Forty-one years ago today, Liberia was plunged into another horrifying chapter of its troubled political history when former Commanding General of the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL), General Thomas Quiwonkpa, launched an armed incursion into the country from neighboring Sierra Leone in an attempt to overthrow the government of Head of State Samuel K. Doe.

What began as an abortive military intervention on November 12, 1985, would unleash a devastating chain of violence, vengeance, ethnic persecution, arbitrary arrests, extrajudicial killings, and widespread destruction whose painful consequences would reverberate across generations of Liberians.

The invasion initially caught the Doe government by surprise. Government officials were arrested, subjected to degrading treatment, stripped naked, brutalized, and detained at the BTC military barracks. However, within hours, forces loyal to President-elect Doe regained control, overpowered the invading forces, and released the detainees.

What followed was an even more horrifying descent into reprisal and collective punishment.
Rather than allowing the rule of law to prevail, government loyalists unleashed a campaign of retaliatory violence against persons suspected of sympathizing with or supporting General Quiwonkpa. Opposition politicians were rounded up and detained, while innocent civilians became targets of indiscriminate reprisals.

Hundreds of people reportedly lost their lives in the ensuing bloodbath. Homes were torched, properties looted, families displaced, and communities subjected to terror. General Quiwonkpa was eventually captured and brutally killed, and his lifeless remains were publicly displayed at the BTC military barracks in a spectacle that symbolized the depths to which political vengeance and human indignity had descended.

Among the casualties was Charles Gbeyon, a distinguished journalist of the Liberia Broadcasting System, whose death further underscored the vulnerability of journalists and independent voices in an environment where political dissent and perceived opposition could attract fatal consequences.

These were not merely isolated incidents of political violence. They represented another manifestation of a deeply entrenched culture of impunity in which political power was repeatedly asserted through the barrel of the gun, human lives were sacrificed on the altar of political ambition, and justice was subordinated to the whims of those wielding state authority.

A NATION TRAPPED IN THE RECURRING CYCLE OF BLOODSHED

The tragedy of November 12, 1985, cannot be understood in isolation from the preceding episodes of political violence that had already scarred the Liberian nation.

On April 14, 1979, President William R. Tolbert's government violently suppressed a mass demonstration in Monrovia against the proposed increase in the price of rice. What should have been an expression of legitimate public grievances ended in a massacre, with more than one hundred people reportedly killed and hundreds injured. The dead were buried in mass graves, while accountability for the killings remained elusive.

Barely one year later, on April 12, 1980, seventeen enlisted members of the Armed Forces of Liberia, under the banner of the People's Redemption Council (PRC), overthrew the Tolbert government. President Tolbert was brutally assassinated, and the country entered another dark period of military authoritarianism, as was the case with the late President E.J. Roye in 1871.

On April 22, 1980, thirteen senior officials of the deposed government were publicly executed at South Beach behind the BTC barracks, where the Unification Park was constructed as a memorial, following proceedings that fell profoundly short of minimum standards of due process and fair trial. Their executions were followed by further persecution, arbitrary detention, and violence against individuals associated with the former administration.

In 1981, another tragic episode unfolded when General Thomas Weh-Syen, then Vice Chairman of the PRC, and other members of the military leadership were accused of plotting against Head of State Samuel Doe. They were arrested and executed. Their alleged supporters and associates subsequently faced persecution and reprisals.

By 1983, the uneasy relationship between Head of State Doe and General Quiwonkpa had deteriorated beyond repair. Following his dismissal as Commanding General of the AFL and the escalating political tensions surrounding his position, Quiwonkpa fled Liberia. Two years later, he returned with an armed group, the National Patriotic Forces, to challenge the Doe government, setting the stage for the November 12 tragedy and its devastating aftermath.

These successive episodes reveal a disturbing historical pattern: one administration gives way to another through violence; those perceived as loyal to the previous order become targets of vengeance; ethnic and political identities become instruments of suspicion; and perpetrators of grave violations frequently escape accountability.

The tragedy is not simply that Liberia experienced repeated bloodshed. It is that successive generations were made to endure violence without the assurance that justice would ever be served. So it was with the 1984 military attack on the University of Liberia by the Doe combatants that saw students, professors, staff, and even marketeers were attacked, killed, raped, maimed, and incapacitated, and neighboring environs  terrorised.

THE PRICE OF IMPUNITY AND THE FAILURE OF HISTORICAL ACCOUNTABILITY

The Office for the Establishment of War and Economic Crimes Court in Liberia (OWECC-L) observes that the events of November 12, 1985, and their aftermath constitute an important part of the historical record of grave violations that must neither be forgotten nor distorted.

The Liberian experience demonstrates that when unlawful killings, torture, political persecution, ethnic reprisals and other serious human rights violations are left unaddressed, the wounds of society do not simply disappear with the passage of time. Instead, they become inherited grievances, intergenerational trauma, unresolved demands for justice and fertile ground for future instability.

