25.1 C
Monrovia
Friday, March 7, 2025
Home 2025

Yearly Archives: 2025

FDA Illegally Permits Abandoned Logs Export, Missing Over US$100K

0
created by dji camera

Top: Some of the 431 logs Iroko Timber and Logging Company harvested and took about a year and six months to export. The DayLight/Derick Snyder

By Esau J. Farr

MONROVIA – The Forestry Development Authority (FDA) permitted the export of 2,549 cubic meters of abandoned logs, failing to punish the company involved, and losing substantial revenue.

Iroko Logging and Timber Company exported two consignments of logs on May 7 and July 18 last year, based on official documents. The combined 431 logs were shipped to Chittagong, Bangladesh via the cargo ship MV Nimeh.

But that was more than one-and-a-half years after the logs were harvested in the Central River Dugbe Community Forest in Sinoe County.

Iroko had harvested the logs in October 2022, per the Nigerian-owned company’s website and Facebook page. It only transported the 431 logs from the Jaedae District woodland to an open field near Greenville in February and March last year, residents and other sources said.

That violates the Regulation on Abandoned Logs, Timber and Timber Products. The 2017 regulation requires all logs to be transported, processed, or exported between three weeks and six months after harvesting.

If a log stays in a particular location outside the regulatory timeframe, the FDA is obligated to investigate, auction the logs, or fine the company that harvested them.  The fine includes a tenth, a twentieth and a fortieth of twice the total value of the abandoned logs, depending on the species classes.  

Because the FDA did not do that with Iroko, the government lost US$103,387, according to The DayLight’s analysis, based on the export permits and the regulation.

To arrive at the fine, the newspaper grouped each species of the logs and doubled their volumes. Next, it multiplied the total volumes by their corresponding, FDA-approved prices and added those products. Then it added all of the first-class species, based on the FDA’s categorization, and found 10 percent of that sum.

The newspaper did the same with the second-class ones, finding five percent of the sum this term. Finally, it added the percentage values of the two classes to establish what should have been Iroko’s fine and the government’s revenue.

The loss of US$103,387 comes when the forestry sector faces a downturn in revenue generation. From July 2021 to December 2022, the sector generated US$7.65 million, the least in the extractive sector despite Liberia holding the largest patches of West Africa’s remaining rainforests.

That figure could be more, though. Iroko left several logs in the Central River Dugbe Community Forest, according to residents.

A screenshot from Iroko Timber and Logging Company’s Facebook page showing the logs were harvested on October 14, 2022, more than one-and-a-half years before they exported.

Bartee Togba, the chief officer of the community forest, corroborated the residents’ account. Togba said villagers had counted over 60 logs in the woodland on the border with Grand Kru. “There were more logs,” he said, and there would be an additional counting. 

Following the second of two DayLight investigations last year, the FDA promised to investigate Iroko over the logs’ abandonment but did not. The regulator did not respond to queries for comment.

From July to August last year, Iroko paid the Liberian government US$173,432, covering export, land rental and other fees. The evidence, however, shows that the company owed the government US$16,263 in land rental fees.

That August, Iroko asked the Liberia Revenue Authority (LRA) to pay the balance due in September and October. The LRA agreed.

“If we default on this agreement, our tax debt may be referred to the Ministry of Justice to sue for the unpaid tax and or court’s authorization to seize and sell our property,” the agreement’s terms and conditions read.

But the money has not been paid, according to Iroko’s tax payment record, seen by The DayLight. Despite months of notice, Iroko and the LRA did not respond to inquiries for comments.

This story was a production of the Community of Forest and Environmental Journalists of Liberia (CoFEJ).

FDA Pays Board Member Living in America

0

Top: The Forestry Development Authority (FDA) pays Mr. Isaac Grigsby a board sitting fee through a proxy despite the fact he lives in the United States of America. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

By James Harding Giahyue

MONROVIA – The Forestry Development Authority (FDA) pays a member of its board of directors who lives in the United States fee for meetings he does not attend, according to official documents obtained by The DayLight.

In March, President Joseph Boakai appointed Isaac Grigsby, an 80-year-old resident of New Jersey, on the FDA board. Since then, Grigsby has been receiving board-sitting fees through Gabriel Flaboe, a project coordinator at the Ministry of Public Works.

Grigsby informed FDA Managing Director Rudolph Merab about the payment procedure in May, based on a letter obtained by The DayLight. “You are hereby authorized to issue the board fees in the name of Mr. Gabriel Sarkpa Flaboe each time he [serves as a] proxy for me,” Grigsby wrote.

Accordingly, Merab forwarded the communication to the Deputy Managing Director for Administration and Finance Victor Kpaiseh to process Grigsby’s payment. “Please act accordingly,” Merab requested on May 13.

That same day, Flaboe received L$131,625, the equivalent of US$500 for sitting fees, US$50 for communication and 25 gallons of fuel for transportation.

The board of directors, which comprises seven other people, is crucial to the running of the FDA. It has oversight over the formulation of regulations, codes and manuals governing the forestry sector. It provides direction for the FDA, passes resolutions and approves the agency’s organizational structure.

A letter Isaac Grigsby wrote to the Forestry Development Authority appointing Gabriel Sarkpa Flaboe to receive board sitting fees on his behalf.
One of the checks Gabriel Sarkpa Flaboe, Sr. received on behalf of Isaac Grigsby, a member of the FDA board of directors

And the stakes are even higher now, with widespread violations and forest degradation, while the sector struggles to generate revenue.

Quorum

The board does not have a code or bylaw regulating its activities. However, Grigsby collecting board payments while residing in a foreign country violates the FDA Act of 1976. The law requires payment for directors who sit in board meetings, not absent ones through proxies.

In fact, it has a provision for absent board directors. “They may receive [from] the authority a stipend for each meeting attended and reimbursement for all expenses they incur in discharging their duties to the authority,” the law states. “A quorum for any meeting of the Board shall be a majority of its members.”

FDA Managing Director Rudolph Merab did not respond to queries for comment on the matter. Merab’s failure to respond comes barely a month after he bragged of denying journalists required access to public information and evading interviews.

“I don’t run my office in the press but when there is something like I told people I would call a press conference,” Merab told a media event last December. “I will speak once and I will try to make myself clear. After that, I will not speak again.”

Flaboe positively identified Grigsby in a photo The DayLight downloaded from Grigsby’s Facebook page. He said Grisby was his uncle. However, he did not answer why he was receiving board-sitting fees for his uncle who does not live in Liberia, and whether Grigsby was sharing the board fees with him.

Similarly, Grigsby did not respond to queries.

This story was a production of the Community of Forest and Environmental Journalists of Liberia (CoFEJ).

123Page 3 of 3

Podcasts

ABOUT US

The DayLight is a nonprofit, environmental news website. Our evidence-based, independent and quality news contents tell..... read more

FOLLOW US

© The DayLight