Protest Over Dirty Logging Contract

March 26, 2025

Top: Trucks transporting logs are stuck on a road in Vambo Township, Grand Bassa County, after community protesters set up roadblocks, demanding benefits. The DayLight/Ojuku Kangar

By Emmanuel Sherman

VAMBO, Grand Bassa – People claiming landowners of a community forest have protested against a company for allegedly sidelining them in a logging contract.

The aggrieved citizens of Vambo Township set roadblocks to prevent C&C Corporation (CCC) from transporting logs to Buchanan. Over 10 towns and villages, including Gblorso, Vahzohn, Baryogar, Boe, and Cee, participated in the protest.

“We have decided to set roadblocks because of the mismanagement of our resources without understanding,” said Abel Payway, youth chair.

“We did not sign the agreement with them, only a few groups of people. They formed a clique and did what they could without consultation with the citizens,” added Payway.

Last year, CCC signed a logging contract with 39 towns and villages adjacent to the Mavasagueh Community Forest, a 26,003-hectare woodland, in exchange for development.

But everything about the deal was illegal. An environmental assessment of the impacts of the CCC’s operation left out 15 towns and villages. Mavasagueh had been illegally established, and the company is ineligible for logging activities, a report review found, which a DayLight series corroborated. Some towns had criticized the Mavasagueh process for excluding them.

The protest followed months of failed negotiation. It echoes the illegalities of CCC’s operations and foreshadows likely future hostilities.

Rebecca Gblorso, a middle-aged protester, did not mince her words during a Daylight interview. “The company started extracting our logs without any benefit. They started hauling our logs last week Thursday. We feel bad and angry so we set the roadblock,” Gblorso said.

Jacob Cee, an elder in his late 80s was among the protesters.

“I am here to protect my township. I speak for all my elders, so when something is happening here and is not right I represent my community,” said Cee.

“The protest is a wake-up call for the company to meet our needs,” said Vambo’s Commissioner Nathaniel Clarke.

Daniel Dayougar, Vambo’s ex-commissioner and now CCC’s community liaison officer, refutes the protesters’ claim. “Togar Town is out,” said Dayougar, who is accused of handpicking the forest’s leaders.

Horace backs Dayougar. “Those towns that did the protest are not within the [contract area].”

The protest lasted three days and ended when police arrived on the third day.

Misapplication of US$6,000

Clarke and the protesters also demanded accountability for a US$6,000 CCC paid to the community forest leadership. The company had deposited the money into the community’s account.

Askew Varney, CCC’s bush manager, confirmed the company deposited the fund.

“My boss called and said the money given to the community had been mismanaged. I expected the [community leaders to meet] to say, ‘This is what the company has brought to us.’ There is no awareness going on. So, if they are going on with the protest they are right,” Varney said.

One of the roadblocks in Vambo Township that stopped C&C Corporation from transporting logs. The DayLight/Ojuku Kangar

But instead of spending the money on community forest guards and health benefits, Mavasagueh’s leaders bought motorbikes and pills, according to Stephen Horace, one of the leaders. Horace said he had not seen the money but confirmed it had been misapplied.

Last week, at a Buchanan meeting to mediate between the protesters and the company, Representative Clarence Banks of Grand Bassa Electoral District Two and Superintendent Karyou Johnson suspended Mavasagueh’s leadership.

However, Representative Banks and Superintendent Karyou do not have any legal power to suspend the leadership. That power lies in Mavasagueh’s community assembly, its highest decision-maker, and the FDA. The FDA did not immediately respond to queries.

Isaac Tukar, Mavasagueh’s leader, denied any wrongdoing. “I am not in the know of any suspension,” Tukar said. “I am in the Guehsuah Section and doing my work.”

Representative Banks, told Okay FM, a DayLight affiliate, Vambo was awaiting the outcome of a three-week ultimatum CCC to address the protesters’ concerns.

“It is my citizens, that closed the roads. Give me three weeks, I will work with the Superintendent,” said Banks. “If the company does not listen to the issues that will be raised, “I will close it down legally.”

[Additional reporting by Ojuku Kangar]

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

Evidence Mounts FDA Signed Illegal Logging Contract

March 14, 2025

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Top: Logs appear undersized and spread out, with an earthmover in the background. The DayLight/Ojuku Kangar

By Emmanuel Sherman

Editor’s Note: This is the third part of a series on the illegalities of a new community forest in Grand Bassa County.

VAMBO, Grand Bassa County – Early last month, The DayLight started a series on a newly established community forest, documenting a string of illegalities involving the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) and a logging company.

So far, the series has published evidence that the FDA illegally established the Mavasagueh Community Forest in Compound Number Two, Grand Bassa County. The agency approved Mavasagueh’s logging contract with the C&C Corporation (CCC), owned by an ineligible logger, Clarence Massaquoi, who also, manages an illegitimate sawmill in Buchanan.

The DayLight has, however, gathered additional evidence of the FDA’s breach of forestry’s legal provisions, cementing initial findings of the regulator’s wrongdoings.

‘Embarrassing’

Twenty-four out of 39 or nearly 40 percent of the communities that own Mavasagueh participated in an environmental and social impact assessment conducted on the community forest, according to a report. The study, which took place between October and November last year, after the FDA awarded Mavasagueh a community forest status, shows the signatures of representatives of the participating towns.

A legal requirement for logging contracts, the report clearly shows that 15 towns and villages were left out of the process, including Gblorso Town and others in the Vambo Township, which hosts a large portion of forest in that area.

This evidence confirms a previous finding that many communities did not participate in Mavasagueh’s formation. Townspeople alleged that ex-Vambo Commissioner Daniel Dayougar handpicked members of Mavasagueh’s leadership, with some unaware of their roles. Dayougar, who was involved with another bogus deal in 2020, denies the allegation.

Civil society organizations flagged those issues when they reviewed Mavasagueh’s documents last year. They asked that the FDA ensure people participate in the boundary process. Residents The DayLight interviewed corroborated the findings.

Mavasagueh Community Forest supposedly overlaps 3,200 acres of private land. Picture credit: James Giahyue

The new evidence shows the forest’s original name, Vambo-Marloi, was changed to Mavasagueh, a play on Marloi, Vambo, Gorzoah and Sawbein. Like Vambo, Marloi is a township, while Gorzoah and Sawbein are clans.

