Modern-Day Slavery: In Liberia, Tappers’ Still Live in Dire Straits on LAC's Plantation
Story by Nat Nyuan Bayjay - 11/03/09 (posted to this site 12/14/09)
Culled from Front Page Africa
The days of colonialism may have ended over decades ago but somewhere in the northern part of Grand Bassa County where the Liberian Agricultural Company (LAC) operates the country’s second largest rubber plantations, there exists a modern colonial means of livelihood mainly for the plantations destitute tappers and other low-level workers.
A recent FrontPageAfrica’s visit to the inner parts of LAC’s vast rubber plantations reveals a very desperate means of survival being encountered by hundreds of Liberians who are workers of the company who still find it very difficult to get adjusted to that kind of living conditions despite the fact that a bulk of them have been involved in it for years while others were even born in it.
LAC is of an Italian-Dutch joint-shareholder that signed an agreement with the Liberian Government in 1959 to plant rubber and get involved with other agricultural activities. It is about 45 minutes drive away from the port city of Buchanan farther north and covers about thousands of acres of land in the upper part of Grand Bassa County.
The worst affected of the company’s impoverished workers are mainly the tappers who wake up as early as 3 AM and walk miles to tap over a hundred trees for salaries that can barely take them through for at least five days.
Most of the tappers who hail from the Kissi and Lorma tribes of Lofa County who spoke with FPA but on conditions of anonymity for fear of reprisal said they most often return home from the ‘pay-ground’ with US$20 to US$50 after the company’s deduction of supplies issued them (commodities which the poor living conditions compel them to credit from the company).
One of them said, “I came home last month with just US$13 in my envelope”. According to information gathered on the plantations, the company charges the workers US$26.5 for a bag of rice, US$1 for a bar of soap while they obtain fish at the cost of US$8.78—items which according to them cannot even take them throughout a month.
A group of workers categorized as casual workers make US$2.5 daily provided a full day’s job is completed.
One of such workers who too set the condition of anonymity being granting an interview said, “We are more than slaves here. I’ve been a casual worker for over 18 months now, though I was told that after three to four months I could get my employment. We have no voice here, my brother.”
Poor Housing For Tappers, No School Bus For Tappers’ Children
A tour of the various camps set up in the deeper parts of the plantations shows very poor housing units in which tappers and their families are bundled in a single room which one of them prefers to rather call ‘an oven’.
With just a single window, the single room that cannot comfortably contain more than a family of three persons is assigned to each worker. Each unit contains four of these ‘ovens’ for four different families while a lone kitchen is built between every two units to cater to eight different wives who will be cooking for eight different families.
For instance, at the Food Crop Camp located in the Estate Four area, there is a single toilet built and a single hand-pump to cater to all the inhabitants of the 16 units of the camp.
Residents told FPA that the single toilet has no bathroom; for they have to build some for themselves. But residents of that camp consider themselves a bit lucky for having a single toilet because there are larger camps than theirs that have larger inhabitants who have to manage a single toilet and sometimes a single hand-pump.
It was also revealed that the tappers’ children have to walk miles to go to one of the plantations’ three schools.
Jasper Chowoe, a boy aged 12, told FPA that his mother wakes him up as early as 4 AM for him to get ready to begin a daily three-hour walking journey to a school called St. Joseph in a far away camp called Estate One.
Management Aware of Appalling Conditions
During a recent meeting between one of the county’s legislative members and the management of LAC, the General Manager of the company, Pascal Demesdt, when confronted with the awful living conditions of the workers confirmed LAC’s awareness of the situation.
Demesdt acknowledged that the welfare of the low-level workers, especially the tappers, is not a satisfactory one. He further confirmed that the tappers’ children walk miles to go to school because the school buses on the plantation had mechanical faults but said that the management would soon remedy the situation.
The situation on the plantations has claimed the attention of the Junior Senator of Grand Bassa County, Nathaniel Innis (Liberty Party-LP) who, when contacted by FPA to state whether he is aware of the appalling condition in his county, described the situation as a destitute environment which needs urgent national attention.
The Grand Bassa County lawmaker told FPA that LAC’s practice of colonialism and President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf’s delay in re-examining the entire LAC Concession Agreement of 1959 jeopardize the Liberian Government’s Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS) program otherwise known as ‘Lift Liberia’.
He said President Sirleaf gave the assurance of renegotiating the LAC Concession Agreement some years back which he said remains to be done.
Senator Innis who also chairs the Grand Bassa County Legislative Caucus told FPA that LAC needs to copy the example of Firestone that is to some extent trying to improve the living standards of its employees as shown by the erection of some modern housing units on its plantations.
“The rights of our people (the employees) on the plantations of LAC must be guaranteed and protected by improving their living standards”, he emphasized.
The modern slavery acts being exhibited by LAC have over the years also claimed the attention of many local and international organizations which have been coming out with reports of the plantation’s terrible living conditions of its workers.
On 9 May 2006, the United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) forwarded to the management of LAC a report in which the Liberian representation of the world body cited a six-point severe human rights violations being meted out on hundreds of Liberians working for the company.
In the report entitled “Human Rights in Liberia’s Rubber Plantations: Tapping into the Future”, UNMIL’s Deputy Chief of its Human Rights and Protection Section, Adam Abdelmoula, stated that there were “serious human rights violations in Liberia’s rubber plantations, including the Liberian Agricultural Company plantation”.
Many believe that LAC’s continual ignoring of its workers’ plight could as well jeopardize its expansion plan that has witnessed a long-ongoing discussion between the locals who are represented by the Resilient Council of Elders of Grand Bassa County and the company’s management.
The agreement, signed in November, 2007 between LAC and the Liberian Government, gives the company new land to expand its facilities and to evict those who live there. But there have calls for the Liberian government to annul and renegotiate the agreement.
In August 2006, former Liberia’s Justice Minister Frances Johnson-Morris sent a letter to President Sirleaf advising against the expansion of the company and the eviction of the citizens from their villages because the agreement was arbitrary.
