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Liberia: The Willis Knuckles Saga
Nude Threesome Photo Causes Minister to Stand Down from Post
By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye
There are quite a
number of lessons to be learnt from the scandal which
hit the Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf Administration in Liberia
recently, and which resulted in the resignation of the
highly influential Acting Chief of Staff, Minister
Willis D. Knuckles jnr. One of the country’s tabloids,
The Independent, had published the nude picture of Mr.
Knuckles in a revolting threesome sexual act with two
women, thus provoking a national outrage and widespread
calls for the resignation of Knuckles, whose office was
also known as Acting Minister of Presidential Affairs.
At first, Knuckles
thought he could manage the crises, by trying to point
accusing fingers at different directions. At a hurriedly
arranged press briefing at the Conference Room of the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Monrovia on February 19,
Knuckles declared that “the perpetrators of this act
along with a certain female legislator have distributed
copies of the photograph with the intent of embarrassing
me socially and inflicting political damage to the
government given my current political position.”
Although Knuckles
did not call any names or accuse anyone directly, there
were reports that he strongly believed the former
Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rep Edwin
Melvin Snowe and his wife, Mardea White Snowe, were
responsible for his predicament. Moreover, during the
press conference, at which he refused to take any
questions, he made references to Mr. Snowe and his wife
in ways that suggested he strongly suspected them.
A week before
Knuckles’ travails commenced, Speaker Snowe had been
forced to resign from office and he had accused an
unnamed “senior minister” of bribing the lawmakers to
ease him out. He had given the “senior minister” one
week to publicly declare his role in the bribery
allegation or he would also deal with him in his own
way.
“If he does not
make public everything he knows about this alleged
bribery at the House of Representatives, I will expose
him”, Snowe told newsmen some minutes before he handed
in his resignation letter.
Despite his refusal
to name the “senior minister” in question,
FrontPageAfrica (FPA) News reported that Snowe’s aides
had told it that Knuckles was the “senior minister”
their boss was referring to.
On his part,
Knuckles stated that Snowe had pleaded with him to stop
opposing him, but instead intervene to salvage his
sinking political ship. He said Snowe and his wife had
him informed about the existence of the nude, obscene
photograph and had threatened to make it public if
refused to accede to Snowe’s request.
“I rejected their
overtures and suddenly, since his (Snowe’s) resignation
as Speaker, copies [of the nude photograph] have
appeared everywhere…Now for whatever political or other
ends the perpetrator wishes to achieve, my private life
is being drawn into the short and inglorious end of
someone else’s public life,” Knuckles said at the press
conference.
The FPA had also
reported that Snowe had wanted to use the threats of
releasing the indecent photograph to the public to
blackmail Knuckles into using his influence with
President Johnson-Sirleaf to halt investigations into
his tenure at the Liberian Petroleum Refinery
Corporation. But Knuckles had told him that the matter
was already before the world, and there was nothing he
could do at that stage to save him.
But the Chief of
Staff to the former Speaker, Darius Dillon, has scoffed
at Mr. Knuckles’ accusations. “I think the question Mr.
Knuckles should be asking is: Is the immoral person in
the photo me? … That is the substance of the matter, it
is not who set it up. He went and did his immoral act,
now he must bear the consequences,” Dillon told FPA.
As the offensive
picture began to widely circulate in Liberia and on the
internet, calls for Mr. Knuckles’ head poured out from
embarrassed Liberians within and outside the country.
Rufus S. Berry 11, for instance, writing in the February
26 edition of the Atlanta, Georgia-based The
Perspective, stated that “As the former President of the
Liberian Community Association Of Northern California (LCANC),
with more than 5,000 Liberians, a recent unscientific
poll showed that the vast majority of the people view
Mr. Knuckles’ resignation or termination as in the best
interest of the country.” The article was addressed to
President Johnson-Sirleaf. There were more virulent
condemnations of Mr. Knuckles’ misconduct and calls for
his resignation.
For President
Johnson-Sirleaf, the scandal represented a very sad
setback. She was faced with two unattractive choices, to
either sack Knuckles and lose an invaluable hand or
retain him and be tarred by his moral problems. In a
nationwide broadcast on February 25 however, she said
she had “accepted today, with regrets, the resignation”
of Knuckles, “which he offered not because of demands
from those who sought to use this unfortunate situation
for blackmail and who should probably review their own
moral probity.” Mr. Knuckles, she said, “has been a
friend and close associate for many years”, but by the
unfortunate incident that had occurred, he has brought
“to his family and friends much pain, but one which
should not be allowed to tarnish his long years and
commitment to our beloved country.”
On his part
Knuckles said: “I must express regrets to my wife of 37
years, my children, my mother, and all my other
relatives, my boss, the President, my pastor and my
church, my co-workers in government and all my friends,
associates and others in the general public to whom this
episode has come as a pointless embarrassment.”
As I followed the
sad story of Mr. Knuckles’ downfall, I began to ask
myself whether he would have bothered to even address
the issue, if he was from my own country. In a country
like Liberia, described by one of its citizens, Rufus S.
Berry 11, as having “a chronic, pervasive problem with
sexual immorality”, I am amazed that a national outrage
could attend the shameful misbehaviour of Mr. Knuckles,
although, there were muffled noises here and there about
“human rights” like the one contained in the unedifying
article by Professor (Ms.) Francien Chenoweth Dorliae,
in the March 3 article of The Perspective. A public
officer need not be told that there is a minimum
standard of conduct expected of him, and that he loses
the right to behave anyhow once he is appointed into
such an office.
