Fugitive Businessman Abandons Logs in Cape Mount

June 19, 2022

Top: Logs, abandoned by Alma Wood in Vanjah Village, Grand Cape Mount County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

By James Harding Giahyue and Varney Kamara

Editor’s Note: This is the second of a series on the aftermaths of timber sale contracts (TSCs) across the country, which were canceled in March 2021 following years of illegitimacy.

VANJAH VILLAGE – The company of a Lebanese businessman fleeing the law abandoned an unspecified number of logs in Grand Cape Mount County, with the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) doing little to address the problem, an investigation by The DayLight has found.

In 2018, Alma Wood Corporation (Liberia), co-owned by El Zein Hassan, abandoned the woods in a small-scale logging concession in the Gola Konneh and Porkpa Districts of Grand Cape Mount County. Hassan fled the country the following year over a debt lawsuit with Afriland Bank, leaving the logs unattended in different locations in the area.

“There are many logs left abandoned and damaged in the bush,” Aaron Quaye, a community leader, told The DayLight. There are over 5,000 cubic meters [of logs] in the forests.”

This reporter saw scores of the woods scattered across the forest, the company’s log yard in a town called Mafalla, another town named Gohn and Vanjah Village. Some locals were burning the logs to make charcoal in Mafalla. Quaye said there were more logs in forests but The DayLight could not reach them due to the difficult road network in that region.

The DayLight’s calculation of the company’s official production and export records between 2018 and 2020 shows that it did not ship 519.267 cubic meters of logs it harvested in that area. That number could be more, given that the records only show the company’s 2018 production in the concession affecting Vanjah Village and Benduma town, where Quaye lives, not the forest around Bong Village, where Alma Wood also operated.

Woods are abandoned if they are “unattended” between 15 and 180 working days depending on their location, according to Regulation 116-17 on Abandoned Log, Timber and Timber Products. It was created in 2017 and repealed certain sections of Regulation 108-07 that narrowed the definition for “abandoned logs” as logs outside a contract area without tracking barcodes.

The regulation requires the FDA to notify the public over a long period once it learns of the situation. Ruth Varney, the agency’s representative in the western region, confirmed to DayLight the community had told her about the abandoned logs.

Logs Alma Wood abandoned in a forest not far from Vanjah Village in the Porkpa District of Grand Cape Mount County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

In April earlier this year, the FDA gave all logging companies a one-month period to declare logs they have harvested as it takes inventory of probably abandoned logs countrywide. That deadline has expired a month ago and the agency said it would begin auctioning the woods this month.

“Those who did not remove their logs as per the stipulated time, the lawyer will now go to the court to seek judicial action to have the logs confiscated the auctioned,” said FDA’s Managing Director Mike Doryen in a rare interview with The DayLight. “That is a problem that we must solve.”

It was unclear whether the FDA has exhausted a mandatory process in the regulation in order to auction the controversial logs, taking 114 working days or just under six months. Within this time, it needs to investigate, possibly remove the woods to a safe location and make several public notices through the media and its website. It is only when no one claims the logs after that process that the FDA can obtain a court warrant for the auction. Doryen did not show any evidence that these things have been done.

Locals are using some of the woods abandoned by Alma Wood in its log yard in Mafalla, Grand Cape Mount County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

Besides, Alma Wood’s own legal nightmare makes it even harder for a normal auctioning. Earlier this year, the FDA disapproved a deal for the logs to be sold to East End, a company owned by former Minister of Justice Cllr. Benedict Sannoh, over Alma Wood’s lawsuit. The agency learned that the logs had been used as collateral for Sky Insurance Company to pay the bail for Hassan’s release by the Commercial Court in Monrovia.

Hassan had taken a US643,000 loan from Afriland Bank missed several payment deadlines, according to several people familiar with the case (all parties to the case denied The DayLight access to court filings and an interview). Hassan would escape the country thereafter. Efforts by The DayLight to contact him or representatives of the company were not successful.

It is not just Hassan’s dealing with the court that is unlawful. Alma Wood’s operations in Porkpa and Gola Konneh are also illegal. Five-thousand-hectare logging concessions, known across the forestry sector as timber sale contracts (TSCs), are meant for only firms with at least 51 percent Liberian shareholdings. The company’s two operations in Cape Mount were some of five illegal deals the FDA signed or sanctioned that we and the Community of Forest and Environmental Journalists (CoFEJ) exposed as part of an investigation on TSC across the country. The one in Quaye’s community is called TSC A11 and the other one is TSC A16. Hassan and Radwan Darwiche, a Senegalese man, equally share the company’s 500 stocks, according to its legal documents. It had been subcontracted to the two TSCs in 2016 by Bassa Logging Company, a Liberian firm, and Sun Yeun, a 98 percent Chinese-owned firm, which also breaks the National Forestry Reform Law.

The two TSCs and nine others in Cape Mount, Grand Bassa, Gbarpolu and Bong County overstayed their legal timeframe of at least five years. All lasted for more than a decade combining to establish some of the most chaotic forest licenses of the postwar era.

Josephus Bank, the CEO and co-owner (one percent shareholder) of Sun Yeun claimed that the company had changed shareholders in an interview with us but did not present any evidence. The company has not changed shareholders since its formation in 2008, the documents we obtained from the Liberian Business Registry show. He blamed the FDA for the abandonment of the logs.

Quaye said Clarence Massaquoi, the CEO and co-owner of Bassa Logging, visited the forest last month with an “investor.” Massaquoi did not respond to specific queries on the matter in a WhatsApp chat.

“FDA contributed to those logs being there today. When Alma Wood’s contract expired, I wrote the FDA informing it about logs being [in the forest]. FDA delayed and I wanted to sell at the time,” Banks said in that interview relative to the logs in TSC A16. The FDA refuted that claim.

A pile of logs that Alma Wood abandoned in Vanjah Village, Grand Cape Mount County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

Massaquoi faces a heavy penalty to redeem the logs amid Hassan’s escape, under the regulation on abandoned logs. He is required to first pay an administrative fee associated with, including the probable transport, storage, security and public notification associated with the woods. Penalties include a payment two times the volume of the logs in question by the legal fees for their stumps. Stumpage fees are calculated based on percentages of the international prices of categories of logs. The regulation was formulated to minimize the waste of forest resources and compel legal compliance in the harvesting and shipment of logs.

Quaye, who savored an opportunity to join his community’s forest management leadership in 2016, just before Alma Wood signed an agreement with them, said they were the biggest losers in everything. FDA had canceled all TSCs in March last year but did not see to it that communities get their benefits, leaving Alma Wood indebted to him and other villagers. Bassa Logging/Alma Wood owes affected communities US$56,550 in land-related fees, according to official documents. It did not pay villagers a cent for the trees it felled, fees for scholarships and a handpump, Quaye said.

“We regret all these things that are happening to our community,” Quaye said. “We are regretting because it takes so many years for trees to get mature in the forest. Our forest is depleted without any benefit that communities can point to.”

The FDA told an annual meeting of forestry players in March earlier this year that it would work with the union of community leaderships to address overdue payments and other benefits. He restated that in our interview with him.

“We didn’t do that (addressing benefits and other issues),” Doryen said, “but we will do it now.”

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

FDA Watches As Company Abandons ‘5,000’ Logs in Nimba

May 3, 2022

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Top: The International Consultant Capital has abandoned thousands of logs in the Gbi-Doru District. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

By James Harding Giahyue

GBI-DORU DISTRICT, Nimba County – Sylvester Garsaynee might have been elected chairman of a group that represents the interest of locals in a logging concession in one of Liberia’s most forested regions. However, he has been welcomed by an estimated 5,000 abandoned logs and outstanding payments and projects, which burdened his predecessor in the last three years.

Between 2018 and 2019, the International Consultant Capital (ICC) felled the logs in the Gbi-Doru Administrative District and the Gbier & Gblor Chiefdom. But it abandoned the logs in the forest ever since amid a row with the community over a bridge, with the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) taking no actions mandated by forestry laws and regulations to avoid waste of the woods.

