MONROVIA – Michael Adeboboye places Jewel Howard-Taylor at the center of a larger charge. One cocaine shipment, he argues, produced three standards of justice. She was picked up on August 19 and faced a writ six days later. Others named in the same probe were questioned, not charged. Inspector General Gregory Coleman kept his post. The President’s son, named in a cartel video, was not invited for questioning, critics say. That comparison, more than the Pharaoh imagery, is his argument. Yet the record is contested. The family of Coleman’s accuser has disowned his statement. Joseph Boakai Jr. denies any link. As THE ANALYST reports, according to the editor, Howard-Taylor’s case now doubles as a test of “no sacred cows.”
Former Vice President Jewel Howard-Taylor is carrying the “full hammer” of the US$317 million (L$53.89 billion) cocaine case while the police chief whose men allegedly escorted the drugs and the President’s son named in a cartel video remain untouched, the Editor-in-Chief of CAJ International Magazine, Michael Adeboboye, has charged. In an article titled “Boakai: A Biblical Pharaoh of Liberia,” Adeboboye contended that her arrest “moved at Pharaoh speed” and that the case exposes “the same shipment, same police escort, same cartel video, but three different justices.”
Adeboboye argued that Howard-Taylor “is not on trial alone,” declaring that what is on trial is President Joseph Nyuma Boakai, Sr.’s promise of “No sacred cows.” He wrote that Liberia sees “two sacred cows grazing in palace” — the police chief whose men allegedly escorted cocaine in car RL-141, and the President’s son named by a cartel in a video — while a 62-year-old former Vice President, not in government and not family, “carries full hammer of $317 million case.”
The Woman Who Feels the Hammer
Adeboboye recalled that on July 21, 2026, 3,971 plates, nearly four metric tons of cocaine valued at US$317 million, were seized in Duazon, with a separate US$19.2 million (L$3.26 billion) seizure at Roberts International Airport (RIA). According to the article, Howard-Taylor, who served as Vice President from 2018 to 2024, as Senator for Bong County, and as First Lady from 1997 to 2006, was stopped on August 19, 2026, at RIA while trying to leave and was taken to the headquarters of the Liberia National Police (LNP).
Adeboboye noted that Justice Minister Cllr. N. Oswald Tweh announced charges of unlicensed importation, sale, distribution, illicit trafficking, criminal conspiracy, facilitation, solicitation and money laundering. According to Adeboboye, prosecutors allege Dubai hotel meetings, US$45,000 (L$7.65 million) in cash for shopping, a foundation, Jewel Star Fish, receiving cartel money, and over US$135,000 (L$22.95 million) taken.
He contended that her arrest “moved at Pharaoh speed,” noting that she was picked up on August 19 and the writ was dated August 25, six days later. By contrast, he wrote, others named in the same investigation, Mark Egon Kuiah, Leroy Harris and Jonathan Momolu, were months later cooperating or being questioned, but not charged before a judge.
Adeboboye cited five opposition parties as saying the government is “letting dismissed security officials roam free while it has summarily and arbitrarily charged, imprisoned and disgraced a Former Vice President” without indictment after more than a month. He noted that her lawyers describe the case as a witch-hunt, and quoted former Ambassador M. B. Kouyateh as saying: “What happened to the former vice president was a witch hunt. If it was not a witch hunt, the government had a channel of contacting this woman to come and clarify. The police car that escorted the drugs from one end to another was never investigated.”
The article further stated that Howard-Taylor, 62 and asthmatic, lost her only son, Philip Taylor IV, on January 20, 2026, at JFK Medical Center, and that the state raided her Congo Town home and seized his two personal laptops. “Nothing in public record ties Philip to drug investigation,” Adeboboye wrote.
Adeboboye set her treatment directly against that of the President’s son. “For Jewel, a WhatsApp voice note dated Aug 31, 2026 asking for money became basis for non-bailable trafficking indictment. For Jojo, cartel video calling him family is treated as social media noise,” he wrote, concluding: “One standard for opposition woman not family. Another for president’s son.”
IG Coleman Remains Police Chief
Turning to the question of who ordered police to escort the drugs, Adeboboye cited a statement attributed to detained former Highway Patrol Chief Wadell Kwarbo at Monrovia Central Prison: “Police IG Gregory Coleman ordered me to escort the van. He instructed me to escort the drugs with my patrol vehicle (RL-141). And I acted on his order. Let them get my call log. My call log can be subpoenaed through the Court. Let them release my written statement also. Why are they keeping it? They have it.”
