After fourteen years of civil war, hopes are riding on the scarred west African country’s truth and reconciliation commission. But it needs international support, writes Tristan McConnell.
There are stories about Liberia's fourteen years of civil war which no one wants to hear. Like Maher Bridge, where almost 200 people suspected of supporting the wrong armed group, were shot and thrown into the river below. Or the young men, high on drugs, who bet on the sex of an unborn baby before ripping the child from its mother's womb and leaving both to die. Or the children dragged from their schools and forced to become fighters. Or the estimated 70% of the female population who were raped.
These and many other stories like them will be told, and heard, before Liberia's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). While the stories are horrific, it seems there will be no shortage of people wanting to talk. Already, the country's TRC has recorded more than 5,000 testimonies in the three months since statement-taking began.
"People are quite ready to talk about what happened," says Priscilla Hayner, head of the Liberia programme at the International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ). Whether the TRC will be ready to hear the testimonies is another question. "All truth commissions face the challenges of setting-up an organisation in very little time, but this is especially difficult in Liberia, with its severe limitations on infrastructure and resources."
By Tristan McConnell