ICC had signed a social agreement with villagers in 2016 as part of its 25-year concession with the Liberian government in 2009, known across the logging industry as Forest Management Contract K or FMC-K Nimba. It covers 127,842 hectares in the northeastern county and extends 40,887 hectares in River Cess and 98,181 hectares in Grand Gedeh. The contract lasts for 25 years but affected towns and villagers must elect new members to their community forest management committee every five years and review their agreement with the company. That is how Garsaynee entered the fray.

“The first thing we are going to do is to make sure the logs are transported from the bush,” Garsaynee told The DayLight in a mobile phone interview from Glahn’s Town, the headquarters of the community forest leadership.

“After that, we will work with the company to make sure it pays the cubic meter fees, the scholarship fees and other fees it owes us,” he added. In forestry, cubic meter fees are the product of the total diameters of all the harvested logs and a particular rate set in an agreement, US$2.25 in this case.

The past leadership of the community had demanded the German company repaired the facility after a log bridge the company built collapsed. The metal passage over Gwen Creek connects the only other road in the area. But when efforts by the pair to sign a memorandum of understanding over the bridge failed, the community asked the FDA to auction the logs and share the proceeds with the community.

“We are of the conviction that those resources are meant to enhance the livelihood of the communities and to generate taxes for the national government,” Jerry Gbaye Sr., whom Garsaynee would replace, wrote in a letter to FDA Managing Director Mike Doryen in November last year. That request was not granted.

Though the logs are abandoned, it is much harder for them to be auctioned, according to FDA’s Regulation 116-17. Depending on their location, logs are abandoned if they are left unattended between 15 and 180 working days, the law requires. But the FDA can only auction it if no one claims them following months of the legal notice and a court warrant, which our investigation showed has not been done in this case.

The FDA investigated the situation itself in August 2020 as part of an “assessment of abandoned logs in concession areas in region three” (Grand Bassa River Cess and Nimba). It found that ICC had abandoned 3,066 pieces or 18,272.158 cubic meters of logs and that some of the unattended logs had been “sold to a local sawmill/mini-mart operator.

“Logging contract holders are not doing much to minimize the incidence of abandoned logs,” the report said at the time. “Much needed revenue that government requires for national development has been lost due to the unprecedented abandonment of the assorted round logs by logging companies.”

The DayLight could not independently verify the number of abandoned logs. The FDA denied us access to the company’s production record, despite forestry laws and regulations guaranteeing public access to such information. Gbaye and other community leaders we interviewed put the number to over 7,000 but did not show any proof.

Also, the FDA imposed no fines on ICC for abandoning the logs, a violation of Regulation 116-17. The regulation calls for grave penalties for an act that “intentionally or negligently causes any logs, timber or timber products to become abandoned.” Penalties include a payment three times the prices of the total volume of species of abandoned logs at the world market price and forfeiture of either a company’s harvesting or export certificate. Created in October 2017, the statute’s purpose is to minimize the waste of forest resources and compel legal compliance in the harvesting and shipment of logs, timbers and timber projects.

‘We are waiting’

In March, the community and company met to resolve their dispute, according to minutes of a mediatory meeting, conducted by the Liberia Timber Association, the FDA and the National Union of Community Forest Development Committee.

Chris Bailey, ICC’s representative at the resolution meeting in Glahn’s Town, accused the community of demanding the company to pay US$1 million before using the bridge, according to the minutes.

Gbaye denies that accusation, saying the amount was an estimated cost of the project, not a fee for the community.

Garsaynee said the company agreed to repair the bridge and conducted a feasibility study on the facility shortly after he replaced Gbaye. “We are waiting on them,” he said. “Everything is now in their hands.”

The DayLight has reached out to Cesare Colombo, ICC’s CEO, for comments. ICC is owned by the estate of the late Liberian businessman Mulbah Willie and the Liberia Wood Industry, a subsidiary of the Liberian Investment Association Limited and Nimarks International Corporation, the articles of incorporation of the companies show.

A log is seen with a chain of custody identification number in Forest Management Contract Area K – Nimba County the International Consultant Capital (ICC) operates. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

Apart from the abandoned logs, ICC has failed to live up to a social agreement it signed with the community. It has not paved a major road linking Glahn’s Town to Dorgbor Town, Gbi-Doru’s headquarters. It has yet to provide four overdue handpumps as per the deal. It has ceased to pay an annual US$6,500 for scholarships since 2018 and has not held mandatory, quarterly meetings with locals since 2019, our investigation showed.

Beginning 2020, the community had written Colombo, FDA, and other stakeholders in the forestry sector on the overdue payments and projects, letters The DayLight saw indicate. In a letter to Doryen on April 16 last year, the community said ICC’s failure to meet up with its obligations “has posed a severe embarrassment to communities’ projects, [ongoing] construction and… projects that should have been already in process.” Overdue payment is a violation of forestry laws and regulations. It is a pre-qualification requirement for licenses, shipment permits, and a ground for the cancellation of contracts.

Bailey blames the company’s failure on illicit chainsaw millers and farming activities in the contracted forest, according to minutes of the mediatory meeting. He falsely claims that the Glahn’s-Town-Dorgbor-Town road is not in their agreement. “The road will commence from Glahn’s Town to Dorgbor Town in the second phase of the social contract…,” the agreement says.

There were signs things are not going as planned following the March meeting of the community and the company. The parties agreed in their Glahn’s Town meeting that they would have met in Monrovia by now to continue their settlement but that has yet to happen.

The FDA did not reply to our queries for comments. We wrote Doryen a letter to that effect in January this year but did not get a reply. That was after we had emailed the top managers of the agency on the matter in December last year. Weedor Gray, the technical manager of the community forestry department, also did not respond to queries regarding the outstanding meeting between the community and the company.

Funding for this story was provided by the Civil Society Independent Forest Monitors (CS-IFM). The DayLight maintained complete editorial independence over its content.

River Cess Community Seeks To Cancel Logging Contract

February 8, 2024

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Top: Logs EJ&J Logging Company abandoned in the Ziadue & Teekpeh Community Forest. The DayLight/Esau J. Farr

By Esau J. Farr

ZAMMIE TOWN – Villagers in River Cess County have made efforts to cancel a contract it has with a logging company over unpaid benefits and unfulfilled promises.

EJ&J Investment Corporation signed a 15-year contract with Ziadue & Teekpeh in 2018. However, five years after logging in the 24,649-hectare forest, the company has failed to live up to the agreement.

“The community said [it is] not willing to work with EJ&J again and therefore has decided to cancel its contract,” said Philip Tarweah, chief officer of Ziadue & Teekpeh’s community forest management body (CFMB).

EJ&J owes the community more than US$72,000 for land rental, harvesting, scholarships and clinic support funds, according to our calculations as of November last year.

EJ&J failed to construct 16 handpumps and pit latrines each within major towns of the Kploh Chiefdom, where the forest lies. It also did not construct the two schools it promised the community.

In the last three years, Ziadue & Teekpeh has made several failed attempts to get their benefits.

In a June 21, 2021 letter obtained by The DayLight, the community sought a meeting with the company the following month. However, EJ&J did not honor the invitation, according to the townspeople.

The parties finally met three months after and the company promised eight handpumps in five months but has not delivered for more than a year.

Stanley Whilzar, EJ&J’s general coordinator, blames his company’s failure on the coronavirus outbreak.

“When it comes to the pit latrines, the elementary schools…, when we entered the first and second years [it was] when we experienced the COVID-19,” Whilzard said. “We couldn’t lay our hands on those projects.”

Whilzar’s remarks are not backed by facts.

Records of the FDA show EJ & J, harvested 2,150 logs or 13,275 cubic meters of logs from 2020 to 2021, during the height of the pandemic.

There is no evidence that EJ&J declared force majeure to suspend its operations and debts. No logger company did.

