Liberian Refugees Set To Go Home

LIBERIAN refugees in Ghana, numbering about 42,000, have declared their intention to go back to their country to help rebuild it.

The about 42,000 Liberian refugees, who have been in the country for the past 15 years, said no matter the hospitality they enjoyed in Ghana, “there is no place like home”.

The Chairman of the Buduburam Council of Churches and Ministries, Rev Aloysius Kpadeh, and the Chairperson of the Liberian Refugee Welfare Council of Buduburam, Madam Alice Georgia Abraham, made the declaration at a press conference in Accra yesterday.

The press conference, was organised by the Machiara of the Pneuma Foundation-Ghana (MPF), a non-governmental organisation, to announce the intention of the organisation to organise a repentance convention in Liberia before the elections in October this year.

Rev Kpadeh said, “Our time in Ghana is about getting over. We need to go back to rebuild Liberia.”

He indicated that most of the refugees at the Buduburam Refugee Camp were willing to return to Liberia to resettle.

He, however, conceded that some of the refugees had a “well-founded fear” because of the inhuman treatment they went through during the conflict in Liberia.

That, according to Rev Kpedah, discouraged some of them from going back, since they felt Liberia was still not stable.

He said if the October 11, 2005 general election in Liberia was held peacefully, virtually all the refugees would leave Ghana for Liberia to resettle there.

Rev. Kpedah expressed the belief that Liberia was guilty of bloodbath, hence the suffering in that country.

He recalled that people were killed, women were raped and children defiled during the conflict.

“We had a covenant with God and we deviated from it. That was the cause of the problem in Liberia,” he said.

According to Rev Kpedah, if a nation broke its covenant with God, the Almighty punishes such people by sending them into exile.

He said every exile had a duration and stated that the exile of Liberian refugees in Ghana “has come to an end.”

For her part, Madam Abraham said, “We (the refugees) have longed to go back to our home.”

“No matter what, there is no place like home,” she added. Madam Abraham thanked the government and Ghanaians for hosting them for the past 15 years, saying, “We have enjoyed peace in Ghana.”

She said the hospitality the Liberian refugees enjoyed in Ghana outweighed that of their colleagues in other countries.

She apologised for the wrongs that her colleagues might have committed during their stay in the country.

The Founder of the MPF, Brother Peter Anamoh, said the history of blood guilt, which included the shedding of innocent blood, rape, robbery, and corruption, loomed over Liberia.

He said he received a vision from God to organise a national repentance conference in Liberia to cleanse the blood guilt of that country.

Brother Anamoh said the conference would be held in Monrovia in September this year, where the citizens would have the platform to repent so that God's healing could come upon the nation.

That, he said, would set the foundation for a peaceful and prosperous Liberia beyond the elections in October.

He, therefore, urged the Liberian political leaders and citizens to settle their differences and forge ahead for the development of their country.