The name Mavasagueh remains an issue, though.

“The combined name is embarrassing to every one of us,” said Nathaniel Clarke, Commissioner of Vambo Township. “We were not combined with any other forest.

The FDA did not answer why Vambo-Marloi, the name recorded in last year’s forestry sector review, was changed to Mavasagueh. The regulator did not respond to the newspaper’s questions, for this story or previous parts of this series.

A 2018 letter

The first part of this series established that the FDA ignored a claim laid by Khalil Haider, a resident of Monrovia, to 3,200 acres of land between the St. John River and Mt. Findley, which overlaps Mavasagueh’s 26,003 hectares. A Google Earth map of the area Haider’s claim falls within in the first compartment CCC intends to operate.

Then a second person Amos Lewis, a resident of Marshall, Margibi, is also claiming the same plot as Haider. Like Haider, Lewis has informed the FDA about his claim. Both men have presented a Tubman-era deed to substantiate their claim.

Lewis and Haider’s claims are sufficient for the FDA to call off the contract between Mavasagueh. The community forest handbook requires the FDA to investigate and potentially slice the problematic plot from the community forest. The claims prove that the demarcation and mapping of Mavasagueh was not participatory.

Mechanics standing by a CCC earthmover parked for maintenance in Vambo Township, Grand Bassa County. The Daylight/Emmanuel Sherman

The compromise has several implications, according to forestry experts. First, CCC has more forest blocks to cut in a season, as the size of the forest determines the number of blocks. Second CCC can harvest at a faster rate—even, if the company does not cut logs in the area Haider is claiming, since the forest contains the supposedly private plot. Third, Mavasagueh overlaps a private plot, contradicting a community forest’s description: a forest on a community or customary land.

But that is not all. One of the new pieces of evidence is a letter Haider wrote to the FDA in 2018, informing it about his claim to the 3,200 acres.

The letter, obtained by The DayLight, read, “We are getting ready to do some farming projects on our land. But because of the road condition and bridges, we are asking your authority to allow us to market the existing marketable species, which will enable us to generate some funds.” Haider claimed he wrote several other letters to the FDA over the years.

Haider’s letters prove one of two things: First, the FDA ignored his communication. Or the regulator lost it, leading him to write the agency again last year. Notably, this appears to confirm a flawed process, and a finding from last year’s forestry concession review that the FDA did not keep proper records.

An illegal compromise

FDA has sanctioned CCC’s operations despite the mounting illegalities associated with the Mavasagueh-CCC contract.

Photographs and videos shot by The DayLight show apparent undersized logs CCC harvested. The woods are visible in the video spread out in an open field.

Last week the Mavasagueh-CCC contract was read to residents. Though signed in August last year, it was the first time, the townspeople had seen or read the document.

Managing Director Rudolph Merab encouraged CCC and Haider to compromise to avoid the FDA from repeating the process, according to Haider, one of the private land claimants and CCC’s owner Massaquoi.

“I received a call from [Mr. Merab], stating that if I pursued it further, they would have to cancel everything until two to three years before anything,” Haider told The DayLight in January. He added he empathized with Massaquoi because CCC spent a lot of money paving over 15 kilometers of a major road in the community.

This Google Earth map shows Mavasagueh overlaps a supposedly private land, rendering the community forest area unlawful.

“Haider and I settled, and he would work with the community and me so, the FDA should let the document be processed,” Massaquoi told a DayLight interview.

Massaquoi, who conducted a failed logging operation in Grand Cape Mount in the 2010s, covering just 5,000 hectares, is confident of success this time around. He intends to sell logs to Krish Veneer Industries, an illegitimate sawmill in Buchanan he manages. A DayLight investigation found that the Indian-owned Krish is not a corporation, a legal requirement for forestry companies.

As organized as the plan seems, it is not backed by law.

Per the community forest handbook—based on the law—the FDA must “review objections, contact and meet with objectors, and use customary dispute resolution mechanism.” It further requires the FDA to work with the Ministry of Mines and Energy, and the Land Authority to establish a community forest area.

“If required, the FDA and [the] community repeat the demarcation process…”

GVL Finally Forms Clinic in Tartweh

March 10, 2025

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Top: GVLcompletes the construction of a clinic in Tartweh, Drapoh Chiefdom, Sinoe County/ The DayLIght/ Franklin K. Nehyalor

By Franklin K. Nehyalor

TARTWEH-DRAPOH, Sinoe County – After more than a decade of protests, Golden Veroleum Liberia (GVL) has finally established a community clinic to serve its workers and residents.

“We are happy that our people no longer have to travel [far away] for treatment. They can now receive medical care right here in Tartweh,” said Nunu Broh, former Tartweh-Drapoh Agriculture Development Committee chairman. “This is a very significant step because seeking treatment [elsewhere] was a major problem for our community.”

In 2010, GVL and the Government of Liberia signed a 65-year Concession Agreement, granting the company rights to 220,000 hectares of land across Sinoe, Grand Kru, Maryland, River Gee, and River Cess counties. This agreement required GVL to enter an MoU with affected communities and commit to constructing a school, hand pumps, and a clinic.

GVL signed the MoU with the Tartweh-Drapoh Chiefdom of Kpayan District, Sinoe County, obligating, Liberia’s largest oil palm investor to build a clinic in the area. However, the company failed to live up to its obligation.

Over a decade, residents walked three hours to Kabada in a neighboring for chiefdom treatment. The absence of a local healthcare facility led to growing frustration and mounting pressure on GVL.

In October 2023, residents protested against GVL, demanding that the company honor its commitments. In response, GVL signed a resolution with the community in May last year, agreeing to construct a temporary clinic to provide immediate healthcare services until a permanent facility could be built.

Several months later, GVL completed the Tartweh Clinic, following a series of DayLight investigations, holding the company to account.

The newly established clinic, which opened in October, now provides medical services to dozens of workers and residents from surrounding communities.

Located in a GVL estate, and painted in green and white, it has a team of five staff members recruited from Tartweh and neighboring areas. GVL did not answer emailed questions regarding the clinic.