‘…More logs in the forest’

The DayLight photographed several large piles of logs EJ&J abandoned in the forest for more than two years. The logs were scattered on both ends of the grassy road that leads to the community forest.

A former worker of the company, who asked for anonymity for fear of reprisal, pointed at several locations in the forest where he said logs were. Villagers corroborated the ex-worker’s story.

“They have felled more logs into the forest, more than 10,000 logs. They are just wasting there,” said Abraham Wizard, a forest leader in Ziadue & Teekpeh.

EJ&J production records appear to support Wizard and other townspeople’s comments. Not one of the 2,150 logs it harvested during COVID-19 has been exported, the records show.

“We have been informing the company and FDA but they are not doing anything about it,” Wizard added.

The FDA did not respond to queries on the issue. However, the agency announced last November it would begin the process of auctioning abandoned logs across the country. It had made that pronouncement at least two times in the past and failed to take any concrete actions.

The FDA shares the blame for what has happened with Ziadue & Teekpeh.

FDA ignored the recommendations of a government-backed report in 2012 by approving EJ&J’s contract with Ziadue & Teekpeh.

Investigators of the Private Use Permit (PUP) Scandal had asked the FDA to set up a panel to assess EJ&J’s financial and logistical capacities before awarding it future contracts.

Investigators uncovered that Eliza Kronyanh, EJ&J’s owner, did not have the financial means to operate independently. They gathered evidence that her company signed contracts only to subcontract to other companies, exploiting locals.

[Additional reporting by Aaron Geezay in River Cess]

Funding for this story was provided by the Kyeema Foundation and Palladium. It was a production of the Community of Forest and Environmental Journalists of Liberia (CoFEJ).

The Illegal Return of a Wartime Logger

October 2, 2023

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Top: A graphic depicting the illegal involvement of Gabriel Doe in the logging industry during and after the Liberian civil wars. The DayLight/Rebazar D. Forte

By Emmanuel Sherman and James Harding Giahyue

KPANYAN DISTRICT, Sinoe County – In 2016, Numopoh Community Forest leased 7,220 hectares of forestland to Delta Timber Company.

Instead of the forest in Sinoe’s Kpanyan District, Delta harvested logs in another area of the woodland, an investigation by an NGO found two years later. It abandoned logs in the forest and at the Ross Port of Greenville, Sinoe County. Then it failed to live up to the agreement with Numopoh.

But all of this would not have happened had the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) disapproved the agreement. The involvement of Gabriel Doe, Delta’s owner, in the logging industry before and during Liberia’s bloody civil wars means he should not participate in forestry.

Doe owned the Cavalla Timber Corporation, one of 17 logging companies that either supported militias, participated in or facilitated the war. An estimated 250,000 people died during the carnage and about a million were displaced.

“Logging revenue was unlawfully used by political elites and warring factions to fund armed conflict[s],” said the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). “Logging companies shipped or facilitated shipments of weapons and other military materials to warring factions.”

Cavalla had an affiliation with the notorious Oriental Timber Corporation (OTC), owned by convicted war criminal Guus Kowenhoven, who traded illegal Liberian timbers and supplied guns to then-President Charles Taylor.

In 2001, the United Nations imposed a travel ban and assets freeze on Doe, Taylor, Kowenhoven and more than 100 other individuals linked to the Taylor regime, which took over a decade to be lifted. Two years after the travel ban, the United Nations sanctioned Liberian logs. The sanctions were intended to break the connection between the individuals and Liberia’s natural resources, and arms smuggling, the UN said at the time.

Following a rigorous reform process, the UN lifted the sanctions on Liberian timber in 2006. The Liberian government canceled the contracts of Cavalla and other companies over irregularities as part of the reform.

Gabriel Doe illegally obtained a logging contract though he and other wartime loggers are debarred from participating in forestry, according to the Regulation on Bidders Qualification. Picture Credit: Facebook/Gabriel Doe Doe

But to prevent future “blood timber,” “conflict timber” or “logs of war,” the reform agenda partially debars wartime loggers from the ravaged industry. It empowered local communities to enter into contracts and benefit from their forests.

An Illegal Re-entry

Apparently inspired by Cavalla, his old company, Doe established Delta in 2012. He holds 60 percent of Delta’s shares, with the rest outstanding, according to its article of incorporation.

Doe did not only have a relationship with former President Charles Taylor. He might have also allied with former President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who led the country when Delta was established. In her 2009 memoir, This Child Will Be Great, Mrs. Sirleaf claimed she secretly boarded Doe’s airplane to escape from late President Samuel K. Doe (No relation to Gabriel Doe). Gabriel Doe denies that story.

With his paperwork in hand, Gabriel Doe headed to Sinoe’s Kpanyan District, a region in which he had worked many years ago. He had begun his logging career in Nimba in the early 1970s with another company, he told The DayLight in an interview in Monrovia. Cavalla had also worked in the southeastern region in the 1980s up to the early 2000s.

Villagers knew Doe’s past but he assured them it was a new beginning, Sam Kainde, the head of Numopoh’s leadership, told The DayLight.

“He told our people at this time that there is [National Forestry Reform Law] and [Community Rights Law of 2009 with Respect to Forest Land] that [are] going to [protect] the community so, what they used to do had passed,” Kainde said. “Our people grasped it in their minds.”

But it was the beginning of the community’s postwar nightmare.

The logging industry fueled the two Liberian civil wars, according to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). Picture credit: Teun Voeten

In December 2018, just two years into the agreement, Volunteer to Support International Effort Developing Africa (VOSIEDA), an NGO, found the company harvested 500 logs outside its contract area. VOSIEDA’s report referenced an investigation by Global Witness in 2017, which captured the illegal felling and other accusations.

The FDA did not punish the company. Per the Regulation on Confiscated Logs, Timber and Timber Products, the FDA should have obtained a search warrant, confiscated the logs in question and auctioned them. It should have fined Delta two times the official price of the logs, a six-month prison term or both, according to the regulation. The FDA did not respond to The DayLight’s queries for this story.

Delta paid Numopoh just under US$1,000 for the illegal harvesting and US$4,963.75 for a one-year land rental fee, according to a receipt of the payment. It owes nearly US$20,000 in land rental and harvesting fees, based on the receipt and the agreement.

Delta has also failed to complete a school, establish a sawmill, and erect a clinic. It has not funded Numopoh’s scholarship program in line with the agreement.

In fact, in all, Delta has only paved a 26-kilometer dirt road.

Delta is one of the most dormant, failing to renew its business registration since June 2021, records at the Liberia Business Registry show.

Delta has abandoned nearly all of the logs it harvested, another violation. Between 2018 and 2021, it produced 1,624.521 cubic meters of logs. However, it only managed to export 237.178 cubic meters or just 41 logs, according to the LEITI, citing company and FDA figures. Some of the logs have rotted at the Port of Greenville, others are scattered in the Numopoh forest.

A receipt from Numopoh to Delta Timber Corporation shows the company paid the community US$5,961.75 in 2017 and 2018.

Doe wrongly claims that the logs are not abandoned.

“They were not abandoned,” Doe told The DayLight. “If you decide to operate in the port, you request for an area and you stockpile the logs until the vessel comes in.”

Doe’s claims are not backed by facts. Under the Regulation on Abandoned Logs, Timber and Timber Products, logs cannot stay more than one-and-a-half months at a port. The regulation came a year after the Numopoh-Delta agreement to curtail the waste of timber but has not been enforced.

Several logs Delta Timber Company left at the Port of Greenville, Sinoe County have now decayed. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

Numopoh and DELTA might have acted illegally by signing an agreement. However, the FDA broke its own law by approving it. The Regulation on Bidder Qualifications requires the FDA to disqualify businesspeople connected to the logging industry before 2006 unless they fully and honestly confess their deeds to the TRC.

Doe claims he received a certificate from the TRC after he appeared. “If I didn’t comply, [the] FDA would not have permitted me to do logging…,” Doe told The DayLight.