Adeboboye acknowledged that Kwarbo’s family later said they “categorically dissociate” him from that statement, and that neither the family nor his lawyers authorized it. He also noted that Inspector General of Police Gregory Coleman calls it a four-month disinformation campaign.
According to the article, what is undisputed is that police vehicles were used, as Coleman himself disclosed that security officers facilitated the movement, that one police vehicle led the shipment and another followed. Highway Patrol Chief Kwarbo and Major Crimes Chief Anthony Blaye were charged and detained, Adeboboye noted.
On what happened to Coleman, Adeboboye recalled that on July 25, 2026, the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) “strongly refuted allegations implicating the Inspector General.” The Ministry said its investigation found that an individual did deliver money to a member of the LNP, but that the officer acted entirely on his own, with “no evidence whatsoever indicating the Inspector General received, authorized, directed, or possessed prior knowledge.”
“Result: foot soldier in prison. Alleged order-giver gives press briefings and leads investigation into shipment his own men escorted,” Adeboboye wrote. He noted that human rights lawyer Cllr. Tiawan Saye Gongloe and Alternative National Congress (ANC) leader Alexander Cummings have called for Coleman to recuse himself or resign, and that Coleman, who has said “big hands and big shots” were involved, remains the investigator of his own alleged case.
President’s Son Named, Not Questioned
Adeboboye wrote that the matter reaches “even closer to throne,” to the President’s son, Joseph Boakai Jr., known as Jojo. He stated that in late July 2026, a video circulated in which individuals claiming to be a Colombian cartel accused Boakai Jr. of ties, displaying his WhatsApp picture, phone number and messages. In a second video, according to the article, two armed men holding samples of Liberia’s largest seizure addressed the President’s son by name, called him family, and threatened him for going silent.
The Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) alleged that Boakai Jr., publicly named in the cartel video, remains free from accountability, Adeboboye noted. He reported that on July 30, Boakai Jr. denied the allegations, stating: “I have never participated in discussions involving narcotics trafficking… I have never used my relationship to the Presidency to shield anyone.” Boakai Jr. said he had remained removed from government since early 2024 and that his relationship with the President is family, not constitutional authority, while government officials also rejected the link.
However, Adeboboye cited Senator Samuel Kogar, who at CEIO on August 26 accused the administration of shielding individuals allegedly linked to the drug crisis while pursuing former government officials. Kogar alleged that individuals associated with the current administration, including the President’s son, have been publicly mentioned but not invited for questioning, according to the article.
Adeboboye added that Senator Chea warned that investigations are directed primarily at former CDC officials while allegations involving the current administration receive less scrutiny, and called for clarity on whether the President’s son had been interviewed. “Verification: Video circulated. Denial issued. No public record of arrest, invitation for questioning, independent clearance report,” Adeboboye wrote.
A Pharaoh Who Cannot Feed
Adeboboye framed the case within a broader charge that Boakai governs like a biblical Pharaoh, describing how, in his words, “a Rescue Government Became a Pharaoh — Tormenting the Oppositions.” “Liberia did not vote for a Pharaoh,” he wrote, stating that in January 2024, Liberians voted for rescue from high rice prices, from darkness, from joblessness, and “from the indignity of a country that begs while its soil is rich,” and that Boakai promised to open the storehouses.
According to Adeboboye, 21 months into Boakai’s own five-year plan, “the independent scorecard is brutal, and the method of rule is unmistakably Pharaonic.” He drew the parallel directly: “When Pharaoh could not feed Egypt, he increased the Israelites’ burden. When Boakai cannot deliver bread, he increases the burden on the opposition.”
Adeboboye noted that the Boakai presidency anchored itself on one document, the ARREST Agenda for Inclusive Development (AAID) 2025-2029, built on six pillars — Agriculture, Roads, Rule of Law, Education, Sanitation and Tourism — and 385 interventions. He cited Naymote Partners for Democratic Development, which he described as Liberia’s most respected independent monitor, and its President Meter Report released on October 7, 2026, covering January 2025 to September 2026.
According to the report as cited by Adeboboye, only 12 of the 385 interventions were completed, representing 3.1 percent. He added that 213 interventions (55.3 percent) are ongoing, 57 (14.8 percent) have not started, and 103 (26.8 percent) could not even be rated because the government has not provided enough evidence to judge.
Adeboboye stressed that Naymote was explicit that the 58.4 percent “activation rate” is not completion. “It is activity, not impact,” he wrote.