“This is a major improvement from the past. It marks a new beginning in the relationship between GVL and the community,” said Broh.

“Moving forward, we expect GVL to honor all other commitments it made to the community.”

The Green Livelihoods Alliance (GLA) provided funding for this story. The DayLight maintained editorial independence over the story’s content.

Inside FDA’s Shady World of Chewing Sticks

March 6, 2025

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Top: Men offload chewing sticks at a beachfront in Greenville, Sinoe County in January 2024. File Picture: Anonymous

By Emmanuel Sherman

BARLOME TOWN – A truck with chewing sticks parked near an open field. Some of the sticks lay on the ground. It had been parked for three weeks in Barlome Town on the Grand Bassa-River Cess highway. The sticks had been transported from Nimba County and uploaded there.

“I am waiting for my boss,” said Obed Amoah, an attendant to the 37-ton truck with Ghanaian license plate GR-5774.

Reporters had happened upon a major player in the shadowy world of chewing stick trafficking. In 2021, the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) imposed a moratorium on chewing sticks to curtail the clearcutting of the species. However, The DayLight found evidence, that the FDA has been issuing chewing stick permits amid the moratorium.

The evidence shows that chewing stick pushers pay the FDA at different levels, with poor, rural communities receiving a small portion. The sticks are transported in smaller trucks and are loaded into large trucks similar to the one The DayLight saw in Barlome Town.

Amoah’s boss, Isaac Pyne, pays several fees: an annual registration, a permit license, an export permit, and a waybill—fees for transporting forest products.

Pyne had to travel to Drodonewein, a town in Nimba County to get the sticks. He would mobilize 30 to 40 men to harvest the sticks.

Emmanuel Gibson, youth chairman of Drodonewein, sits on a pile of chewing sticks. The Daylight/Harry Browne

Pyne’s company, Winner Peace and Love Chewing Sticks reached an agreement with Dordonewien for LD40 per stick. The townspeople signed the deal, hoping it would develop the community, as it lacks a hand pump, toilet and clinic.

In all, Pyne harvested 1,000 chewing sticks and made one shipment. However, he has yet to meet all his obligations, having paid the community L$11,360.

“We were thinking we would have gotten the L$40,000 so that we could renovate our peace hall,” said Emmanuel Gibson, the youth chairman of Dordonewein. Pyne acknowledged his debt to the villagers and insisted he would pay the balance.

On commission

Once uploaded into the large truck, Pyne transports the sticks to the border via Pleebo or Laguatuo, and then to Ghana, Togo, or Senegal through the Ivory Coast.

Zebedi Bonwin, another chewing stick businessman in Buchanan, corroborated the route. Reporters had caught up with Bonwin’s truck in a town on the outskirts of Buchanan.

Bonwin revealed he also transported chewing sticks via the sea. “I used the boat one or two times,” he said. Other people The DayLight interviewed in Bassa, River Cess and Sinoe confirmed Bonwin’s sea route account. The newspaper obtained photographs of men offloading chewing sticks on a beachfront in Greenville, Sinoe County.

The DayLight also gathered evidence that chewing sticks and bitter kola are sourced from Bassa, River Cess, Bong, and Lofa, and transported to Guinea. Our reporter visited several locations in the counties, conducting interviews, and photographing warehouses and border crossings.

In Ghana, Pyne sells his sticks to mostly market women in the Ashanti Region of Kumasi, who pay him a commission. The women retail the sticks in shreds, charging US$2.50 or US$3.00 for a pile.

Prominent in African and Asian communities, chewing sticks (Salvadora persica) are used for tooth cleaning and as a herb. With their use dating back to prehistoric times, chewing sticks can be as effective as toothbrushes in removing dental plaque and caries.

A waybill issued by the FDA for 630 pieces of chewing sticks at L$12,600 (US$64) to Winer Peace and Love. File picture: Isaac Pyne

Moratorium

Pyne, Bonwin, and other businesspeople are violating the 2021 moratorium on chewing sticks—with the aid of the FDA.

Pyne provided three receipts that show different kinds of payments to the regulator. One for US$250 dated February 20, 2024, for annual registration. Another one recorded two payments for 630 pieces of chewing sticks with an accumulated volume of 15.908 cubic meters and an export permit fee of US$1,073.70. Two receipts document US$50 for an export license and a waybill of L$12,600. The waybill had been issued at the FDA’s Big Joe Town checkpoint in Grand Bassa on January 17, 2025.

Similarly, two official receipts The DayLight obtained reveal transactions in January last year. The two receipts show L$6,000 and L$9,000 payments to the FDA from one Emma Emmanuel in Greenville Sinoe County.

The evidence establishes Pyne paid some of the fees to an FDA account at the United Bank of Africa (UBA). This payment procedure violates the National Forestry Reform Law and the Regulation on Establishing a Chain of Custody System.

The regulations require that all forest fees be paid to the government’s account at the Central Bank of Liberia. The measure was installed to safeguard public funds, following decades of mismanagement, which, interestingly, continues today.

Women shred chewing sticks from Liberia in Kumasi, Ghana. File picture: Isaac Pyne

That mode of payment is similar to the one that fueled block wood or kpokolo, heavy and compact timber blocks illegally harvested, containerized and exported via land or sea. Following a decade of facilitating the trade, the FDA finally banned kpokolo in 2022. Last year, the regulator also banned the issuance of a certificate that facilitated the trade, according to minutes of an FDA board of directors meeting in July last year.

Pyne and Bonwin claim the government has lifted the moratorium.

“The FDA said the moratorium is lifted and we are starting again,” said Bonwin, who runs the Garraway Enterprise Inc. in the Buchanan suburb of Lower Harlandsville.

But that claim contradicts the facts. The FDA board meeting’s minutes prove the moratorium remains in place. In the meeting, the board agreed to lift the moratorium only upon a review of the Regulation on Non-Timber Forest Products (NFTPs) for the public to participate, an underlining principle of forestry reform.

“All other certificates signed by the [Managing Director] become null and void,” according to the document. “FDA needs to invite all those involved for a way forward.”

