23/02/2013
STATEMENT DELIVERED BY
H.E. AUGUSTINE KPEHE NGAFUAN,
MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF THE REPUBLIC
AT THE RECEPTION IN HONOR OF MEMBERS OF THE UN HIGH LEVEL PANEL (HLP) ON POST-2015 GLOBAL DEVELOPMENT AGENDA
MONROVIA, CITY HALL
January 30, 2013
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Distinguished Members of the UN High Level Panel as well as their technical support personnel;
Honorable Members of the Liberian Senate and the House of Representatives;
Mr. Acting Chief Justice and Members of the Supreme Court Bench here present:
Cabinet Colleagues here present
Mr. Doyen and Members of the Diplomatic Corps;
Distinguished Members and Representatives of Academia, the Private Sector and Civil Society;
Members of the Fourth Estate;
Ladies and Gentlemen:
I will ask that you indulge me a little as I attempt to take you on a voyage into the past and land you onto the shores of the Liberia of 1990 or July 2003. No doubt, the staccato of the AK 47’s and the boom of the howitzers, the sight of starving little children gasping for breath, of bullet-ridden and looted hospitals, schools, and private homes; the presence of many lords of war and their legions of teenagers jockeying for power in a terribly wrecked country; all of these and many other heartrending and nightmarish occurrences would leave you feeling that I have landed you in a hell-hole, where the senses of men go on vacation as, to paraphrase Thomas Hobbes, men become wolves to men. Indeed Liberia of then was a hub of destabilization, a problem-child of the West African region, a pariah and a place where even “angels feared to tread.”
Then, let us fast-forward to August 2003 and the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Accord (CPA) in Accra; to 2005 and the election of the first democratically elected female President in Africa; to 2012 to the appointment of that illustrious, visionary, and astute female leader and Nobel-laureate by the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon as one of the distinguished and respected world leaders to chair a high-level panel of 27 eminent brain-trusts from across the globe to envision and design a new Global Development Roadmap post-2015; and finally to 2013 to the convergence of three Heads of State and a significant number of the world’s “who’s who” in Monrovia to further discuss and distill this roadmap. This transition of Liberia from a pariah to a partner, from a problem-child to a problem-solver, and from a place to run from to a place to come to, is truly and indisputably a remarkable achievement.
This achievement is attributable not only to the resilience of the Liberian people home and abroad, but also to the genuine partnership and solidarity of members of the international community, some of whom came to our shores as humanitarian workers, international civil servants, and private sector actors to help us pick up the broken pieces and rebuild our battered nation. Liberia and Liberians remain eternally grateful to all our friends from beyond our borders, especially to those countries that sent their precious sons and daughters to Liberia as peacekeepers to stop our country’s precipitous descent into the bottomless pit of untold human tragedy. If the tree of stability, the tree democracy, the tree of economic growth and development; if the tree of progress has yielded some fruits today, it is because that tree was fertilized by the blood, sweat, and tears of many – Liberians and non-Liberians from the far-flung corners of our one world.
So it is within the typical Liberian spirit of gratitude and brotherhood that I, on behalf of my dynamic President, H.E. Mrs. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and the Government and people of Liberia, wholeheartedly welcome you to the new Liberia, the new Monrovia, a city once bludgeoned and battered but now brimming over with vitality and hope.
Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen, as the global community reflects upon the post-2015 Global Development Framework within the ambience and hospitability of our capital, Liberia has also seized the opportunity to reflect upon its progress and challenges of the last decade, especially within the context of progress against critical benchmarks of the Millennium Development Goals (MDG’s), whether it is the fight against extreme poverty, food security, women and gender equality, girls education, or reducing infant mortality. Many of these targets were in fact encapsulated in our last poverty reduction strategy (PRS) and have again formed part, in more expanded ways, of our current growth and development plan – the “Vision 2030” – wherein Liberia aspires to the status of a middle income nation by 2030. Having only ended a deadly civil war almost exactly a decade ago, we are proud of the level of progress thus far achieved to stabilize our nation, spur growth in our economy, deepen democracy and good governance, and respond in more concrete terms to the needs and aspirations of our people. Though we have travelled so far, we still are of no illusion that we still have a far way to go.
However, no matter what we in Liberia do, or for that matter, what any developing country does domestically to lift its people from poverty to prosperity, an enabling global space characterized by well-thought-out and appropriate objectives undergirded by equitable rules and collective commitment to action, is essential.
This is why we look avidly to the outcomes of the work of the High Level Panel as it attempts to identify the right road to be taken or the wrong road not to be taken by the global community in our grand march to eradicating the scourge of poverty.
Distinguished guests, fellow compatriots:
In the endless precession of time, many generations of men and women will ascend and descend this stage called Life. Each generation will have its own set of challenges and circumstances. Some challenges will be enabling to the achievement of human development while others will be disabling. It must therefore be the goal of the global community to leverage its positive circumstances and work tooth and nail to reverse or limit the debilitating effect of its negative circumstances. This generation of mankind, through collective thinking and collective action, can and must make this world a better place to live. This generation of mankind can and must make this world a place where no one will have to die from preventable disease; a place where extreme poverty and all its dehumanizing and degrading features are consigned permanently to history, a place where the political, economic, and social rules of global engagement are not lopsided to favor the few at the expense of the many, the strong at the expense of weak, and the prosperity of today’s generation at the expense of the prosperity of tomorrow’s generation.
The 27-members of the UN High Level Panel are the ones on whose shoulders the enormous burden of sifting and distilling through the labyrinth of paths that should be travelled to achieve these noble and global objectives has been thrust. In spite of the enormity of the task, we in Liberia entertain no doubt that the Panel, co-chaired by our own President, will be up to the task. Our optimism springs from the geographical, professional, and gender balance of the Panel as well as the solidity of the credentials of each of its members.
As you members of the Panel and all your technical support teams meet in Monrovia this week to discuss and refine a narrative document that will, among other things, articulate your expectations for the post-2015 process and clarify the role of economic transformation in the achievement of global development objectives, on behalf of the President of the Republic of Liberia and the Liberian people dispersed from Cape Mount to Cape Palmas, from Mt. Nimba to Mt. Barclay, I wish you a productive and successful Meeting. Your presence in Monrovia has attracted the attention of the entire world on our small country and our small city. But as small as we are, it is our big wish that the quality and outcomes of the Monrovia Meeting will contribute, in no small measure, to the crafting of a sound and robust Global Development Agenda that lays the appropriate basis for the achievement of sustainable human prosperity.
Thank You Very Much
