Due to fear of the December 30 protest announced by the Council of Protests, a grouping of opposition political p[arty members, and the threat of a counter protest by the Youth League of the ruling Coalition for Democratic Change, the capital city of Monrovia was on Monday locked down with few government officials and private business people venturing on the streets.
The Council of Patriots had planned to stage a protest on Monday, December 30 to, according to reports, request the president to step down due to the dismal state in which the country’s economy has been plunged since the ascension to power of the Coalition for Democratic Change Government headed by former soccer legend George Manneh Weah.
Since the Weah-led government assumed power, the economy has slumped to dismal proportions, resulting to government’s inability to pay civil servants and other government employees’ salaries and meet other obligations on schedule. There has also been a shortage of Liberian dollar banknotes on the market since it was reported that 16 billion Liberian dollars went missing upon the ascension to power of the current government, despite the denial of this claim by government.
This has made it difficult for commercial banks to meet their customers’ demands. In recent times, commercial banks pay only two thousand Liberian dollars to their customers who go to withdraw from their Liberian dollar accounts, no matter the amount deposited in their accounts.
Many annual savings clubs that deposited money contributed by their members in banks could not pay their members at the end of the year due to the shortage of Liberian dollars banknotes.
This has also resulted to a hike in the prices of local commodities by more than one hundred percent, while the exchange rate of the United States dollar against the Liberian dollar has dropped significantly.
The rate of one United States dollar against the Liberian dollar which used to be 220 Liberian dollars is now exchanged for 184 Liberian dollars. This has also affected the expenditure capacity of government employees who earn 80 percent of their monthly salaries in United States dollars.
The cancellation of the December protest was prompted by the intervention of the United Nations and ECOWAS which played a major role in ending the 14 years civil conflict that rocked the country
from December 1989 to 2003. The Embassies of European Union countries accredited to Liberia also intervened to abort the December 30 protest.
Following a meeting of the Council of Patriots, Government of Liberia and representatives of the United Nations, ECOWAS, and European Union countries in Liberia, an agreement was reached to call off the December 30 protest. The diplomatic missions agreed to reschedule the protest for Sunday, January 5, 2020, but the Council of Patriots has resolved to stage the protest on Monday, January 6, 2020.. They argued that Sunday, January 5 is the first Sunday of the month of January
2020, which is a very important Sunday for Christians.
Due to the cancellation of the December 30 protest at the last hour, the streets of Monrovia were on Monday empty, with many stores closed. Many street corners were inundated with armed police who had been deployed to put the protesters to check. The famous Waterside Market in central Monrovia was also virtually empty with many marketers abandoning their tables for fear of insecurity.
TSS/abj/APA