The failure to hold perpetrators accountable does not erase the crimes. Neither does the passage of decades extinguish the dignity of victims or diminish the legitimate claims of survivors and affected communities.

Equally important, accountability must never be confused with collective punishment. No ethnic community should bear the guilt of crimes committed by individuals, military formations or political authorities. The responsibility for violations must be established through credible investigations, evidence and fair judicial proceedings.

All Liberians deserve recognition as citizens whose rights, dignity and security are equally protected by the State. The same principle applies to every Liberian community that has suffered persecution, violence or historical marginalization.

WHY THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE WAR AND ECONOMIC CRIMES COURT MATTERS

It is against this painful historical background that the establishment of the War and Economic Crimes Court for Liberia assumes profound national significance. The Court is not intended to reopen old wounds for political convenience, settle ethnic scores, or provide an avenue for revenge. In fact, there are no old wounds in the first place. Its fundamental purpose is to advance justice, establish accountability for grave violations, recognize victims, preserve historical truth, and strengthen the foundations of a peaceful and democratic society.

For too long, Liberia's history has been punctuated by atrocities whose victims have waited in vain for justice. Mothers have buried children without knowing whether those responsible would ever answer for their actions. Families have lived with unanswered questions about missing relatives. Survivors have carried the physical, psychological and emotional scars of violence, while perpetrators have often enjoyed the privileges of political protection and impunity. This must not remain Liberia's inheritance.

OWECC-L therefore reaffirms its commitment to the historical documentation, preservation and protection of evidence relating to Liberia's conflicts and the serious violations committed during the country's troubled past.

The preservation of historical records, testimonies, photographs, audiovisual materials, newspapers and other documentary evidence is indispensable to establishing an accurate national historical record and supporting credible accountability processes.

History must be documented, evidence must be protected, victims must be heard, and the truth must be allowed to stand, irrespective of whose interests it challenges. Memories must be visible through the participation of all persons, victims and others, and not in relation to age.

A CALL FOR NATIONAL REFLECTION AND HISTORICAL CONSCIENCE

As Liberia remembers November 12, 1985, OWECC-L calls upon the Executive, the Legislature, the Judiciary, traditional authorities, religious institutions, civil society organizations, the media, the academic community and all Liberians to reflect soberly on the consequences of a political and governance culture that repeatedly elevated vengeance above justice and ethnic allegiance above national citizenship. We must resist every attempt to romanticize military adventurism, justify atrocities on the grounds of political loyalty, or assign collective blame to communities because of the actions of individuals.

No political grievance justifies the slaughter of innocent civilians. No military victory confers the right to humiliate, torture, or summarily execute prisoners. No allegation of treason removes the obligation of the State to guarantee due process. And no individual or institution should be above the law.

The memory of November 12 must therefore serve as a solemn reminder that the preservation of peace requires more than the absence of war. It requires justice, accountability, reconciliation, respect for human dignity, and institutions capable of protecting every citizen without discrimination.
Liberia cannot afford another generation condemned to inherit the unfinished business of the past.

Today, we remember General Thomas Quiwonkpa and all those who perished during the November 12 invasion and its aftermath. We remember Charles Gbeyon and the countless unnamed civilians whose lives were extinguished in the ensuing violence. We remember the families whose homes were destroyed, whose loved ones disappeared, and whose dignity was violated.
We also remember the victims of April 14, 1979, April 12 and April 22, 1980, the 1981 political executions, the 1984 military invasion of the University of Liberia, and the countless other victims of state-sponsored and politically motivated violence throughout our national history.

Their lives must not be reduced to footnotes in Liberia's history books. Their suffering must not be rendered meaningless by silence. Their memory must become a national commitment to justice.
November 12, 1985, must never be remembered merely as the day an invasion failed. It must rather be remembered as a day when the failure of political tolerance, the triumph of reprisal and the absence of accountability exacted another devastating price from the Liberian people.

As we reflect on this painful anniversary, OWECC-L remains resolute in its conviction that sustainable peace cannot be built upon forgotten atrocities, selective remembrance, or the convenient burial of historical truths.

There can be no enduring reconciliation without truth, no meaningful justice without accountability, and no lasting peace without confronting the painful realities of our shared past.

Never again must Liberia become a theatre of political vengeance, ethnic persecution and impunity.  The past must be confronted. the victims must be remembered. justice must prevail.

A CALL FOR SUBSTANTIVE ACTION

LIBERIA CANNOT AFFORD ANYTHING SHORT OF INSTITUTING THE NECESSARY MECHANISMS TO ADDRESS IMPUNITY AND HOLD PERPETRATORS OF WAR CRIMES TO ACCOUNT. THEREFORE, OWECC-L CALLS ON THE HONORABLE LIBERIAN LEGISLATURE TO AVOID ANY FURTHER DELAYS IN ENACTING THE WECC AND NACC BILLS AND ESTABLISHING THE TWO COURTS FOR THE GOOD OF ALL.