Proving or disproving Doe’s appearance is difficult, as he is not mentioned in the TRC report and most of the commission’s archives remain sealed until 2029. However, journalists who covered the commission and former commissioners, communication staffers and data clerks deny Doe’s claim.

But appearing before the TRC is not the only condition for wartime loggers to participate in forestry today. The qualification regulation requires wartime loggers to restitute funds that the government lost as a result of their illegalities. Interestingly, they must pledge they would not repeat their illegal dealings. There is no record that Doe did so.

The TRC aside, the FDA has illegally approved a number of contracts for companies whose owners are ineligible. For instance, it approved a contract for a company owned by Deputy Foreign Minister Comfort Thelma Duncan Sawyer, one owned by a rogue company owner and another by the then-Minister of Posts and Telecommunications Cllr. Cooper Kruah.

Harrison Karnwea, the Managing Director of the FDA at the time—who approved DELTA’s contract— did not say whether or not Doe appeared before the TRC. Rather, he justified having approved the wartime logger’s contract.

Karnwea suggested he could not be held responsible for the Delta situation. He claims that the FDA is not required by law to have a list of debarred people and companies and that the FDA only witnesses contracts.

“The communities award their contracts to somebody and take the person to the FDA for the FDA to witness the agreement and acknowledge it,” said Karnwea, the current chairman of the agency’s board of directors.

“There is no such thing as [a] debarment list,” he added.

Karnwea’s claims are not based on the facts. The qualification regulation mandates the FDA to keep a list of debarred persons in addition to a list the Public Procurement and Concession Committee (PPCC) should make.

The National Forestry Reform Law requires the FDA to make sure that companies generally meet the threshold to conduct logging in Libera. Issues include individuals’ financial and technical capabilities, human rights and criminal records, integrity and government affiliation.

A screenshot of the page of the Regulation on Bidders Qualification mandates the FDA to keep a list of debarred individuals.

Contrary to Karnwea’s claim, the FDA does not witness community forest contracts. It approves—and can disapprove—them, based on the qualification regulation.

Karnwea’s apparent excuse that it was not his responsibility to prequalify companies does not hold. “The Managing Director shall be professionally qualified in forestry, the act that established the FDA says. “He shall be responsible for the conduct of the general operation of the Authority…”

Termination

Following those years of rigmarole, Numopoh is seeking an end to the contract with Delta. Kainde accuses Doe, who has been away in the Ivory Coast, of holding the forest hostage.

“Given the fact that the agreement has ended and the company has failed to fulfill its financial obligations, the community has decided that it will not renew its agreement with Delta,” Kainde wrote to the FDA in July. “The FDA should therefore not engage in any dealing with Delta regarding the Numopoh [agreement].”

The community’s action is not lawful. To end their relationship with Delta, locals will have to go through an arbitration process, according to the agreement. The arbitration panel comprises three persons, one each from the disputed parties and a third from the FDA.

Doe wants to continue with the agreement despite being indebted to the community.

Kainde told The DayLight Numopoh already engaged an attorney.

“We will seek legal advice for the way forward if FDA does not give us the authorization,” said Kainde.

[Konwroh Wesseh contributed to this story]

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

FDA Authorized Firm’s Illegal Harvest on Private Land

August 21, 2023

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Top: A graphic depicting an elder, illegal logs, abandoned logs and camp, and harvesting maps from an unlawful plan the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) approved. The DayLight/Rebazar Forte

By Esau J. Farr

CONIWEIN, Grand Bassa County – One day in late 2020, Abednego Davies spotted some loggers felling trees on the way to his farm.

The forest does not fall within the Marblee & Karblee Community Forest so, what were they doing there, Davies thought to himself. The land belongs to Coniwein a section in the Marblee Clan in Grand Bassa’s District Number Two.

Surprised and suspicious, Davies headed back to his village and told the elders, who proved his suspicion was right. In no time, the elders summoned a representative of the African Wood and Lumber Company and halted the illegal operations.

African Wood conceded it encroached on the villagers’ territory and began to negotiate to continue but that would not happen, according to documents The DayLight obtained and elders we interviewed.

The elders knew the harvesting was happening on the Coniwein’s land and so it was illegal. Back in 2019, Coniwein had opted to be part of the Marblee & Karblee Community Forest but African Wood refused, according to Gonaweh Gbiahgaye, one of the elders. The following year, the elders had warned African Wood from their land while the company prepared to harvest.

“Coniwein is a section with a substantial deed, which, if you want to do anything, you should meet the citizens,” villagers said in a May 2020 letter to African Wood at the time. Coniwein’s land covers 6,760 acres, a copy of the community’s deed, seen by The DayLight, shows.

Having ignored Coniwein’s warning, African Wood now tried to convince the elders to continue the illegal operations. A meeting by the parties ended in deadlock, according to Gbiahgaye.

The elders wrote Joshua Howard, a manager of the African Wood, rejecting its proposal to keep the logs in question and cut additional ones. Then they asked the company to pay for the logs it had harvested.

“We are telling you not to touch any of the logs or cut down any logs until we all meet and come down to one conclusion,” the January 2021 letter read.

The DayLight photographed the stumps of trees of African Wood and Lumber illegally harvested in Coniwein private forest in Grand Bassa County. The DayLight/Harry Browne

Such negotiation is prohibited in forestry. Communities are under a legal obligation to inform the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) in such matters, according to the Regulation on Confiscated Logs, Timber and Timber Products. It requires the FDA to investigate and seek a court’s approval to confiscate and then auction the logs in question. It also sets a penalty for logging outside a contract area.

But amid their rowdy negotiation, a huge pile of the illegal logs adjacent to Davies’ farm disappeared between March and July, according to some villagers.

African Wood had taken the logs not long after Davies discovered the illegal operations, former workers of the company said. One account had it that the company smuggled the woods overnight. However, The DayLight could not independently verify the claim.

“When they felled the logs, they took some and some remained in the bush. Our work was to extract logs from the bush for the company,” said David, whose duties included fastening the tags bearing barcodes to the logs.

Another former worker, Daniel Muopoe, corroborated the account. He said, “[African Wood] felled our logs from our community but they never carried [all of them].”

A handwritten letter from Coniwein to African Wood, warning the company against its encroachment on the community’s land. The DayLight/Esau J. Farr

In total, African Wood harvested about 200 logs, according to Muopoe and other ex-workers who participated in the illegal operations.

A team of reporters from The DayLight photographed and videotaped some of the logs in a forest near a town called Wayglon before and after the disappearance. White tags clearly brandishing “African Wood & Lumber Company” were attached to the wood. Some standing trees had tags on them, suggesting they had been earmarked for harvesting. Felled trees lay in the forest in a number of locations, some rotting.

With no logs nor money and three years after Davies’ discovery, Coniwein has decided to inform the FDA about the incident.

Actually, elders attempted to inform the agency but a townsman tasked to lodge a complaint did not do so. “I have not gone to the FDA because I don’t know how to get to them,” Patrick Karngbo, who serves as Coniwein’s land administrator, told The DayLight.

What Coniwein did not know was that the FDA had authorized the harvesting on their land.

The FDA had illegally granted African Wood and six other companies access to excess forests to harvest in short timeframes. The most infamous of the seven was the West African Forest Development Incorporated (WAFDI). A Ministry of Justice investigation discovered WAFDI had harvested the illicit forest area for nearly three years, exporting thousands of round logs.

Gonaweh Gbiahgaye, an elder of Coniwein Section in District Number Two, Grand Bassa County. The DayLight/Harry Browne

But African Wood’s harvesting of the illegal FDA-approved forest area remained unreported—until now.

African Wood’s harvesting plan for 2019-2020 shows the FDA authorized the company to cut trees on 5,600 hectares. However, the plan further shows that 6.95 percent of the FDA-approved area was outside Marblee & Karblee, including in Coniwein.

