Violent coup of Liberia in 1980 and those who survived.
Violent coup of Liberia in 1980 and those who survived.
Do you know that: Only four members of the Tolbert administration survived the coup and its aftermath; among them was the Minister of Finance, future President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, and the Vice President Bennie Dee Warner?
10 years before Samuel Doe met his fate, he had presided over the public execution of members of the Cabinet he had overthrown.
He overthrew William Tolbert to become Liberia’s first native president. Tolbert himself was shot while he slept either in bed or in his office.
Most members of his cabinet were arrested and tried for different crimes.
There are videos of the trial. At one point, the judge tells the defendants to ‘Keep it short.’ He then found them guilty and recommended their execution.
The gruesome execution was televised. The ministers were marched through the streets as citizens lined up to jeer them.
They were then taken to the public beach where they were ordered to stand next to the installed posts and remove their shirts.
The men are tied upright to the posts. Soldiers then line up to form a firing squad.
After the first barrage of gunfire, only one man, Cecil Dennis, still stands. The others are dead, with their bodies slumping on the posts. Two soldiers shoot Dennis with an Uzi and a pistol. The firing squad continues firing, shooting the ministers at least 60 more times.
Strangely, Doe called for Cecil Dennis to be brought to the Executive Mansion a few days after he had had him killed.
It is possible that Doe had never bothered to look at the list or the recommendation.
One anecdote has it that the court recommended the execution of 3 men but Doe, either distracted or otherwise, ordered that they all be killed.
In fact, the execution was delayed because there were not enough poles installed on the beach that day.
Four men sat in the bus while the first nine were being killed.
One of the people who survived the purge was none other but Ellen Sirleaf, the current President of Liberia.
She was Tolbert’s Minister of Finance from 1979 to 1980, same year of the Samuel Doe coup; she believes she survived because her mother had once given Doe and his men water to drink.
Now you definitely know more.
Source: www.gregnwoko.com
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