He also cited Senator Amara Konneh, a former Finance Minister, who summarized Boakai’s 2025 performance as “a year of missed opportunities: Agriculture funding was slashed and repurposed, Liberians remained spectators in their own economy, Monrovia stayed filthy, feeder roads deteriorated, and job creation failed to match the scale of unemployment.” Adeboboye further noted that the roads celebrated last dry season are, this rainy season, as Kouyateh said, “those same roads are deplorable.” “That is Pharaoh promising grain that never reaches the market,” Adeboboye wrote.
Opposition Alleges Political Witch-Hunt
“When you cannot justify the throne, you justify the whip,” Adeboboye wrote, turning to what he called the witch-hunting of the opposition. He recalled that on November 7, 2025, the CDC formally condemned the Unity Party (UP) government for “orchestrating political witch-hunts and diverting public attention from its failures in governance,” recalling what the party called tyrannical tactics historically used to intimidate opponents.
According to the article, CDC Chairman Atty. Janga A. Kowo listed former officials targeted, including Nora Finda Bundoo, John S. Youboty and Thelman Duncan Sawyer, calling the cases “bogus” and the asset recovery system “dysfunctional.” Adeboboye added that on January 10, 2025, the CDC accused Boakai of “clandestine arrests and systematic targeting of political opponents,” naming Eric Susay, James Weah and Andrew Sleh Lawson, who were allegedly detained in undisclosed locations without due process, and warned of an “arrest-to-kill” trend.
The article further recalled that four lawmakers — former Speaker J. Fonati Koffa, Dixon W. Seboe, Abu Kamara and Jacob Debee II — were detained at LNP headquarters from 10 a.m. until late at night over the Capitol fire. The opposition bloc of the ANC, the CDC, the Movement for Economic Empowerment (MOVEE) and the CMC called it a “dangerous and undemocratic abuse of power,” Adeboboye noted.
Tenure Officials Purged, Article Claims
Adeboboye described as “even more systematic” the purge of tenure holders. He claimed that officials with fixed tenures appointed by former President George Manneh Weah were suspended in May 2024 and replaced by UP-aligned individuals, citing the suspension in early 2025 of Emma Metieh Glassco of the National Fisheries and Aquaculture Authority (NaFAA), whom he described as celebrated. He added that Liberia Telecommunications Authority (LTA) Chairperson Edwina Crump Zackpah and all commissioners were forced out via suspension letters, while commissioners of the Independent National Commission on Human Rights (INCHR) and the Governance Commission (GC), whose tenures run to 2027, were told to take “administrative leave.”
Adeboboye noted that the Supreme Court ruled in 2024 that the President cannot remove tenure officials at will, but argued that the Executive ignored the spirit of the ruling, maintaining that “suspension is not removal” — an investigation with no timeline. He quoted an unnamed insider as telling the press: “They are using suspension for alleged corruption as a coverup to employ partisans of the Unity Party. Show us one audit report that led to conviction. Not one.”
The article cited two corruption cases as evidence of a double standard. According to Adeboboye, Arthur Massaquoi and six former BSE officials walked free after Judge Ousman Feika dismissed their indictment on August 31, 2026, because the prosecution failed to bring them to trial in time. In contrast, he noted, former Foreign Minister Dee-Maxwell Kemayah and former Internal Affairs Minister Varney Sirleaf were convicted on October 9 in the Saudi rice diversion case. “One group freed because state failed to act; another convicted,” he wrote.
Adeboboye also pointed to what he called inconsistency “inside Boakai’s own house.” He alleged that Abdullah Kamara, acting chair of the LTA, was implicated in a General Auditing Commission (GAC) audit report but continues in his position without consequence, while female officials — Davidetta Browne Lansanah of the National Elections Commission (NEC), Rustonyn Suacoo Dennis of the National Oil Company of Liberia (NOCAL) and Glassco of NaFAA — were publicly suspended.
When People Refuse Bricks Without Straw
Adeboboye added to Howard-Taylor’s case the 12 of 385 promises completed, roads deplorable after one rainy season, a filthy Monrovia, youth “still zapping,” and opposition lawmakers detained until nightfall. “That is Pharaoh. That is biblical Pharaoh — not builder who stores grain, but tormentor who makes lives bitter with hard bondage when he cannot deliver,” he wrote.
He also cited Representative Musa Bility, who told Boakai in an open letter on May 12, 2026: “Stop shielding those who milked this country and are today wielding power within your Government.” Adeboboye concluded: “Liberia knows how Pharaoh’s story ended. When people refused to make bricks without straw.”