Doryen wrongly claimed in the letter that the plan conformed with the Guideline for Forest Management Planning and the Regulation on Pre-felling Requirements. “After thorough review… by the joint team…, we hereby approve said plan, having met all basic requirements,” Doryen wrote African Wood’s CEO Cesare Colombo on June 17, 2019.

On the contrary, the plan broke all those legal instruments. Doryen did not respond to questions The DayLight emailed to him for this story.

African Wood’s operations in Coniwein are not the company’s first logging offense.

In December 2020, the company harvested 550 logs in a forest in River Cess without the FDA’s approval. The FDA replaced a ranger in responsible for that region but did not take any known required action against the firm.

Adjacent to Coniwein’s woodland, African Wood has neglected the Marblee & Karblee Community Forest, leaving the landowners with about a US$140,000 debt and abandoning 2,682 logs, according to official records.

Colombo did not respond to questions for comments.

FDA Axes Illegal Loggers and Wasteful Companies

May 9, 2023

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Top: The headquarters of the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) in Paynesville. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

By James Harding Giahyue

MONROVIA – The Forestry Development Authority (FDA) has banned a Turkish logging company and barred its shareholders for illegal logging activities in Liberia, the agency said in a press release on Tuesday.

The FDA said Askon Liberia General Trading Limited abused its sawmill license and extracted and exported timber. The agency said it would recommend prosecution for its owners: Hassan, Yetar and Faith Uzan.

“The permit issued required Askon to source logs from legal sources and not engage in the informal harvesting of logs,” the FDA said. “The investigation into the whereabouts of these individuals will progress, and subsequent actions will be recommended or referred to the justice system of Liberia.”

Askon Illegal operation campsite between Ganta and Sanniquellie, Nimba County. The DayLight/Gerald C. Koinyeneh

Askon’s illegal operations were exposed by The DayLight in March. The report said Askon ran an illegal operation in Nimba County in which it harvested and smuggled timber in containers. It named Assistant Minister of Trade Peter Somah as an accomplice. The FDA said it took the report “seriously.”

Hasan Uzan, Askon’s majority shareholder, did not immediately respond to questions for comment on this story.

The FDA also said it took action against logging companies for stockpiling logs across the country. Companies abandon logs when they do not attend to the woods between three weeks and six months, depending on their location, according to the Regulation on Abandoned Logs, Timber and Timber Products.

The agency announced it has suspended the harvesting certificates of Mandra Forestry, Ruby Light Forestry and Atlantic Resources. A recent report by The DayLight found Mandra abandoned some 7,000 logs from its contract with the Sewacajua Community Forest. Ruby Light Forestry, which operates in a large concession that extends to Grand Gedeh, has perhaps the largest field of abandoned logs in the country. Holding a logging concession covering Maryland, River Gee and Grand Kru, Atlantic Resources has abandoned a host of logs, including decayed ones in an open field in Greenville, Sinoe County.

This drone photo shows some of Mandra’s abandoned logs outside Greenville, Sinoe County

“This decision is prompted by the failure of these companies to honor the mandate from the FDA to enroll all logs harvested in LiberTrace,” the FDA said. LiberTrace is the system to tracks logs from their sources to final destinations.

Companies that have abandoned logs but do not have harvesting certificates will not be allowed to fell any trees until they export the wood, the FDA said.

The agency said it had initiated actions to confiscate abandoned logs. According to it, the action will deter companies from further harvesting logs without exporting them, one of the most common forestry violations today. Under the law, the FDA must petition a court to confiscate and auction abandoned logs.

“Companies in both categories, suspended certificates and otherwise, may be subject to further [penalties]…,” the FDA said.

Representatives of the three companies did not return WhatsApp messages for their sides of the story. However, in April, Augustine Johnson, Mandra’s manager, falsely argued the logs were not abandoned because they were durable, and that he had already paid the royalties on them. “Before you talk about abandonment. I am expecting a ship to come to Greenville by the second week in next month to get the logs out,” Johnson told The DayLight in a phone interview at the time.

A screenshot of pictures showing decayed logs Atlantic Resources Limited harvested and kept in a log yard in Greenville, Sinoe County. The DayLight/Eric Opa Doue

In January, Massaquoi Robert, a transport supervisor of Ruby Light, too, wrongly argued that the company had abandoned no logs.

“We’re defacing the logs you see there. We have sales contracts right now,” Robert said at the time. “My logs are not rotten. You are not a logger, I say my logs are useful.”

Deputy Foreign Minister Runs An Illegal Logging Company

April 16, 2023

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Top: A drone shot of logs in a log yard just outside Greenville, Sinoe County. The DayLight/Derick Snyder

By Eric Opa Doue and James Harding Giahyue

Deputy Foreign Minister for Administration Thelma Comfort Duncan Sawyer controls Tetra Enterprise, a logging company operating in a community forest in River Cess County. That is according to documents The DayLight obtained, and her lawyer

That violates the Liberian laws, including the Constitution, the Code of Conduct for Public Officials and the National Forestry Reform Law

Sawyer could well be the owner of the Tetra. Her lawyer claims her family established Tetra as a “fallback position.” The company is legally owned by a woman named Annabel Morris. However, Tetra has a bearer share that is held by an unregistered individual

Liberia’s Business Association Law prohibits bearer shares, which means the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) has illegally approved Tetra’s operations

The company in question owes communities affected by its operation, failed to live up to its agreement with villagers and has abandoned a huge volume of logs

GOZOHN, River Cess – In October 2020, President George Weah appointed Thelma Comfort Duncan Sawyer, the manager/proprietor of Tetra Enterprise Inc., a logging company, as the Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister for Administration. Eight months later in June 2021, the Liberian Senate confirmed her.

But even after assuming office, Sawyer has continued to run Tetra Enterprise’s operations in the Garwin Community Forest of River Cess County’s Morweh District, communications between Sawyer and the community forest’s leadership show. The letters discussed managerial issues: a new agreement, delayed payments, abandoned logs, and failed projects Tetra had promised in their March 2017 agreement for the 36,637-hectare forest.

“On behalf of the community and my family, we [wholeheartedly] welcome you back to Liberia,” read one letter Rev. Benison Sackor, the head of the Garwin Community Forest’s leadership, wrote to Sawyer on November 16 last year.

“Things have been so tied in your absence. We are pleased that you are here,” it added. Frank Nimmo, the chairman of Tetra’s board of directors, replied to Sackor’s letter on Sawyer’s behalf eight days after.

In an interview with The DayLight, Sackor said he addressed every communication for Tetra directly to Sawyer, who “instructs” it what to do. His comments were corroborated by other members of Garwin’s leadership, including Rev. Harry Gueh, the head of its executive committee, the highest decision-making body. William Yeasay, the public relation officer of Tetra, confirmed Sawyer took major decisions for the company.

Running a company while holding a government position contravenes a number of Liberian laws. The National Forest Reform Law debars members of the cabinet from conducting commercial forestry activities. Violators of the law face a fine between US$10,000 and US$25,000, up to three times the sum they received from their companies or a prison term of up to 12 months. Sawyer’s relationship with Tetra is a conflict of interest, a breach of the Liberian Constitution and the Code of Conduct for Public Officials. Penalties for this breach include a suspension or a dismissal.

“[A conflict of interest] hurts a country or any organization because the person having a such conflict of interest is likely not to be objective, but to put [their] personal connection or interest above the collective,” said one lawyer, who asked not to be named.

Former Interim President of Liberia Dr. Amos Sawyer and his wife Thelma Comfort Duncan Sawyer, Deputy Foreign Minister for Administration, created Tetra Enterprise Inc. to bring in extra income for the family, according to Stephen Kai, Thelma Sawyer’s lawyer. Thelma Sawyer runs Tetra Enterprises, which operates in the Garwin Community Forest in River Cess County, according to documents obtained by The DayLight. Picture credit: The Liberian Embassy in the United States.

