National Security Advisor H. Boima Fahnbulleh told commissioners of Liberia's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) he owes no apology for his role in Liberia's conflict past.
"Anything the military did while we were engaged with the People's Redemption Council (PRC) we take responsibilities. As young militants we owe no apologies," Dr. Fahnbulleh said.
Dr. Fahnbulleh who served as the first Minister of Education in the PRC junta testified Wednesday at the ongoing TRC Thematic and Institutional Inquiry Hearings at the Centennial Memorial Pavilion on Ashmun Street.
Fahnbulleh said the role he played in the history of the country was well taught of and therefore has no apology to render.
"I will not bow down to history. I am a proud participant in history. To sit here and condemn what I took part in, I would not," Dr. Fahnbulleh said to the cheers of hundreds of people that crowded the Pavilion to witness his appearance before the TRC.
Fahnbulleh said the sacrifices of he and others made it possible for Liberians to enjoy the kind of democracy practice now in the country. Fahnbulleh: "For you to now elect your own representatives and senators was predicated upon our struggles."
He described the True Whig Party (TWP) regime as an "oligarchy" that suppressed the rights of the majority and contended that the 1980 military coup was justifiable.
"We owe no one apologies for our role in fighting this oligarchy. Why should we apologize for what we proudly did? They imprisoned our fathers; we went to jail at the tender age of 18.
They jailed my sister at a tender age too. They killed scores of unarmed demonstrators who were simply protesting and exercising their rights. Why can't they apologize for those excesses? I owe no one, absolutely no one an apology," he continued.
"The basis of our crisis is that we got involved in a situation developing very fast without the right political leadership to comprehend what was happening in the country. As such the society exploded. Our duty as young revolutionaries was to understand the explosion, if you like to, call it opportunism. In history as in politics, especially the violent politics of Liberia, it is that those who make that history must survive enough to write about that history," Fahnbulleh said.
Under the theme: "Understanding the Conflict Through its Principal Events and Actors," the ongoing hearings will address the root causes of the conflict, including its military and political dimensions.
The hearings are focused on events between 1979 and 2003 and the national and external actors that helped to shape those events.
The TRC was agreed upon in the August 2003 peace agreement and created by the TRC Act of 2005.
The TRC was established to "promote national peace, security, unity and reconciliation," and at the same time make it possible to hold perpetrators accountable for gross human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law that occurred in Liberia between January 1979 and October 2003.
