data-enterers to achieve that goal. (Benetech is barred contractually from paying local staff.) A $1 million Swedish grant included some funds to hire between six and ten new staff members. These new employees mean that the TRC could realistically finish all coding and data-entering in time to draw conclusions for the December report. Verdier has vowed to push the report back to January or later if necessary to make sure every statement is included. Meanwhile, the TRC will look for other funding options to speed up the statement coding and data-entry process. ¶10. Post notes that the TRC has launched a website, including press releases, videos, and photos of the hearings, at www.trcofliberia.org. The site also allows Liberians to submit formal statements to the TRC online. COMMENT ¶11. (SBU) Donors continue to be worried that the TRC will be under political influence when it has to decide whether to recommend prosecutions and restitution payments concerning individuals in its final report. It is clear, however, that the TRC's visits to counties affected by the war have already had a very positive impact for the people living there. The county public hearings, psychological counseling sessions, and the traditional reconciliation ceremonies have been vehicles for a veritable healing process at the local level, making the effort successful even if the Commissioners never quite get the "major-league warlords" to testify. Media coverage of the hearings in the counties, like earlier coverage of proceedings in Monrovia, has been extensive and generally factual. Overall, the public response has been calm, and the TRC seems to be providing a valuable outlet for Liberians while helping build a common story/history of the war years. BOOTH