Sawyer, who has a faculty lounge named after her at a college at the University of Liberia honoring Dr. Amos Sawyer, her late husband, has a history of alleged dishonesty with Garwin. Sawyer had lost a bid to acquire the forest in 2016 Xylopia Incorporated, a company with her registered shares. A 2016 media report and a 2018 Global Witness report alleged she bribed and coerced villagers to sign a deal at the time. The media report by Mongabay alleged Xylopia paid villagers US$150, alcohol and rice for the villagers’ signatures.

In forestry, villagers own adjacent forests and have a right to co-manage them with the Forestry Development Authority (FDA). Illegally, Sawyer’s Xylopia had signed a memorandum of understanding with Garwin even before it legalized that right. The parties agreed that “It is clearly understood that no third party will come between the people of Garwin and Xylopia… It is also understood that Xylopia is the only company that will work with the people of Garwin.” The FDA terminated the deal following a protest. Global Witness used the incident to highlight how businesspeople were undermining community forestry, which was created to benefit locals.

Eventually, Tetra, co-owned by a Liberian woman named Annabel Morris, won the bid for the forest, with harvestable trees covering 96 percent of it. The Global Witness report also alleged Tetra, backed by county authorities, bribed villagers to seal the deal.

‘Fallback Position’

It was unclear how Sawyer ended up at Tetra but there are indications the widow of the fallen Chairman of the Governance Commission co-owns it. The Global Witness report cited unnamed villagers who claimed Tetra was the same as Xylopia. The DayLight obtained two January letters from the Office of the Acting Paramount Chief of Garwin Chiefdom that provide some clues. One of the letters addressed Sawyer and the other Senator Wellington Geevon Smith.

“We write to formally complain to you about the behavior of Tetra, a Logging Company which you introduced to our community as your corporation…,” the letter that addressed Sawyer read. The other one to Smith also restates Thelma Sawyer had allegedly brought the company “to harvest Garwin Community Forest.” Smith did not pick up our call.

Stephen Kai, Thelma Sawyer’s lawyer, claimed that the Sawyer family had created the company as a familial contingency project. “The old man (Dr. Amos Sawyer) decided to establish something as [a] fallback position whenever he [reached] the age of retirement,” Kai said. “[Thelma Sawyer] was doing nothing, so her husband decided, ‘Look you have to do something to see how we can generate extra incomes.’”

The Office of the Paramount Chief of Garwin Chiefdom recognizes Deputy Foreign Minister Thelma Duncan Sawyer as the owner of Tetra Enterprise Inc, co-owned by an unregistered person. Stephen Kai, her lawyer, backs villagers’ claim she co-owns the company, adding her family had established it as a “fallback position.” The company’s only known co-owner is a woman named Annabel Morris, who served as its general manager in 2018.

A page of a handwritten complaint chiefs and elders filed with Monweh Magisterial Court in River Cess County to halt Tetra’s logging operations in the Garwin Community Forest.

Tetra’s Secret Shareholder

Tetra’s shadowy ownership apparently supports Kai’s claims. Morris holds 51 percent of the company’s shares, 19 percent are reserved and 30 percent are bearer shares, according to the company’s article of incorporation. Bearer shares are shares whose holders are not registered or named. Firms pay dividends to the holders of the bearer shares based on an arrangement between the company and the bearer shares holder.

Kai may have simplified Tetra’s complex, shady ownership but he contradicts other facts about the firm. Thelma Sawyer already had Xylopia when Tetra was established, suggesting the Sawyers may have created the latter firm to get Garwin, not generally for extra income as Kai puts it.

But Tetra’s bearer shares make it ineligible for forestry activities in the country, anyways. The Business Association Law as amended in 2020 prohibits bearer shares in Liberia. It compelled firms in the country to convert such shares into registered shares as of December 31, 2020. The change in the law was part of a global effort to abolish bearer shares, which can lead to terrorist financing and tax evasion. It reinforces the reform agenda of Liberian forestry, which debars certain individuals from commercial logging, including human rights violators, embezzlers and fraudsters. It also renders the FDA’s approval of the company’s operations in the last two years and today illegal.

Kai did not comment on the bearer share issue. He, however, said Sawyer had stepped aside and the “day-to-day activities of the company are now being handled by her sister-in-law Esther Sawyer, sister to the late Dr. Amos Sawyer.” He added Nimmo, another relative, had been appointed as the chairman of the company’s board of directors to avoid a conflict of interest.

“We advised her as lawyers and she in fact said to us, ‘Look, any communication or any contact, you deal with… Esther.’ And so that we are aware of. But [did she communicate] that to all the stakeholders? No, I can’t say that,” Kai added. Efforts to get comments from Esther Sawyer and Morris—Tetra’s general manager in 2018, according to FDA records—were unsuccessful.

The involvement of Esther Sawyer and Nimmo with Tetra still remains a violation of the forestry law. Individuals who companies-linked officials have control over are barred from commercial logging activities, too. The law requires government officials to transfer their shares or roles in a company to a blind trust or someone outside their control, not relatives. A blind trust is a firm that manages’ people’s businesses to avoid conflicts of interest.

The FDA again broke the law and the Regulation on Bidders Qualification to authorize Tetra’s operations with the Sawyers’ relatives. The regulation requires to disapprove of logging contracts connected with government officials—or their relatives.

Thelma Sawyer or her relatives aside, the FDA would have broken the regulation if Thelma Sawyer is actually one of Tetra’s owners. Though bearer shares were legal in Liberia in 2017 when Tetra was created, the regulation mandates the FDA to get a full list of companies shareholders. Then the agency can tell whether or not the companies’ owners are on its debarment list.

In 2021, the FDA approved Tetra’s harvesting plan amid conflicts between a map of the plan and another plan for its entire five-year operations in Garwin, according to a report by SGS, a Swiss firm that co-manages Liberia’s log-tracking system. Interestingly, Tetra harvested 4,264 that year it would abandon based on FDA records. The FDA did not respond to emailed questions for comments on this story.

Unfulfilled Promises and Abandoned Logs

Tetra’s bearer shares and links to Thelma Sawyer do not conclude the company’s illegalities.

Tetra has abandoned a large volume of logs. Between 2018 and 2021, Tetra harvested 46,729 cubic meters of logs and only exported just 18,690 cubic meters, according to the Liberia Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (LEITI). Thus, it abandoned 28,039.6 cubic meters of logs, based on The DayLight’s analysis of the LEITI records. It owed US$70,574.93 as of March 31, last year relating to its operations, minutes of a high-profile meeting of forestry actors at the time show.

Tetra has begun work in Garwin in the absence of a new agreement. That is against the Community Rights Law of 2009 with Respect to Forest Lands that created community forestry. The law calls for companies to review their agreements with communities every five years before felling any other trees.

Tetra has not lived up to its agreement with Garwin. As per the agreement, Tetra should have constructed 18 handpumps in Garwin’s 15 towns and villages within its five years of operations. It only constructed two, according to locals. It also failed to build a school in the area, supply drugs to community clinics and build bridges.

Chiefs and elders have lodged a complaint with the Moweh Magisterial Court. “Six years have gone and the company failed to implement the provisions of the contract,” the April 7 complaint read. “We write to seek your intervention to stop all logging activities by the company until the contract is reviewed.”

The Story was a production of the Community of Forest and Environmental Journalists of Liberia (CoFEJ).

New Contract for Rogue Company’s Owner

April 4, 2023

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Top: A collage showing Iroko harvesting activities in October 2022. Picture credit: Iroko Timber and Logging Corporation

By Emmanuel Sherman

KARQUEKPO, Sinoe County – The Forestry Development Authority (FDA) has approved a contract for Iroko Timber and Logging Corporation, a new Nigerian-owned company, to operate the Central Dugbe River Community Forest. The company began logging in the fourth quarter of last year, according to its website and Facebook page.