Though the board discussed local and national benefits of lifting the moratorium, there is no evidence the regulation has been reviewed, or a consultation has taken place. The FDA’s website does not have such information. Key civil society actors, including the Botanical Products Association of Liberia, which makes awareness of the protection and trade of NTFPs, said they did not participate in any such event.

Formulated in 2008, the NTFPs regulation covers chewing sticks, charcoal, rattans, bitter kola and other forest products other than timber. It was meant to provide income opportunities for local communities and the government, create awareness of NTFPs, and classify them for research purposes.

But it was not sufficiently community-centric, necessitating a review for a possible amendment or replacement.

“Once the [law] gives the community the right to own, manage, and protect the forest, and non-timber forest products are in the forests,” said Bonathan Walaka of the National Union of Community Forest Management Body.

“So, there should be a kind of benefit-sharing scheme for a community to receive benefits from that.”

Philip Parker, the chairman of the FDA’s Board of Directors, did not reply to questions, and neither did the FDA management. This is the second time Parker, whose duty is to hold the FDA to account, has ignored The DayLight’s inquiries. Similarly, the FDA’s refusal to respond adds to its silence on such matters, and an unwillingness to provide public information.

[Harry Browne contributed to this Investigation]

Nimba Locals Embark on Ecotourism, Commit to Conservation

March 5, 2025

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Top: The Zor Community Forest covers 1,140 hectares. The DayLight/Franklin K. Nehyalor

By Franklin K. Nehyalor

ZOR, Nimba County – Local leaders in a northeastern community seek more support to conserve their forest.

The Zor Community Forest in Zor Chiefdom in the Gbehlay-Geh District of Nimba County has support from ArcelorMittal Liberia and NGOs. With the support, Zor, a conservation forest, has established cocoa and oil palm farms, recruited forest guards, and conducted training for community members. The community has also provided loans locals have invested to purchase a rice mill and cassava-processing machines.

However, Zor needs more to develop its ecotourism to continue to protect its forest resources.

“We need technical and financial incentives to better preserve our forest and make our community a place of attraction for investors and businesses,” says Robert Mahn, Zor’s executive committee chairman. “But for this to happen, we need constant monthly salary for forest guards, declaration of ecotourism site, and reclamation of our forestland from foreigners.”

“To reduce deforestation, poaching and other illegal activities, we need the necessary support for the community to realize its ecotourism dream,” says Grace Yeeplah, Treasurer of the Executive Committee of the Zor Community Forest. “These efforts have helped us to improve conservation in the last 10 years. We need help to continue with them.”

Cocoa being sunbaked in Zor, Nimba County. File picture: Zor Community Forest

Zor’s push for ecotourism is a significant step in line with the government’s pledge to conserve 30 percent of Liberia’s forest, which forms the largest portion of West Africa’s remaining rainforests. The Community Rights Law…, which created community forestry, allows locals to co-manage forests alongside the government.

However, unfriendly environmental practices like logging, mining, bad farming methods and other forms of deforestation often undermine these efforts, according to a World Bank report. Between 2002 and 2022, Liberia lost 23 percent of its primary forest due to rampant deforestation, according to the World Resources Institute (WRI), which tracks global deforestation.

“More needs to be done,” says James Otto, a lead campaigner at the Sustainable Development Institute. “The community must set up governance systems and structures that will pay attention to issues like benefits for those who have and those who don’t. They must consider seeking partnerships outside, and external support from other entities who have an interest in ecotourism,” adds Otto.

Zor Community Forest lies adjacent to the East Nimba Nature Reserve (ENNR), home to nearly 3,000 different species. Zor is a buffer between the reserve and forests on Liberia’s border with Guinea and Ivory Coast. Covering 1,140 hectares, Zor has faced significant threats from illegal mining, poaching, and commercial agriculture in the past, with hunters from Ivory Coast and Guinea.

So, for over a decade, community leaders in Zor constantly employ conservation and sustainable livelihood initiatives to address these challenges.

Currently, the community has recruited and trained 22 forest guards, who regularly patrol the forest. In October last year, the FDA conducted a joint forest guard training with community rangers with the ENNR. In November 2023, an MoU agreement reached between AML and the Zor community turned former bushmeat sellers and hunters into forest protectors in local communities such as Zolowee, Gbapa, Suakasue and Zortapa.

“We have mobilized the community, created awareness on the need to save the forest and the environment,” explains Mahn. “These efforts are meant to empower our people in ways that will discourage them from harming the forest and its species.”

New development

Zor maintains a host of community livelihood programs through which it protects its forest.

With support from ArcelorMittal Liberia and the NGO, the Multi-stakeholder Forest Governance and Accountability Project (MFGAP), the community processes rice, cocoa, and cassava. ArcelorMittal provides US$160 for community forest guards on a quarterly basis. On the other hand, MFGAP provided US$112,971 to strengthen Zor’s governance system, develop its business model and provide other needs.

Also, Zor has set up 40 acres of oil palm farms in 20 towns adjacent to the rocky forest, with two acres established in each of the beneficiary communities. Zor has a rice mill that helps to increase farmers’ productivity and reduce their high cost of labor, while at the same time generating proceeds from minimal fees charged.

Zor Community Forest’s leaders inspecting a cassava processing machine. File picture: Zor Community Forest

Depending on the size, each farmer is charged LD130 or LD150 to mill a bucket full of rice. Zor’s leadership retains 70 percent of the proceeds into a community account, distributing 30 percent to the rice milling machine maintenance team. Of the 70 percent, 40 percent goes to the landowning communities, while the remaining portion is used for administrative purposes.

Despite the prevailing challenges, Zor remains hopeful of achieving their ecotourism desire provided they receive the necessary support.

“We will get many benefits with the ecotourism project,” says Mahn. “With the right support, we expect the community to come alive with hospitality. We also expect business investment, jobs, economic growth and new community development.”

Beekeeping and Loan Protect Sinoe Forest

March 3, 2025

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Top: Ariel view of Nitrian Community Forest in Sinoe County. The DayLight/Derick Snyder

By Esau J. Farr

KABADA, Sinoe County – Jackson Tweh makes a living from beekeeping. Tweh, 35, and a father of six children has six beehives, which produce up to seven gallons of honey every three months.

