EDITORIAL: Liberia’s Win of Permanent UN Security Council Seat is National Pride; Let’s All Support It!
IN THE DAYS of old, in traditional Liberia, when a war entered a town or region, even the old woman confined to a hammock in the village unable to join the fight would call a youth or two, passed on a leaf or concoction, and would invoke blessings of protection and warring spirit upon them. All the villagers would brace themselves for defense and/or aggression, summon their best militant prodigy, forgetting petit quarrels and animosities simmering amongst them. That’s communalism.
IN CONTEMPORARY TIMES, like with America’s 9/11, or Israel’s 8/07, the nation would rise up against the common enemy, shrugged or downplay the spirit of partisanship and other simmering cleavages of the day, put on their best armors and settle scores as crudely as possible. That’s nationalism.
THERE ARE TIMES in the life of a people, a nation, that every citizen is moved naturally and automatically to a common cause, without the slightest hesitation, joining forces without remembering any internal wrangles and hiccups, and put up everything emotionally into upholding a shared cause – towards protecting the common pride. That’s patriotism.
AS LIBERIA LAUNCHES its campaign to grab a seat at the High Table of the United Nation – that revered Non-Permanent Seat of the UN Security Council – it is dawn upon all Liberians to demonstrate and prove their spirit of communalism, patriotism and nationalism – a spirit that one feels in their soul when what is deeply loved and cherished is won or come under attack.
THE POLITICAL, ETHNIC and regional differences, hate and squabbles that are regular ingredients characterizing our domestic politics and powerplay have no place in such times and circumstances when a common pride or a potentially cherished legacy is at stake. That same spirit which, for instance, causes a heartfelt embracement of staunched political foes – when Barcelona FC wins a trophy because both are cheerers of the team – is exactly what we are referencing here. Or when two political archrivals, who are sons or daughters of Nimba County, for instance, happily celebrate together, drinking from the same table, because they won a football or kickball match is exactly what we are talking about.
WITH THIS SAME spirit, we are sure and certain that all Liberians – Upists, CDCians, LPists, ANCians, apolitical citizens – can forego their differences, close ranks and go for the UNSC seat. And with determination, unity and common purpose, leveraging our skills and acumen in diplomacy and lobby, whispering our prayers and moral support, Liberia will not fail. With this, we can, and will, win.
OUR COUNTRY WAS once a leading international actor, a founding signatory to all iconic world organizations, international protocols and conventions. We were a widely respected stakeholder on the world stage. Sadly, for 14 long years, we lost this prized prestige to an internecine civil conflict, drifted into being a problem child, suffered state collapse, and today, here we are finding our rightful seat in the comity of nations. Grabbing this seat, exerting ourselves more visibly, is more than announcing our comeback to the world stage; it is a telling of our resilience as a people, a message to all and sundry that the Lone Star of Africa, which crusaded for the enlightenment of “Dark Continent” with the torch of freedom and liberty, a beacon of all oppressed people around the world, is once again well and kicking.
IT GOES WITHOUT saying, therefore, that the win of the Non-Permanent UNSC Seat, which campaign is launched today, Monday, February 10, is not a Unity Party win. It is not a Boakai win. And any UPist or Boakaist or opposition element feels this way, it is folly. The history that will be made promises a valued legacy that is not partisan, but Liberian. That is when that history shall have been read, it would be that Liberia, for the second time, sat on the revered seat at the High Table of the United Nation’s Security Council. And, in fact, as Ambassador Lewis G. Brown, put it, the symbol that will be pinned on the seat at the Security Council will the Liberian flag.
FELLOW LIBERIANS – SONS and daughters of the Grains Coast – lets come out of our partisan and apathetic closets, put on our fighting spirit, join hands and go for it – together.