Again, as role
models and people that are always in the public eye,
public officers should endeavour to conduct themselves
in ways and manners that do not constitute damaging
examples to society, especially the youth.
Whether done out of
contrition or due to unbearable pressure from the
public, however, Mr. Knuckles must be saluted for his
courage and decision to tread the high ground of
standing down from his post, and openly apologizing for
his misbehaviour (a quality that is extremely scarce in
my own country).
Mrs. Johnson-Sirleaf
who is pioneering a new Liberia deserves our
commendation too. She said in her broadcast that she
accepted Knuckles’ resignation “because first, I have
sworn to uphold high standards in my own behaviour and
have made it clear to my staff and others that they will
be held accountable for the same standards, and second,
because I am in full agreement with those who do speak
with moral authority that the behaviour of Minister
Knuckles, while not illegal, is improper and
inappropriate for a public servant.”
In Nigeria, all
sorts of verifiable scandalous stories explode daily on
the faces of public servants, and they simply shrug it
off and move on to more hideous acts. Public officers
are openly called thieves today in Nigeria for very
clear and justifiable reasons, yet they still shuffle
about in the limelight with sickening flamboyance,
grinning from ear to ear. Liberia is teaching us with
the Knuckles affair that the conscience of its people
has not been seared by a terrible war, and that whatever
image someone may have had about them before now as a
“sex-obsessed” and “horribly corrupt” country is already
being put behind them. With this, they do not need a
multi-million naira Image Project to whitewash their
image abroad!
When will Nigeria
commence its own cleansing? When will leaders accused of
very horrible crimes (as opposed to Knuckles “legal”
misbehaviour) shed their thick skin and bow out? Will
Liberia also get there before us?
Only last Sunday
(March 4), Senator Iyabo Anisulowo (Ogun West) was
reported in the Sunday Sun as saying that the “PDP (the
ruling Peoples Democratic Party) is full of filthy men
who only support women politicians that could offer
themselves in illicit sexual affairs…”
She revealed how a
certain powerful national leader of the party had
“refused to support me because I refused to offer him my
body. The man does not even appeal to me… I left the
party because of immoral acts and anti-progressive
elements in the party. I can’t give my body to any
idiot, any filthy person… it is their stock in trade in
PDP. I refused to do what my children would not like to
see me do.”
Talking about the
Ogun State Deputy Governor, Alhaja Salmat Badru,
Anisulowo said: “She needed a job very badly, she used
whatever she has to get it, and she has gotten it.”
Dear reader, I am
surprised that all the men and women in high positions
in the PDP whose reputations this devastating statement
has raised serious doubts about are yet to rush out to
distance themselves from the “sex-for-position” racket
allegedly thriving in the PDP, and equally dare the Ogun
West senator to be more explicit to prove her point
convincingly. I am surprised that the national leaders
of the PDP, especially, those who share geographical
proximity with Senator Anisulowo, and the bevy of
“powerful women” in several strategic positions in both
the “largest party in Africa” and the “women friendly
government” in Abuja, are yet to come out to denounce
her statement and even seek to probe the allegation to
see whether this kind of repelling practice reigns in
the PDP. I wonder! May be, it doesn’t matter.
Now, back to
Monrovia. The one-year ban clamped on The Independent
which had published the former minister’s obscene
photograph, by the Liberian government has attracted
wide international attention, and mostly condemnation.
The action is very unpopular and capable of soiling the
good image of Mrs. Johnson-Sirleaf is trying to
cultivate for her country.
But Liberian
Information Minster, Lawrence Bropleh, is saying the ban
“has nothing to do with Minister Knuckles. This has
something to do with ethics of journalism. This has to
do with understanding that when you’re in a civilized
society, you do not publish pornography in a regular
newspaper.”
This is a very
familiar line, dredged up by the government’s
information organ to justify an unwholesome act.
Interestingly, the Liberian government has apologized
for the arbitrary closure of the newspaper, when a siege
was laid on its premises by security agents, an action
that was sternly condemned by the Liberia Press Union (PUL)
and several international agencies. Spokesman for the
government, Gabriel I.H. Williams, was quoted by the
Inquirer (Monrovia) as saying that “such an act will not
be repeated. We have learnt our lesson . . . what we are
saying is that this government subscribes to the rule of
law, democratic governance and free press.”
For those of us in
Nigeria, it is strange to hear that a government,
especially one headed by the “father of modern Nigeria”,
can bring itself to apologize for its (mis)behaviour.
Such an “abnormal” conduct is totally alien to the
militarized sensibilities of the grand emperors that
rule us from Abuja.
But the Liberian
Government can win more friends if it also lifts the ban
and restore the operating license of The Independent. If
it feels that the paper’s conduct had breached any of
the Liberian laws, as it is claiming, it should go to
court. That is a more civilized and decent option, which
we have continued to insist that those that rule in
Nigeria adopt too.
* *
* * *
Other Stories On Sex Scandal:
Knuckles Statement /
Press Suspended /
Iron Lady Accept Resignation * *
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Ugochukwu
Ejinkeonye writes a column for Independent
www.independentngonline.com every Wednesday
scruples2006@yahoo.com
www.ugochukwu.blog.com
Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf
(video) * * *
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update 4 October 2008 |