Tweh was a farmer and hunter since his youth but in 2019 Universal Outreach Foundation, a Canadian NGO, went to Kabada, a town in the Kpanyan District of Sinoe County. The NGO trained him and other townspeople in beekeeping. When the training ended, he received six beehives, enclosed structures where honeybees live and raise their young.

“From what I see, beekeeping is one of the best programs when it comes to human promotion in the conservation community,” says Tweh. “Whenever we harvest, the honey can’t stay long with us because people can be standing by, waiting to buy it.”

Like Tweh, Ophelia Merrian, a mother of five children in her 40s, dropped farming in the forest for full-time shopkeeping.

In 2019, the Ministry of Agriculture trained Merrian to set up a village saving and loan association. The ministry came to Tweh Town, about half an hour’s walk from Kabada, and introduced her to swamp farming, which increased her yield.

In the last five years, Merrian saved her income from the loan scheme, and the interest transformed her life dramatically.

“When I started, I was renting in someone’s house, but right now I have my place,” Merrian said. “This same program helps me to pay my children’s school fees.”

Tweh and Merrian are two of over 200 townspeople living adjacent to the Nitrian Community Forest who have benefited from alternative livelihood programs. The schemes provide replacements for forest farmlands and bushmeat for locals to keep them away from forest farming in one of Liberia’s few conservation community forests.

Established in 2011, the 958-hectare Nitrian is home to different species, including chimpanzees, African elephants, buffalos and pangolins. Located in southeastern Liberia has a high stock carbon value, a 2018 study shows. The forest is, however, being undermined by poachers, farming and other illegal activities.

Dennis Broh, president of the Nitrian community assembly, tells The DayLight the beekeeping and loan schemes have helped to reduce unwanted occupants.

“Intruding into the forest by farmers and hunters has been some of the challenges we have faced here,” says Broh, in a Kabada interview.

“Currently, when you look at the farming activities, the way people were involved with the forest has been cut down,” adds Broh.

Universal Outreach Foundation introduced beekeeping in 2019. The NGO trained 40 men from six towns and 16 villages. In these six years, the trainees have multiplied their beehives from their initial six. Tweh now has 15. Johanson Wiah has nine, the same as Stanley Saydee, and Broh has 15.

Six beehives can produce at least three gallons of honey in as many months, according to the beekeepers, and five liters sell for US$20 on local marketplaces.

Similar to beekeeping, the village saving loan started in 2019. It is a product of a partnership between Dutch NGO IDH and the Ministry of Agriculture. It encouraged residents to do lowland farming to keep their forest standing.

Locals accepted the proposal and started lowland farming. The exercise produced more yields, increased villagers’ incomes and introduced the village saving loan and association program there.

Since then, the association has had an annual saving of not less than L$1 million, except for 2019, the year the scheme was established. The highest income of the scheme was realized in 2023 when the association saved more than L$2 million.

Victoria Cooper, former Sinoe County’s agriculture coordinator, explains it became clear that they needed to manage their proceeds. The ministry provided technical support.

“This is a very good project and I think everyone needs to welcome it to help rural communities fight climate change and strengthen conservation efforts,” says Cooper, who is now a technical assistant at the Ministry of Agriculture.

Vincent Swen, a community leader, led a tour of Nitrian Community Forest in 2019. Picture credit: James Harding Giahyue

‘Not going into logging’

Residents have seen the result of their actions. At the beginning of their conservation efforts, they would record bullet casings and illicit farms. Today, they no longer see those things.

But Nitrian reckons there is a need for full-time forest guards to frequently monitor the forest, not leaders who conduct monthly patrols.

There is also a need for other forms of animal husbandry in addition to beekeeping—and loans—according to Neboe Sarboh, Nitrian’s secretary general.

“The way we are reserving this forest, by right, companies supposed to come here and bring goats, ducks and even cows to the community people to raise them so that anytime you want to eat meat… you can get one and kill it,” says Sarboh. He adds there is a need for more awareness to prevent or curtail unauthorized entry and extraction of the forest’s resources.

A lack of community benefits is a common reason why some communities have dropped conservation for logging or incorporated mining.

Others are considering abandoning logging for conservation.

For Nitrian, things remain the same.

“It has been difficult for us carrying out conservation,” says Broh “However, we know the importance of conservation and so we are not going to go into commercial logging.”

Community Forest Cancels Contract with Wartime Logger

February 21, 2025

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Top: By Varney Kamara

JOHNNY TOWN, Sinoe County — A community forest in Sinoe County has canceled a contract with a logging company owned by a wartime logger.

Last August, the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) approved the Numopoh Community Forest’s request to terminate the contract with Delta Timber Corporation. The move marked the end of a years-long dispute over unfulfilled promises to local people, and wasted logs.

“[The FDA] is pleased to have you informed that it interposes no objection to your request.,” wrote Managing Director Rudolph Merab in an August letter only recently obtained by The DayLight.

“However, you are advised to identify and select a company that has both the financial and technical capabilities to manage the forest,” added Merab.

Delta signed a Community Forest Management Contract with Numopoh, securing the right to harvest timber from 7,220 hectares of woodland In 2016.

Under the agreement, Delta was required to construct schools and clinics in the district, providing scholarships and creating jobs for citizens.

However, the company failed to honor its commitments. Instead, disputes over unfulfilled obligations and Delta’s abandonment of about 1,387.343 cubic meters of logs and illegal harvesting.

Furthermore, Delta did not renew the contract after five years in 2021, a legal requirement in community forest agreements.

Gabriel Doe, Delta’s owner and CEO, did not respond to queries for comments on the termination.

The termination of the Numopoh-Delta contract is one of the rare occasions where the FDA acted without an arbitration process as the contract requires. However, several forestry legal instruments give the regulator the right to cancel failing contracts.

Wartime Logger

While the FDA eventually granted the community the legal authorization to terminate Delta’s contract, its decision to previously approve the company’s operations was unlawful.

During the First and Second Liberian Civil Wars, Doe owned Cavalla Timber Corporation, one of 17 logging companies accused of either supporting militias, participating in violence, or facilitating armed conflicts. An estimated 250,000 people died during the wars.