But there is a problem with Iroko’s Dugbe River deal and operations in the 13,193-hectare forest. Timothy Odebunmi, Iroko’s majority shareholder, is not eligible to conduct logging activities in Liberia over the dishonesty of another company he co-owns.

That firm, Akewa Group of Companies, falsified the tax clearance of a mining company called Tiger Quarry to bid for the Gola Konneh Community Forest in Grand Cape Mount County in 2019. At the time, Akewa paid US$1,000 as a fine for the forgery, a violation of the Revenue Code. Odebunmi holds 50 percent of Iroko’s shares and 20 percent of Akewa’s, according to the articles of incorporation of both firms at the Liberia Business Registry. Iroko’s other shareholders are Samson Odebunmi (45 percent) and Akinsiku Arinkan (5 percent). Abigail Funke Odebunmi (60 percent) and Kenneth Amazeika (20 percent) complete the list of Akewa’s shareholders.

Odebunmi’s co-ownership of Akewa, Iroko, which he co-founded in 2021, should have disqualified the Iroko’s bid for Central Dugbe River. The Regulation on Bidders Qualifications bars individuals whose companies have been convicted or penalized for theft, embezzlement, bribery, tax evasion, false swearing, or forgery. With Akewa having paid a fine for forgery, Odebunmi should not have gotten another logging contract until 2024, according to the regulation.

Akewa with Odebunmi as a shareholder has violated a horde of provisions of forestry laws and regulations. One of the oldest active logging companies, Akewa long line of violations includes its involvement in forestry’s worst post-conflict scandal, in which the FDA criminally awarded 2.5 million hectares of forests to it and other companies. It has a track record of prolonged indebtedness to communities. Currently, it is in an out-of-court settlement with the Beyan Poye Community Forest regarding benefits.

Iroko’s Woes Amid FDA’s Failure

Iroko’s agreement with Central Dugbe River adds to the FDA’s records of failure to enforce forestry legal frameworks. Before then, the FDA had failed to disqualify Akewa over fake tax clearance, which also constitutes perjury under the regulation. It remains Akewa’s only active logging operation, with the Beyan Poye legal issues and the cancelation of a logging contract the company illegally held in Grand Bassa County.

“We prevented Akewa from doing further business until they could provide [their] tax clearance,” said Managing Director Mike Doryen in an interview with The DayLight in June last year. “They rectified it and they paid a fine and that’s how we resumed business with them.” The Bidders Qualification Regulation requires the FDA to disqualify companies that commit forgery and perjury. It did not respond to emailed inquiries for comments.

A screenshot of Iroko’s website page showing logs the company harvested in October 2022 and only transported to another location in February

Assessing the qualification of companies is an important provision of forest management in Liberia. It mandates the FDA to investigate the character of companies and individuals, their financial capacities, and their record of legal compliance.

Iroko’s ineligibility has started to show in its operation. It has abandoned an unspecified number of logs it harvested in October last year. Photographs and a video posted to the company’s website and Facebook page show some of the logs in the forest. Akin George, a representative of the company, confirmed the harvesting in a mobile interview in March.

Logs do not remain where they were harvested for more than one month and two weeks upon harvest, according to the Regulation on Abandoned Logs, Timber and Timber Products. The logs in question have remained in the forest far beyond that statutory period.

George said the company was taking the logs from where they were harvested to another location in the forest. Bartee Togba, the head of the Central Dugbe River’s leadership, said the same. Togba said Iroko began to transfer the logs in late February, some four months after it felled the trees. The forest is a portion of 39,000 hectares and includes a proposed protected area between Grand Kru and Sinoe.

The Dugbe River Community Forest map. Credit: Forestry Development Authority (FDA)

Iroko’s logs add to thousands of abandoned logs across the country, with the FDA taking no known public actions. The abandoned logs regulation mandates the agency to investigate, seize the logs and petition a court to auction them. Penalties for the offense include fines and forfeiture of the contract.

The total volume of the logs, in question, is essential for Iroko to pay the community’s benefits. Last year April, the community signed a 15-year commercial use contract with Iroko Timber Logging Corporation. It promised to build two elementary schools, handpumps, guesthouses and a clinic.

Efforts to establish contact with Timothy Odebunmi did not materialize. There is no trace of his phone number, email address or WhatsApp. In January, George promised to get Timothy Odebunmi to speak to the issue but failed to do so.

George evaded several attempts for an interview on the situation on behalf of the company. The DayLight reached out to George through phone calls and Facebook messages and WhatsApp text messages but to no avail.

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

Editor’s Pick: Our Best Stories in 2022

December 30, 2022

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Top: A collage showing investigations published by The DayLight in 2022. The DayLight/Gabriel Dixon

MONROVIA – This year has been very eventful for The DayLight. We produced some very revealing investigations, particularly in the forestry sector. They include violations of all sorts: conflict of interest, illegal logging and wildlife poaching.

Our stories led to at least one official inquest and two court cases. They put the forestry industry under the spotlight for accountability and transparency, apparently led to administrative actions within the Forestry Development Authority (FDA), and uncovered certain illegal logging activities commonly called “Kpokolo.” We even lifted the lid on abandoned logs across the country.

As the year draws to an end, we take a look at our best stories:

Park Beautiful But Breaks Airport Safety Standards

The Invincible park shines with beauty but goes against international aviation safety regulations. Picture credit: Knewsonline

In this April piece, Gabriel M. Dixon exposes how President George Weah’s much-loved Invincible Park, built at the foot of the James Spriggs Payne Airfield, breaches international aviation standards. Citing the rules and regulations of the International Civil Aviation Authority (ICAO), the article showed the facility is a beautiful nuisance. Draped in the exposure of Weah’s inconsistent comments in the buildup to the park’s dedication, the story features a history of accidents at the airport and its 6,000-foot runway’s relevance to Liberia’s troubled political history.

It is our most-read story with more than 4,555 readers as of writing time.

Akewa: The Nigerian Company Breaking Liberian Laws Unpunished

Akewa Group of Companies has been involved in illegal logging for over a decade now. Picture credit: Facebook/Akewa Group of Companies

Editor-at-large Emmanuel Sherman and Managing Editor James Harding Giahyue started the year on a very high note, investigating a bundle of violations by Akewa Group of Companies.

The January investigation exposes very serious offenses committed by the company as well as the failure of the FDA to enforce forestry laws and regulations. They include lying under oath, forging another company’s tax clearance, prolonging indebtedness to communities and illegal issuance of contracts meant solely for Liberian companies.

FDA Fails to Punish Firm For Chain of Illegal Logging

A scene of Masayaha’s illegal logging operation outside the Worr Community Forest in Compound Number One, Grand Bassa County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

Editor-at-large Emmanuel Sherman tells a tale of Masayaha’s illegal logging activities. The Lebanese-owned company harvested an unspecified number of logs outside its contract area in Compound Number One, Grand Bassa County. Evidence Sherman gathered—interviews, pictures and official reports—shows Masayaha felled trees in several communities far away from the Worr Community Forest it is, in practice, entitled to.

Sherman and our Director/Managing Editor James Harding Giahyue would expose the company’s other wrongdoings, including an illegal transfer of its logging rights from Magna, a Liberian-owned firm, its indebtedness to communities and abandonment of nearly 600 logs.

Foya Plants Trees to Defeat Deforestation

Rain sets over a village in Foya, Lofa County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

James Harding Giahyue tells us how a collaboration among villagers, local authorities, civil society, the private sector and an international nongovernmental organization is putting Foya on the cusp of victory against deforestation.

Trees have been replanted on riverbeds and where there was savannah, with crops thriving. A large group of farmers is returning to swamplands and producing rice threefold. All of this is happening with locals having formalized ownership of their land.

Foya may have surrendered its breadbasket profile to the marauding savannah grass fueled by climate change but it is getting it back.

Inside Liberia’s Pangolin Scales Smuggling Syndicate

Pangolin scales in Bopolu, Gbarpolu County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

In a four-year investigation covering nine counties, The DayLight sheds light on a network that traffics pangolin scales out of Liberia. It names and shames major actors of the illicit trade and exposes the organization of the cabal as well as its trafficking routes.

