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Authors: Ahmadou Kourouma
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him down and arrested him. They put him in jail.
While he was locked up, he bribed his gaolers with stolen money and escaped to Libya, where he introduced himself to Qaddafi as the fearless leader of the revolution against Samuel Doe’s bloody dictatorship. Qaddafi, the Libyan dictator, had been trying to overthrow Doe’s regime and kissed Taylor right on the mouth. He sent them—Taylor and his followers—to the camps they have in Libya where they make terrorists. Libya has had terrorist camps ever since Qaddafi came to power. In this camp, Taylor and his followers learned guerrilla warfare.
And that’s not all: Qaddafi palmed him off on Blaise Compaoré, the dictator of Burkina Faso, with lots of commendations, like he was commendable. Compaoré, the dictator of Burkina Faso, recommended him to Houphouët-Boigny, dictator of Côte d’Ivoire, like he was a choirboy or a saint. Houphouët, who hated Samuel Doe for murdering his son-in-law, was happy to meet Taylor and kissed him right on the mouth. Houphouët and Compaoré quickly agreed that theywould support the warlord. Compaoré, on behalf of Burkina Faso, took care of training the soldiers, and Houphouët, on behalf of Côte d’Ivoire, took care of paying for and transporting all the guns.
And that’s how Taylor the warlord got to be a big somebody. A famous warlord who bled Liberia dry (‘bleed dry’ means ‘to systematically exploit the population, forcing them to make heavy sacrifices’). Taylor lives in Gbarnea. From time to time, he sends child-soldiers on murderous missions to try and capture the Mansion House. The Mansion House is where the president of Liberia used to live before the warlords divided up the country between them.
Compared to Taylor, Compoaré, the Burkinabé dictator, Houphouët-Boigny, the Ivorian dictator, and Qaddafi, the Libyan dictator, are civilised people, he makes them look like civilised people. Why would they support a barefaced liar, an out-and-out thief, a crook like Taylor and make him head of state? Why? Why? It can only be one of two reasons: either they’re as corrupt as Taylor, or they’re playing what people in Africa with its barbaric dictatorships and liberticidal fathers of nations call ‘la
grande politique
’. (According to my
Larousse
, ‘liberticidal’ means ‘that which destroys freedom’.)
In any case, Taylor is always going everywhere pestering everyone. The warlord has taken the whole country hostage and he’s so powerful that by the time we arrived in 1993, the slogan his supporters chant, ‘No Taylor, No Peace’, is becoming a reality.
Gnamokodé! Walahé!
* * *
Colonel Papa le Bon, Taylor’s representative in Zorzor, is weird.
For a start, he never had a father, never knew who his father was. His mother was wandering from bar to bar in the big city of Monrovia when just like that she gave birth to a baby she called Robert’s. When the kid was five, a sailor wanted to marry the woman, but he didn’t want anything to do with the kid, so Robert’s was given to his aunt who also worked in the bars. The aunt used to leave him on his own in the house playing with French letters (‘French letters’ are condoms).
Some children’s rights organisation saw what was happening and took Robert’s away and put him in an orphanage run by nuns.
Robert’s was a brilliant student. He wanted to be a priest, so they sent him to the USA. When he finished studying he went back to Liberia to be ordained. But it was too late, by now it was tribal war in Liberia. There was nothing left, no Church, no organisations, no records. He wanted to go back to the USA and sit back and wait until things got better.
But when he saw all the street kids everywhere, it reminded him of his childhood and he was deeply moved. So he changed his mind and decided to do something about it. In his soutane, he gathered the kids together and set about making sure they had enough to eat. The kids called him
While he was locked up, he bribed his gaolers with stolen money and escaped to Libya, where he introduced himself to Qaddafi as the fearless leader of the revolution against Samuel Doe’s bloody dictatorship. Qaddafi, the Libyan dictator, had been trying to overthrow Doe’s regime and kissed Taylor right on the mouth. He sent them—Taylor and his followers—to the camps they have in Libya where they make terrorists. Libya has had terrorist camps ever since Qaddafi came to power. In this camp, Taylor and his followers learned guerrilla warfare.
And that’s not all: Qaddafi palmed him off on Blaise Compaoré, the dictator of Burkina Faso, with lots of commendations, like he was commendable. Compaoré, the dictator of Burkina Faso, recommended him to Houphouët-Boigny, dictator of Côte d’Ivoire, like he was a choirboy or a saint. Houphouët, who hated Samuel Doe for murdering his son-in-law, was happy to meet Taylor and kissed him right on the mouth. Houphouët and Compaoré quickly agreed that theywould support the warlord. Compaoré, on behalf of Burkina Faso, took care of training the soldiers, and Houphouët, on behalf of Côte d’Ivoire, took care of paying for and transporting all the guns.
And that’s how Taylor the warlord got to be a big somebody. A famous warlord who bled Liberia dry (‘bleed dry’ means ‘to systematically exploit the population, forcing them to make heavy sacrifices’). Taylor lives in Gbarnea. From time to time, he sends child-soldiers on murderous missions to try and capture the Mansion House. The Mansion House is where the president of Liberia used to live before the warlords divided up the country between them.
Compared to Taylor, Compoaré, the Burkinabé dictator, Houphouët-Boigny, the Ivorian dictator, and Qaddafi, the Libyan dictator, are civilised people, he makes them look like civilised people. Why would they support a barefaced liar, an out-and-out thief, a crook like Taylor and make him head of state? Why? Why? It can only be one of two reasons: either they’re as corrupt as Taylor, or they’re playing what people in Africa with its barbaric dictatorships and liberticidal fathers of nations call ‘la
grande politique
’. (According to my
Larousse
, ‘liberticidal’ means ‘that which destroys freedom’.)
In any case, Taylor is always going everywhere pestering everyone. The warlord has taken the whole country hostage and he’s so powerful that by the time we arrived in 1993, the slogan his supporters chant, ‘No Taylor, No Peace’, is becoming a reality.
Gnamokodé! Walahé!
* * *
Colonel Papa le Bon, Taylor’s representative in Zorzor, is weird.
For a start, he never had a father, never knew who his father was. His mother was wandering from bar to bar in the big city of Monrovia when just like that she gave birth to a baby she called Robert’s. When the kid was five, a sailor wanted to marry the woman, but he didn’t want anything to do with the kid, so Robert’s was given to his aunt who also worked in the bars. The aunt used to leave him on his own in the house playing with French letters (‘French letters’ are condoms).
Some children’s rights organisation saw what was happening and took Robert’s away and put him in an orphanage run by nuns.
Robert’s was a brilliant student. He wanted to be a priest, so they sent him to the USA. When he finished studying he went back to Liberia to be ordained. But it was too late, by now it was tribal war in Liberia. There was nothing left, no Church, no organisations, no records. He wanted to go back to the USA and sit back and wait until things got better.
But when he saw all the street kids everywhere, it reminded him of his childhood and he was deeply moved. So he changed his mind and decided to do something about it. In his soutane, he gathered the kids together and set about making sure they had enough to eat. The kids called him
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