Prince Johnson
Prince Yormie Johnson (born 6 July 1952) is a Liberian politician and the current Senior Senator from Nimba County.[nb 1] A former rebel leader, Johnson played a prominent figure in the First Liberian Civil War, most notably capturing and executing President Samuel Doe.
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[edit] Biography
Johnson was born in Nimba County, in the east-central interior of the country, and was brought up by an uncle in Monrovia. While living in Monrovia, in 1971, he joined the Liberian National Guard (LNG) which was transformed into the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL) in the aftermath of the 1980 coup since when his life became that of the barracks. He rose to the rank of Lieutenant, and benefited from military training in Liberia and United States. Johnson had been trained in military police duties in South Carolina, USA." He was a stern, often draconian, disciplinarian.[1] He served as aide-de-camp to Thomas Quiwonkpa, the Commanding General of the Armed Forces of Liberia.[2] Johnson fled into exile with Quiwonkpa in 1983.
Johnson later allied with Charles Taylor as part of the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), where he was formerly the NPFL's Chief Training Officer,[3] which crossed the border from Côte d'Ivoire and began operations in Liberia on Christmas Eve, 1989.[4] However, an internal power struggle resulted in Prince Johnson breaking off from the Taylor-led NPFL and forming the Independent National Patriotic Front of Liberia (INPFL). Despite intervention in the civil war by the Economic Community of West African States Monitoring Group (ECOMOG), INPFL forces captured most of the capital, Monrovia, in the late summer of 1990.
During the civil war, Johnson was notorious for killing anyone who showed opposition or criticized his actions. When Hare Krishna devotees, who were distributing food to starving people in Monrovia in the midst of the chaos of the civil war, sent him a letter begging him to stop killing people, he personally orchestrated the execution of Hladini devi dasi, born Linda Jury, and five of her students, on the bank of the Saint Paul River on the night of Thursday, 13 September 1990.[5][6][7]
In September 1990, Johnson's supporters abducted President Samuel Doe from the ECOMOG headquarters, the Freeport of Monrovia. Doe was tortured and executed in Johnson's custody on September 9, with the spectacle videotaped and broadcast around the world. The video showed Johnson sipping a Budweiser as his men cut off Doe's ear.[8] Johnson later denied killing Doe. Ahmadou Kourouma (who depicted Doe's assassination in his novel Allah is not Obliged) also accused Prince Johnson of war crimes in the form of abducting and torturing several Firestone executives.
Shortly after Doe's death, Johnson briefly claimed the presidency of Liberia, though his claims ended following the consolidation of rebel power under Taylor. In an attempt by the weak national government to reconstruct Liberian politics, the INPFL was recognized at a conference held in Guinea, where Amos Sawyer was elected president. However, Johnson was forced to flee to Nigeria in fear of rebel forces supporting Taylor and was uninvolved in the Second Liberian Civil War.
While in Nigeria, Johnson became a Christian and reconciled with the Doe family through the intervention of the controversial Nigerian 'prophet' T.B. Joshua.[9]
Johnson returned to Liberia in March 2004[10] following the resignation of Taylor as president and the installation of a transitional government. He stated his intention to return to politics, though he briefly left Liberia again on 7 April due to death threats he had received from the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) rebel group. In the 2005 general elections, Johnson contested and won a Senate seat representing Nimba County. For a period he served as the chair of the Senate's defense committee.
In the June 2009 final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which was established as part of the 2003 peace deal, the TRC recommended Johnson in a list of 50 names of people that should be "specifically barred from holding public offices; elected or appointed for a period of thirty (30) years" for "being associated with former warring factions."[11] Johnson labelled the recommendation a "joke," noting several other combatants absent from the recommendation, and vowed to resist any charges brought as a result of the report.[11] In January 2011, the Supreme Court ruled in Williams v. Tah, a case brought by another person recommended for being banned from public office in the TRC report, that the TRC's recommendation was an unconstitutional violation of the listed individuals' right to procedural due process, and that it would be unconstitutional for the government to implement the proposed bans.[12]
In 2010, he announced his intention to run for president in the 2011 presidential election.[13]
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ "Prince" is a common given name for males in Liberia, rather than a royal title.
Johnson later allied with Charles Taylor as part of the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), where he was formerly the NPFL's Chief Training Officer...
source: Alao, Mackinlay, and Olonisakin, Peacekeepers, Politicians, and Warlords, The Liberian Peace Process (Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 1999), 22.
[edit] References
- ^ Suah, Throble (21 March 2011). "PYJ : I Regret The War". The NewDawn Newspaper. http://www.thenewdawnliberia.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3008:pyj-i-regret-the-war&catid=25:politics&Itemid=59. Retrieved February 01, 2012.
- ^ Ellis, Stephen (2001). The Mask of Anarchy. London: Hurst and Company. pp. 57–58.
- ^ Alao, Abiodun (1999). Peacekeepers, Politicians, and Warlords: The Liberian Peace Process. Tokyo: United Nations University Press. pp. 22. ISBN 9-280-81031-6.
- ^ US freed Taylor to overthrow Doe, Liberia's TRC hears
- ^ Dasi, Manjari-devi (2007). Death Divine: The Gateway to Spiritual Perfection. Jaya Radhe Publications. pp. 151–154. http://www.indiadivine.org/audarya/spiritual-discussions/444802-death-divine.html.
- ^ "New Vrindaban Remembers Hladini devi dasi (same text with more photos)". New Vrindaban. http://www.dandavats.com/?p=8886. Retrieved February 01, 2012.
- ^ "Devotees Remember Hladini devi dasi". World Vaishnava Association. http://www.vina.cc/news/index.php/Vaishnavas/Devotees-Remember-Hladini-devi-dasi.html. Retrieved February 01, 2012.
- ^ Akam, Simon (2011-10-20). "The Comeback: A Notorious Ex-Warlord Hits the Campaign Trail in Liberia". The New Republic. http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/magazine/95493/prince-johnson-liberia?passthru=MGVmMDgxZTYwMGIxN2E2NmY5OTQ3MThjN2NlNGU3ZTE.
- ^ "Son Forgives Man Who Butchered President Doe". IOL. 2000-11-22. http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=86&art_id=qw97489038074B252.
- ^ Jolayemi, Moses (2004-11-16). "Johnson, Liberia's Warlord, Leaves on Sunday". This Day. http://www.thisdayonline.com/archive/2004/03/25/20040325news09.html.
- ^ a b "Sirleaf should be banned from office: Liberia truth commission". AFP. July 6, 2009. http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5joAaW2DuzNDfyi8t7h4X594XcHCg. Retrieved December 14, 2010.
- ^ "Liberian Supreme Court Squashes Truth And Reconciliation Commission Ban on Politicians". NetNewsPublisher. January 24, 2011. http://www.netnewspublisher.com/liberian-supreme-court-squashes-truth-and-reconciliation-commission-ban-on-politicians/.
- ^ Liberian ex-warlord to run for president 22 September 2010, AFP
[edit] Further reading
- Stephan Ellis, ‘The Mask of Anarchy: The Destruction of Liberia and the Religious Dimension of an African Civil War’, Hurst & Company, London, 2001 - Introduction 'A Death in the Night' has an excellent account of Doe's death.
