By Dr. Togba-Nah Tipoteh
At 8:43PM on August 29, 2022, Comrade Prof. Dr. Saye Guannu, Liberia’s Renowned Historian passed away but his work shall not pass away. His work remains about the founding of Liberia in the History of Liberia.
His work remains the sharing of the Truth about the people of Liberia who occupy the public space called Liberia. From this Truth, it is known that people of Liberia have been living in this public space called Liberia for centuries before Liberia was founded in 1847, some 175 years ago.
From this Truth, it is known that people came from other parts of the world, like the United States of America (USA) under unbearable and unacceptable slavery, to live in Liberia. From this Truth, it is known that Americo-Liberian Rule and Native Liberian Rule had the same outcome, the outcome of poverty.
The Truth from the knowledge of Prof. Dr. Guannu became most important because working with this Truth is the best way to solve Liberia’s problems. This Truth helps us to solve Liberia’s problems because it is the way to know about Liberia’s problems. Without knowing Liberia’s problems, it is not possible to solve Liberia’s problems.
It is most important for us Liberians to solve the poverty problem because it has become the pretext, the reason, that persons who want to overthrow governments use to carry out coup d’etat and civil war.
The people of Liberia have experienced both the coup d’etat and the civil war and this is why they say that Peace is preferred to War, chanting: We Want Peace! No More War! The Civil War in Liberia was terrible, taking the lives of at least 300,000 people, damaging billions of dollars worth of infrastrastructure and rendered the economy of Liberia unrecovered at its pre-war level.
From this Truth, we learn that the powers that be are not interested in solving the poverty problem because they see themselves as beneficiaries of the poverty problem, through their corrupt practices. Let us remember that the present set of powers that be have declared corruption to be the number one enemy of Liberia.
The powers that be are convinced that their promotion of the poverty generation system of the production of raw materials for export without any prioritization of Value Addition gives them the living standards that they need. But when the living standards needed by the global masters, like the USA government, are not made high enough by the local powers that be, like the Liberian government, then the global masters bring in sanctions against the local powers, sinaling the need for a regime change. Some persons see the passing away of Prof. Dr. Guanuu as a LOSS but it is a GAIN because of the considerable knowledge about Liberia and Liberians that we have from him.
It is with this knowledge that the Movement for Justice in Africa (MOJA) was formed in 1973, some 49 years ago to struggle against he poverty genrerating injustice and bring in the poverty alleviating Justice. Prof, Dr. Guannu became a MOJA Comrade and worked in highly populated Nimba County, his County of origin and all over Liberia to help people learn about themseves to be able to improve their living conditions through the Rule of Law. From the University of Liberia and Cuttington University, he taught many students who learned to work togerther to make Liberia a Better Place for All.
Last, but certainly not the least, Comrade Guannu was my Running Mate when I ran to be President of Liberia. When Reporters from the Media were asking me questions, I would refer them, at times, to Comrade Guannu and some Reporters would be surprised that I referred them to Comrade Guannu. I told the Reporters that I wanted them to see that Comrade Guannu had the record to be a good President in case I became indisposed and he had to replace me.
I told the Reporters that the Vice President must always have a good record to be President whenever the President became indisposed. Comrade Prof. Dr. Saye Guanuu is looking at Liberia now and wondering why the local powers that be have to wait for the sanctions command from the global powers that be before taking any anti-corruption action, especially when Liberia has Liberians who know the History of Liberia. Kazuo ka to-to dia (the Mah, wrongly called Mano, language of Nimba County for Thank you very much for listening).
