in Liberia. After staying at a temporary place for a few days, we moved into a large, well-appointed house within the diplomatic enclave in Sinkor, a residential suburb about eight kilometers from the city center. The country was still under the military rule of Commander-in-Chief Samuel Doe, but the life was generally peaceful and enjoyable.
Liberia was founded in 1822 as the second Permanent Black American Settlement after Freetown in neighboring Sierra Leone. Monrovia, the coastal town where the settlement began and which later became the capital of Liberia, was named after US President James Monroe, who supported the resettlement of emancipated American black Africans in Africa.
In 1847 the settlers proclaimed Liberia as a republic, adopting a constitution. They adopted a national flag with eleven red and white stripes and one white star in the canton, which was very similar to the American flag of the time with thirteen stripes and twenty-eight stars. Liberia is the only republic in the whole of black Africa without a history of colonization.
In 1980 Samuel Doe, a twenty eighty-year-old master sergeant leading a group of young non-commissioned officers, staged a coup against the elected president William Tolbert, killing him and seizing power. His closest ally was Thomas Quiwonkpa, a twenty-six-year-old private who was shortly thereafter appointed as Commanding General of the Liberian National Army while Doe himself assumed the title of General and Commander in Chief. In 1983 Doe and Quiwonkpa fell out and the latter fled the country.
In October 1985, a general election was held and as expected Samuel Doe’s National Democratic Party won a landslide victory paving the way for Doe to establish himself as the elected president.
The 11th of November 1985 was just like any other day for us. After putting the children to sleep and watching the TV for a while, my wife and I retired for the night. From the time our night security guard woke me up next day morning to the sounds of gunfire, our life took a different turn where peace and happiness were replaced by fear, apprehension and horror. We had heard the gruesome stories of looting expatriates’ homes, attacks on persons and even raping during the coup in 1980.
After listening to the radio, we came downstairs and switched on the TV. It was showing the Elwa Radio Station, which the rebels had seized. Sitting on the low veranda in front of the station were the Vice President and several ministers who had been arrested. All of them were stripped to their underpants. The TV also showed the rebels surrounding the Executive Mansion. President Sam Doe was trapped inside his quarters.
The rebel leader Thomas Quiwonkpa hailed from the Gio tribe from Nimba county. Our houseboy was also from the same tribe. He lived in the servant’s quarters within our compound. Having learned from the radio that the rebels belonging to his tribe had seized power, he quickly finished his early morning chores and valiantly walked out of the house to join his jubilant fellow tribesmen. Our security guard, however, stayed back, for he belonged to a tribe that supported Samuel Doe and therefore feared for his life.
I telephoned the Swiss ambassador, who was our immediate neighbor and expressed my fears of the possibility of raids by soldiers or hooligan civilians. I sought his help to move to a safe place. All he could do to assist me was to welcome me and my family into his house, if we could make it. I also realized that in the circumstances prevailing in the country, no one was in a position to help anyone else. His house was behind our house. It was not safe for us to leave our house, walk to the left and then take two more left turns to reach the ambassador’s front gate. The only possibility was to climb the wall dividing our compounds and jump into his compound and that was what we did when we felt that we were in danger.
The TV was showing scenes of jubilation on the streets as the civilian crowd mingled with rebel soldiers were dancing and singing. Some rebels were shooting into the sky for fun. Some were carrying bottles of beer and most of them appeared inebriated. Intermittent radio announcements were heard declaring the success of the rebels and it only remained to capture Samuel Doe from the Executive Mansion. The rebels had surrounded the Mansion, but they seemed in no hurry to enter and capture President Doe, who had apparently no avenue of escape.
By this time, our telephone line had gone dead. At about 9:00 a.m., we saw a dozen or so soldiers carrying guns coming from Tubman Avenue and shooting helter-skelter. They entered our enclave. Since we were the only expatriates living in that area apart from the heads of various diplomatic missions, we concluded that the group must be targeting our house. We quickly gathered our passports, exited through the back door and proceeded to climb the compound wall. I, my wife and our two sons climbed the wall and jumped into the compound of the Swiss ambassador’s residence. Our security guard also accompanied us trembling with fear.
We strained our ears for any noise coming from our house. There was no sound from our house though we were fearing it being broken into by the group of soldiers who had been seen advancing towards our lane a few minutes before. We also noticed that the sound of gunshots was gradually receding. We sent our guard back to find out the position. He climbed the wall and jumped into our compound. After a few minutes, he returned and reported to us that the soldiers were looting the house of the Vice President and that our house was safe. With a sigh of relief, but still very fearful, we returned to our house. We saw the soldiers carrying TV sets, radios, beds and other household goods which they had looted from the Vice President’s house. We remained on high alert.
By about 1.30 p.m., the radio started singing a different tune. President Samuel Doe came on the radio and announced in a ‘special statement’ broadcast on the Monrovia Radio Station:
“I take this opportunity to inform the nation that the coup has failed''.
The radio station had been taken over by rebel forces 13 hours earlier, but was recaptured by the government troop.
''I am still the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces of Liberia and Head of State,'' he said.
A spokesperson for Doe’s government further stated that government forces had repelled the rebels and taken back all the public installations, the rebels had occupied in the morning. Many rebels had been shot dead. The rebel leader, Thomas Quiwonkpa, was in hiding and the army was in hot pursuit of him. They were confident of capturing him. A twenty-four-hour curfew was imposed. Our houseboy who had left our house to participate in the jubilation of the success of his fellow tribesmen returned like a wet cat and promptly hid in his quarters. He knew that if the army found him, being a Gio tribesman, as the rebel leader was, he would be killed. I feared that we also could land in trouble for sheltering an enemy if he was found in our compound, but hoped that no one had noticed him.
Later, we learned how the table had turned in favor of Samuel Doe. Apparently, the rebels became over-confident and started their victory celebration a little too soon. They became careless. Samuel Doe, who was isolated in the Executive Mansion, quietly mobilized an army unit from the Robertsfield army barracks, some eighteen kilometers from the city. The unit overran the motley rebels, who were totally drunk and shot most of them dead. On the third day, rebel leader Thomas Quiwonkpa was captured and killed.
Quiwonkpa’s body was brought to the Executive Mansion. The body was exhibited in an open area within the Mansion. It was seen being hit and kicked by the soldiers. It was then dismembered and the parts were taken away by the soldiers. One soldier made a necklace with some fingers cut from the body. We watched these scenes on the TV, utterly horrified. My wife fell sick seeing these barbaric and grisly acts.
Then the reprisals started. The members of the Gio and Mono ethnic groups from Nimba County, Quiwonkpa’s homeland, were slaughtered. Quiwonkpa’s village was burned down.
The twenty-four-hour curfew was changed to dusk to dawn after three days with a stern warning from President Doe stating, ‘The situation in this country is very tense—I repeat, if you are caught out one minute after 6 o'clock you will be executed’. Foreign diplomats breaking the curfew
