African Woman and Child Feature Service

Even as it takes the path to recovery, Liberia will not let history define their future. According to President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, they are working towards recovery and have set very ambitious goals for the country's future.

Sirleaf was speaking at a public lecture organised by the Centre for Global Development in Washington DC.

“In ten years, Liberia will not require foreign assistance,” said the President.

This is one of the three targets the country has set as it works to rebuild the nation. Sirleaf is quick to highlight the importance of foreign aid indicating that external funding has made a difference in Liberia.

“We could not have done what we did without aid.  Aid can work. It can be effective,” she observed. The country is keen to shed the yoke of aid dependence that characterises many African nations.

Liberia is a resource rich country. The President is certain that through consolidating the resources the country has, they can be aid free in the next decade. Hopefully Liberia wants to start producing its own oil with support from American companies one of which is Chevron.

“However, we have to be careful not to have the oil curse,” she said explaining that they have to be careful not to divert all attention to oil at the expense of other economic ventures

The country is also investing in human resource by building capacity and giving incentives for Liberians in the Diaspora to go back and contribute towards nation building.
Fighting illiteracy through compulsory primary education has led to a 40 percent increase in enrolment. This is inline with the Millennium Development Goal number two that targets to attain universal education for all by 2015.

Through community colleges, Liberia is working to decentralise tertiary education to increase access especially for the rural folk who are often marginalized.

As most of the skilled labour migrated during the war, the President indicated that the country’s priority now is building capacity of its people so they do not have to rely on foreign labour. The government is working in partnership with organisations such as the Peace Corp to train teachers to build capacity to provide quality education to the citizenry.

For a country to thrive economically, it requires peace and stability, a good infrastructure as well as established governance. One of the key challenges in Liberia today is poverty eradication.

“You cannot begin to tackle poverty unless you tackle growth,” reiterated Sirleaf.

“Liberia will be a middle income country by 2030,” she observed.

However, Sirleaf acknowledges that to achieve this, the country has to fight corruption at all levels of government and promote good governance.

“We would like to have the legal system that works better in the next year,” she said of her efforts to reform the judiciary.

This is an issue that Kenyans will relate to as the country is currently in the process of implementing the new Constitution and one of the first stops is with reforming the judiciary.

Even as the country thrives to do without aid in the near future, Liberia would like to rebuild its infrastructure. It would like to have working airports, seaports, roads, and power.

“We would like America to help with the reconstruction of their hydro electricity plant,” observed Sirleaf. She added: “With power, we can industrialise.”

The President regrets that currently the thermal power they are using is too expensive and not sufficient for industrialisation.