Rotten logs at the Ross Port of Greenville Delta Timber Corporation transferred from Numopoh Community Forest. The DayLight/James Giahyue

In 2001, the United Nations imposed a travel ban and asset freeze on Doe, then-President Charles Taylor, Dutch arms dealer Guss Kowenhoven, and over 100 individuals linked to the Taylor regime.

Two years after the travel ban, the UN sanctioned Liberian logs, aiming to cut the connection between timber revenues and arms smuggling. The sanctions were lifted in 2006, following reforms, leading to the cancellation of Cavalla’s and other companies’ contracts over irregularities.

Subsequently, reformers formulated the Regulation on Bidder Qualifications, which bars individuals involved in the logging industry before 2006, unless they fully and honestly confessed their past actions before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and worked with the FDA to repay stolen funds. No wartime logger ever did that.

But Doe resurfaced about a decade later with Delta, the FDA ignoring the qualification regulation’s war-accountability provision.

Numopoh views the termination as a break from the past, and an opportunity to be in line with the law.

“When [Delta] came here, they refused to consult the community on things they did,” said Sam Kandie, Numopoh Community Forest’s chief officer in an interview in Johnny Town.

“Now, we have taken a collective decision to get rid of Delta. We can only hope this will bring the much-needed development and prosperity to our land.”

GVL Suspends Teachers’ Program, Hampering Sinoe Education

February 18, 2025

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Top: The Butaw High School in Butaw District is one of several schools affected by Golden Veroleum Liberia’s suspension of support to teachers in Sinoe. The DayLight/Varney Kamara

By Varney Kamara

TARTWEH, Sinoe County – Golden Veroleum Liberia (GVL) has suspended a program through which it provided mandatory support to schools in its concession area in Sinoe County, crippling academic activities.

Inked between 2013 and 2017, the MoUs were a product of GVL’s 65-year concession agreement with Liberia. It granted GVL the right to develop 220,000 hectares of plantations in southeastern and southcentral Liberia.

Thus, GVL launched the scheme during the 2020-2021 academic semester in collaboration with the Ministry of Education, the GVL Workers’ Union, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and local communities. Then it placed 90 volunteer teachers on GVL’s payroll, providing each a US$100 monthly stipend, compensating for GVL’s inability to build schools in line with its MoUs with communities.

But in March, GVL suspended the program allegedly without any prior notice.

“GVL regrets to officially inform you that the GVL Educational Support (GES) program for the academic year 2023/2024 has been suspended with immediate effect,” GVL wrote the Tartweh-Drapoh District in a March letter last year.

Suspension of an employee’s service without prior notice violates Liberia’s Decent Work Act. The law requires GVL to have notified the teachers before suspending their contract.

GVL claims it informed the teachers before announcing the suspension but provided no proof. Similarly, The DayLight found no evidence of that happening.

The suspension undermines the learning environment of the forested coastal county, leaving hundreds of students on their own.

“The lack of pay for teachers is destroying the learning environment badly. The teachers are not showing the required commitment to teach,” said Armstrong Panteene, principal of Tartweh High School in Tubmanville.

“They don’t have their minds set on teaching because they are out there to find food for their families. We no longer have control over them,” Panteene added.

Last December, The DayLight saw students in Butaw, Tartweh, and Tarjuwon discussing the issue in groups, while others engaged socially. The situation has overwhelmed administrators across the communities, reducing the quality of learning.

At the Butaw High School, where GVL has 95 percent of its employees’ dependents, there are currently 14 teachers from a previous list of 18. The number of teachers at Tarweh High School in Kpayan District, and the Teahjay High School in Tarjuwon, Myerville Township has also declined.

“At the moment, we don’t have math, physics, and chemistry teachers. This is shameful and embarrassing,” said King Chester Kun, principal of the Butaw High School. “The school is empty, and students keep asking us about what’s going wrong.”

“Most times, when classrooms are empty, the school rings the bell, and everyone leaves for home,” said Ralph Carpeh, a 12^th grader at Butaw High School. “We just pack our bags and go home because we are not able to teach ourselves.”

GVL plantation in Butaw, Sinoe County. The DayLight/Derick Snyder

The suspension is likely to impact enrollment in Sinoe.

Between 2015 and 2022, Sinoe recorded a drop in primary school enrollment, according to a 2021-2022 school census. Only 13 percent of public early childhood students in the county met readiness benchmarks.

The suspension worsens GVL’s failure to implement agreements it signed with communities.

“We entrusted our land to GVL with the promise of education, healthcare, and other important benefits. Yet today, Tartweh’s children are left with little to no education, as the company fails to honor its commitments under the MoU,” said Nunu Broh, chairman of the Tartweh-Drapoh Agriculture Committee.

Broken Promises

The aggrieved instructors, whose voluntary services range from six to 24 months, said the suspension had put them in hardship.

In May, volunteer teachers from Kpayan and Butaw districts sued GVL at the Greenville City Court for unpaid wages. GVL partially settled the claims, paying 24 teachers by July, court filings show.

However, dozens remain unpaid.

“GVL owes me three months of arrears,” said D. Swen Charles, a former volunteer teacher at Tartweh High School in Tubmanville. “They told us they would pay, but for now, that story has changed. There is no hope.”

Alphonso Kofi, GVL’s communications director, said the company did not commit any wrongdoing. Kofi claims that GVL is not obligated to continue the program.

“Volunteer teachers are recruited by the government to help support other teachers in those schools. GVL is only assisting them to compensate those who are not on the government’s payroll,” Kofi said in an emailed statement.

Kofi’s assertions contradict the MoUs between GVL and the communities. The documents obligate GVL to build schools and provide teaching materials in its concession areas free of charge.

“GVL will work with the Ministry of Education as appropriate, to confirm the location for schools, build schools it has agreed to provide, recruit and pay for teachers, maintain schools and provide study items in schools, which it builds or agrees to support,” says GVL’s 2017 MoU with Butaw.

The situation adds to the frail relationship GVL has with locals. In 2018, the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) found GVL guilty of land grab. In 2022, the High Carbon Stock Approach, which addresses deforestation in agricultural practices, found that GVL cleared 1,000 hectares of high-carbon forests in the Kpanyan District.

