The twelve-year Vice President under President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, H.E. Joseph N. Boakai, has termed cabinet ministers during their administration as PowerPoint ministers who were only good at presentation and explanation but worth nothing in terms of implementation.
Ex-VP Boakai noted that many of the shortcomings of the Sirleaf regime were mostly due to their lack of implementation plan, coupled with a cabinet that only had their personal interest at heart. According to him, each time a cabinet meeting was adjoined, President Sirleaf would ask him, “Joe, what do you think?” and he would state, “We need to implement.”
He lamented that many of his recommendations forwarded to President Sirleaf were not heeded, leaving him in a system that was flooded with individuals who did not have the country at heart and were only after what they could amass for themselves through the positions entrusted them by the people.
The former Vice President disclosed that, during their first term in power (2006—2011), they were able to convert their lobbying and influence into galvanizing resources for the nation to set the pace for development—they established diplomatic ties with great nations and peoples and brought influential persons to little Liberia. As such, he said, the second term (2011—2017) was supposed to be the era for implementation and bringing development to the people of Liberia but, according to him, this was not the case.
He reiterated that they squandered lots of opportunities and failed to implement well. He stated that, with the level of support their administration had from international partners and goodwill, they could have done better for the people.
However, it seems like VP Boakai’s statement on the 50-50 show with T-Max Jlateh recently did not go down well with all those who served cabinet positions in the Sirleaf administration, as some are beginning to express dismay in the way the former Vice President spoke.
An assistant minister, who spoke to the Hot Pepper on the basis of anonymity, told the paper that the former Vice President is only using them as a conduit for an escape route. “Look, we all played our part to get Liberia to where it is today, and so the papay should stop playing with words on us. If he wants to say we failed, then he, too, failed, as he was a part of the failure from the very beginning to the very end,” the assistant minister said.
It can be argued that the Sirleaf administration had among its cabinet ministers the best of brains and minds that could be found in the motherland at the time. Popular among those who served as minister-proper during the Ellen era included Atty. Kofi Woods, Cllr. Tiawon Gongloe, Cllr. Christina Tah, Olebanke King-Akerele, Miatta Baysolow, Lenn Eugene Nagbe, Amara Konneh, J. Brownie Samukai, Antoinette Sayeh, Florence Chenoweth, Augustine Ngafuan and George Werner.
Observers are beginning to wonder why Ambassador Boakai would choose to pick bone with his former cabinet ministers at a time he is gearing up to contest the standard bearer position of the Collaborating Political Parties (CPP). They noted, however, that Boakai’s argument could be valid, and it could be one of main reasons the nation did not see speedy development amidst the billion dollars that poured into the country.