Woman Runs Illegal Logging Operation

Illegal timber or “Kpokolo” harvested by Binta Bility, a businesswoman, in Compound Number One, Grand Bassa County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

The unlawful operation in Grand Bassa County of Binta Bility, a businesswoman, was exposed in this September investigation. The article showed that Bility produced block wood, which has come to be known in the industry as “Kpokolo.”

Having initially denied she ran the kpokolo operation in Compound Number One and somersaulted to confirm she was the one, Bility has vowed to cease her illicit activities. But the law requires she is punished.

Minister Breaks Law with Shares in Mining and Logging Company

Logs illegally harvested by Universal Forestry Corporation, co-owned by Minister of Posts and Telecommunications Cooper Kruah, are seen in the Sehzueplay Community Forest. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

This late June investigation, the first of a three-part series, reveals the Minister of Posts and Telecommunications Cooper Kruah is involved in a conflict of interest with shares in Universal Forestry Corporation (UFC). The company has held about a dozen mining licenses and one logging contract since Kruah became a minister in February 2018.

Kruah established UFC back in the 1980s and retains his five-percent stake in the company even after he was appointed to his ministerial post in February 2018. Kruah admits he holds the shares but claims he turned them over to a relative, which still contravenes a number of Liberian laws, including the Constitution.

The second part of the series uncovers Kruah and UFC unlawfully subcontracted their agreement with a community forest in Nimba and harvested a number of logs without authorization.

The third and final part of the series will focus on UFC’s mining violations.

Company Cuts US$2M Logs Outside Concession

Sing Africa harvested a huge number of logs outside its contract area in Zorzor, Lofa County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

Another bombshell in June, this first of a two-part series exposes a Singaporean company that cut some US$2.2 million logs outside its contract area in Balagwalazu in Lofa’s Zorzor District.

Sing Africa had rejected the particular portion of forestland where it felled the trees in 2016 when it signed an agreement with the Bluyeama Community Forest. However, that patch of the forest has a good number of first-class logs, and the company secretly harvested them.

At the same time, the second part of the series shows Sing Africa also abandoned an estimated 2,500 logs.

FDA Managing Director Mike Doryen said at the time: “Eventually, we are going to take some actions [against Sing Africa]. We are in a better position now to be faster.”

Doryen suspended and replaced the FDA ranger responsible for Grand Bassa after the story was published. However, no actions have been taken against the company.

Another Company Illegally Cuts 550 Logs in River Cess

African Wood and Lumber harvested logs in the Gbarsaw and Dorbor Community Forest in River Cess without authorization. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

African Wood and Lumber Company, owned by an Italian businessman, harvested 550 logs in a River Cess community forest, this July article reveals.

Cesare Colombo’s company felled the trees in the Norwein District without a harvesting certificate, a violation of the National Forestry Reform Law.

The Forestry Development Authority (FDA), infamous for its complicity in the sector, suspended and replaced its staff responsible for River Cess after the publication. It made no reference to The DayLight’s investigation, though.

Ex-diplomat and Police Commander Involved in Illegal Logging Activities

Police commander Dawoda Sesay and Richmond Anderson, an ex-envoy at the Liberian Consulate in South Korea, are being held for illegal logging. Picture credit: Facebook/Dawoda Sesay.

This August investigation by Gabriel Dixon (Henry Gboluma and Mohammed Sheriff) exposes a log-trafficking network comprising a former envoy, a policeman, illicit loggers, middlemen and villagers. It all came to light when The DayLight published

People named in the investigation and an FDA ranger whose illegal activities were exposed in a leaked video are being investigated. And the FDA has petitioned courts in Bomi and Gbarpolu to confiscate and auction the illegal timber and vehicle used to transport them.

FDA Managers Issue Illegal Export Permits

Some of the teak woods Rosemart Inc. exported from the illegal permit the FDA awarded it. The DayLight

In our biggest report of the year, The DayLight exposes FDA Managing Director Mike Doryen and top managers of the agency award export permits outside of the legal channel.

The October investigation proved that Doryen and co have collected fees from two companies—Rosemart Inc. and Porgal Enterprise Inc.—but have not accounted for the funds. It also sheds light, particularly, on the illegal operations of Rosemart, which has operated illegally for a number of years in Nimba County. A follow-up article uncovers the company has shipped US$100,000, citing the illegal permits we obtained.

FDA’s attempt to deny the report did more harm than good. It claimed that Générale de Surveillance (SGS), the Swiss firm that established Liberia’s log-tracking system, rejected Rosemart’s logs. However, SGS refuted that claim.

Also, Gertrude Nyaley, the technical manager for FDA’s legality verification department (LVD) overseeing the log-tracking system, denied knowledge of Rosemart’s permits.

Swiss Firm Says FDA Lied in Defending Illegal Permits

October 29, 2022

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Top: The Forestry Development Authority issues illegal export permits, including some from a shadowy contract in Nimba County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

By Emmanuel Sherman

WHEIN TOWN, Paynesville – The Forestry Development Authority (FDA) lied that its Swiss contractor had declined to register logs from a plantation in Nimba County, which led it to award illegal permits, the quality company has said.

Responding to The Daylight’s investigation on the permits, the FDA had claimed that Société Générale de Surveillance “declined to certify teak logs within LiberTrace.” Without showing any evidence, it said the woods did not meet “technical requirements.” LiberTrace or the chain of custody is the system SGS created to track logs from the forests to the end users.

But the SGS vehemently dismissed the assertions.

“SGS has never been informed of any scientific management plantations to be applied in LiberTrace,” Theodore Aime Nna, SGS’ forestry project manager, told The DayLight via email over the weekend.

“Logs could be rejected through LiberTrace only if they are not traceable or illegally produced. Moreover, SGS does not certify any log in Liberia, but only verifies their history…,” Nna added.

The illegal permits mentioned in the report were granted to a Liberian-owned company called Rosemart Inc., and an Ivorian-owned Polgal Enterprise Inc. Rosemart secretly operates the Kpaytuo Plantation in the Tappita region. Polgal’s permit was tracked down in Cote d’Ivoire earlier this year by forestry officials there, according to a communication seen by The DayLight. Nearly all of the export fees the companies paid did not go to Liberian Revenue Authority (LRA), a review of their tax histories shows.

FDA published more of the permits in its justification of the violations, despite earlier denying this newspaper‘s request for them. The documents now show Rosemart has sold more than 2,000 teak logs between 2016 and 2020, valued at more than US$100,000, according to our analysis of the permits published so far. That is a far cry from the US$ 1-2.5 million Rosemart alone has traded, according to Trade Key, a Saudi Arabia-based online platform it trades on. Teak logs are expensive, long-lasting woods use in making bridges, ships and firearms.

SGS’ rebuttal aside, FDA’s excuse for awarding Rosemart the permit outside the legal system does not hold. Rosemart illegally exported 88.625 cubic meters of logs in 2020. That same year, Regnals International—which runs another plantation—exported only 62 cubic meters of logs, according to the Liberia Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (LEITI). That is a difference of more than 26 cubic meters. Also, the FDA wrote on the permit that the logs were abandoned was another lie, as there is no record that the agency sought a court order to auction the woods as required by the Regulation on Abandoned Logs, Timber and Timber Products.

SGS created LiberTrace as a part of the reform of the forestry sector. The system is a crucial component of Liberia’s trade agreement with the European Union (EU) called the Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA). It has turned over the system to FDA’s legality verification department (LVD) after it was established but still plays a role there.

SGS is one of the world’s best quality companies. It has been listed a number of times as one of the 2,000 largest companies in the world by Forbes, an American business magazine that tracks such records. It has about 2,600 offices and laboratories worldwide as of July last year. It scored the highest mark between 2014 and 2019 on the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices, a key global ranking for the quality industry.

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