The Green Livelihoods Alliance (GLA) provided funding for this story. The DayLight maintained editorial independence over the story’s content.

Sinoe Chiefdom Demands Intruders ‘Must Leave our Land’

February 17, 2025

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Top: Liberia Natural Produce Incorporated’s workers at a renovated prewar palm oil mill in the Tarsue Chiefdom of Sanquin District, Sinoe County. The DayLight/Varney Kamara

By Varney Kamara

KOMMANAH TOWN, Sinoe County – After nearly four years of illegal occupancy, villagers in a southeastern chiefdom are demanding the departure of an oil palm company from their ancestral land.

Early this month, aggrieved residents from various clans and sections in the Tarsue Chiefdom of Sanquin District, Sinoe County staged a peaceful protest at the headquarters of Liberia Natural Produce Incorporated (LNPI), an Indian-Liberian investment, demanding its immediate withdrawal from their land.

In a six-count petition, locals accused LNPI of intruding on their land and intimidating residents.

“Based on these reasons, the citizens of Tarsue, including elders, women, youth, and traditional leaders, will not sign any agreement with Liberia Natural Produce Incorporated,” the petition stated. “The citizens of Tarsue demand that LNPI leave the plantation so that we can develop our land and improve our livelihoods.”

Representative Alex Noah, whose electoral district Tarsue falls, has appealed for one month to mediate the dispute. Locals granted his appeal, temporarily easing the tension, and suspended a three-day ultimatum for the company to evacuate the palm estate. However, residents have vowed to resume their protest once the negotiation period expires.

“After the one-month grace period requested by the honorable representative, the company must either leave our land or face escalated community action,” said Ericson Pyne, the chief spokesperson of Tarsue in Kommanah Town, Tarsue’s headquarters.

“LNPI must leave,” Pyne told The DayLight. “We have endured their presence for over three years, and they cannot fulfill their obligations. The community is prepared to take further steps if necessary.”

Noah’s intervention differs sharply from Superintendent Peter Wleh Nyensueh’s solution. Last October, Nyensueh dismissed the locals’ demand that LNPI vacate the plantation, claiming chiefs and elders had waived by signing an initial MoU with LNPI. But he was wrong as the MoU he cited was for LNPI to purchase locals’ palm oil, not to acquire the plantation.

‘We Cannot Keep Fighting Forever’

Amid the dispute, LNPI has expressed willingness to negotiate with the community. Acknowledging challenges since its arrival, the company promised improvements should negotiations resume.

“The community is our landlord. We have to negotiate and find a peaceful resolution,” said Baccus Wiah, LNPI’s spokesperson. “We cannot keep fighting forever.”

Wiah’s comments are a turnaround from the company’s previous stance. Until now, LNPI has failed to recognize the community’s right to the land and required consent, even though he admits that the company operates illegally.

Initially welcomed by locals as a much-needed investor, LNPI’s presence in Tarsue quickly turned sour, leading to rising tensions and confrontations. The company had hidden its intent to purchase the plantation, signing an oil purchasing MoU with chiefs and elders instead.

But a series of DayLight investigations last year shed light on LNPI’s deception and illegality, inspiring the community to hold LNIP accountable.

LNIP unauthorizedly renovated a prewar palm oil mill in Tarsue Chiefdom, Sinoe County, as part of the company intrusion into an abandoned palm plantation. The DayLight /Varney Kamara

Shrouded in Secrecy

In February 2022, Konnex Investments Limited, LNPI’s parent company, purchased an abandoned palm plantation from Equatorial Palm Oil (EPO) for US$445,000. However, the agreement has not been approved by the Liberian government, and the community did not consent to LNPI’s operations.

Despite guidance from the Liberia Land Authority, LNPI pushed ahead with its operations, violating the Land Rights Act of 2018, which mandates community approval before land occupation. The law grants communities the right to own and manage land based on customary practices.

Moreover, the deal was poorly publicized, with only a LinkedIn post, a mention on LNPI’s website and references hidden in EPO’s parent company’s annual reports.

Tarsue residents only became aware of the deal in March 2023—nine months after LNPI convinced them to sign a six-month oil palm purchasing agreement. The MoU allowed LNPI to buy a five-gallon container of palm oil for L$1,300 and L$1,500.

The company paid the community US$6,000 and paved a major road but the deal lasted three months beyond the agreed period.

Despite warnings from locals about the MoU violations, LNPI continued its operations unchecked, provoking community anger. Since then, LNPI has forcibly controlled the plantation, including renovating a prewar palm oil mill. Backed by armed police officers, it evicted residents, ignoring their land ownership rights and the legal requirement for consent.

Unlawful Contract Unearths Logger’s Hidden Crimes

February 16, 2025

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Top: Clarence Massaquoi, the owner of Bassa Logging and Timber Company, and co-owner of C&C Corporation. By his admission, Massaquoi worked in the logging sector before January 2006, making him ineligible. The DayLight/Derick Snyder

By Emmanuel Sherman

Editor’s Note: This story is the second part of a series on illegalities associated with a newly established community forest in Compound Two, Grand Bassa County.

Evidence suggests the FDA conducted a flawed process that established the Mavasagueh Community Forest in Bassa

Then a DayLight investigation found several forestry offenses committed and associated with Clarence Massaquoi, the logger authorized to operate the unlawful community forest

Massaquoi owes US$56,550 from a previous contract in Grand Cape Mount, leaving hundreds of logs in the forest to rot

Massaquoi is a wartime logger, which makes his forestry activities and ownership of his companies illegal

Massaquoi is also the Manager of an ineligible forestry company in Buchanan, Grand Bassa

VAMBO, Grand Bassa County – Last August, local people signed a forestry contract with a new company. C&C Corporation (CCC) would conduct logging in the Mavasagueh Community Forest in exchange for hand pumps, roads and other things.

CCC has built a 15-kilometer dirt road through the Vambo and Marloi Townships, where the 26,003-hectare forest lies. The company has begun felling trees after the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) awarded it a harvesting certificate.

While townspeople celebrated the contract, a DayLight investigation established problems with the Mavasagueh-CCC contract. The evidence shows that the FDA skipped some legal steps in granting Mavasagueh a community forest status.

The investigation found that the FDA’s demarcation and mapping of the rocky forest did not involve all the communities as required. It also established that two men are claiming 3,200 acres, or about a fifth of the forest between Mt. Findley and the St. John River, overwhelming proof that authorities did a poor job.

The illegal contract thrusts Massaquoi into the spotlight, exposing his hidden and forgotten offenses, spanning over two decades. It was discovered Massaquoi had illegally acquired a contract, failed that contract and ran an unlawful sawmill.

Failed contract

Mavasagueh is the first contract CCC, established only in 2022, has had. However, it is not the only one for Massaquoi, who has 70 percent of the company’s shares. (One Joseph Varney holds the remaining shares)

Massaquoi has another firm, Bassa Logging and Timber Company, which failed a previous contract in Grand Cape Mount County. In 2009, Bassa Logging signed a contract with locals in the Porkpah and Gola Konneh Districts for 5,000 hectares.

Over five times smaller than Mavasagueh, Bassa Logging subcontracted the Lebanese-owned Alma Wood, though that contract was meant for only Liberian companies.

A broken-down timber jack with a log still attached to it is seen on an open field in Benduma in the Porkpa District of Grand Cape Mount County. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

Massaquoi and El Zein Hassan, his partner, left hundreds of logs to rot in the northwestern forest. Hassan fled the country in 2019 after failing to settle a US$643,000 loan from Afriland Bank. Massaquoi still owes locals US$56,560 in land rental and other fees, according to an official report in 2022.

Months before the report, the FDA had terminated the contract and nine others after they lasted over twice their maximum, legal lifespan.

‘Managerial role’

Massaquoi’s contracts with Bassa Logging had been illegally awarded.

By his own admission, Massaquoi operated for future FDA Managing Director Rudolph Merab during the Second Liberian Civil War. “I worked with Merab from 1999 to 2007 in [a] managerial role,” he told The DayLight.

Liberia Wood Management Corporation (LWMC), Merab’s company Massaquoi worked for, was the subject of international investigations.

One report by UK-based Global Witness in 2000 found militiamen loyal to President Charles Taylor guarded LWMC’s facilities. It said Another report LWMC exported over 12,810 cubic meters of logs in the first half of 2000.

Another report established that LWMC enjoyed a US$1.4 million tax holiday from the Taylor regime during the Second Liberian Civil War (1999 – 2003). Merab claims the amount was less than that.

A 2005 review of the forestry sector reported, “At least 17 logging companies either supported militias… or facilitated illegal arms trafficking, or aided or abetted civil instability.” An estimated 250,000 people died during Liberia’s two wars, with President Joseph Boakai signing an executive order months into his administration to establish a war and economic crimes court.

Merab admits working in the Taylor era but denies any wrongdoing. “We never participated in the war, we never supported any members of the war,” Merab would later tell the Associated Press.

But forestry reformers created a deterrent against the logging industry’s contribution to any future crisis, formulating the Regulation on Bidder Qualifications.

The regulation disqualifies anyone who participated in forestry before January 2006, unless they confessed their wartime deeds to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and worked with the FDA on how they would repay stolen funds. There is no record that Massaquoi, Merab, or any other wartime logger did that.

By his admission, Clarence Massaquoi, the majority shareholder of C&C Corporation (CCC) and sole owner of Bassa Logging and Timber Company, is a wartime logger. The DayLight/Derick Snyder

Despite Massaquoi’s involvement in the “blood timber” trade, and Bassa Logging’s letdown, the FDA still qualified CCC. The regulator’s justification for endorsing CCC disregarded the war-accountability provision of the regulation.

The evidence shows that Massaquoi exploited a loophole in the regulation that allows a logger to create another company when a previous one failed. All its debt-related provisions pertain to companies, not their owners or managers.

“A thorough review of records and files available for the past five years…, including the cancelation of concession agreements/contracts, indicates no proof of the existence of CCC,” wrote then-FDA Managing Director Mike Doryen on CCC’s qualification in 2023.

“This instrument, therefore, serves as sufficient testimony… of no breaches of forestry laws or regulations… until otherwise proven,” Doryen added.

Massaquoi now adds to several wartime loggers illegally in forestry, a list that also includes Merab. Merab did not reply to queries for comments.

Plywood Company

A confident Massaquoi said he could operate in Grand Bassa, even after he failed in Cape Mount. CCC, according to an environmental study last year, has over 40 earthmovers and other equipment. The DayLight saw an earthmover along the newly paved dirt road being repaired by mechanics.

“I have eight machines on the road, a motor grader, and bulldozers. I used 700 gallons per two days,” Massaquoi said. “I had done more than 15 kilometers of dirt road and paid salaries while working. You must be financially strong.”

Massaquoi implied he had more business opportunities with CCC than he had with Bassa Logging. He referenced Krish Veneer Industries, a sawmill in Buchanan, Grand Bassa he manages, which exports timber and wood products.

“I can sell to my plywood factory. My buyers are right in Buchanan,” he added.

Mavasagueh Community Forest, which covers 26,003 hectares, overlaps a 3,200-acre private land. New Narratives/James Harding Giahyue

Krish Veneer Industries, which he declined to address, adds another layer to Massaquoi’s hidden or overlooked illegalities.

Krish’s legal documents and business registration certificate prove the company is a partnership. Atique Ahmed and Kamal Parwani, both Indians, hold 57 percent and 43 percent shares in the 2019 company.

The regulation restricts forestry companies to corporations.

The provision is in line with the Public Procurement and Concession Act. It comes from the fact that corporate entities, have limitless liabilities and lifespan, and present more taxable opportunities. Partnerships do not possess such advantages.

Krish is one of the most active companies in a largely dormant logging sector. Last year, it made several exports of round logs and veneer, according to official records. Those exports included 241 logs or 1,243 cubic meters last June.

By the FDA’s standard operating procedure, the regulator is required to verify a company’s legal documents before permitting it to export.

It is unclear whether Krish’s ineligibility went unnoticed or was just overlooked for over five years.

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

Tag: Liberia

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