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Investigation Uncovers Illegal Timber Traffickers in Caldwell

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Top: The headquarters of Libfor Forest Inc. in Riverview, Caldwell. The DayLight/Derick Snyder


By James Harding Giahyue and Derick Snyder  


Editor’s Note: This is the first of a series that exposes Libfor Forest Corporation, an illegal timber trafficking company, operating in the Monrovian suburb of Caldwell.

CALDWELL – A DayLight investigation has uncovered an illegal timber trafficking company in the Caldwell neighborhood of Riverview. Libfor Forest Corporation. coordinates illegal logging activities in and out of Liberia, packages the wood at an unlicensed sawmill and smuggles them in containers, depriving the Liberian government of much-needed revenue.

Public records and other evidence obtained by The DayLight show that Libfor has never traded through the legal channel for timber harvested, transported, processed, imported, or exported from Liberia, known as LiberTrace.

Yet, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry’s records show that Libfor shipped 55,000 cubic meters of sawn timber in a 20-foot container on May 2 last year with a value of US$22,000.

Also, data compiled by British firm Experian, which tracks global trade, show Libfor has exported 51 times since June 2022. The latest shipments went to Turkey.

The US-based The Trade Vision, Another data company whose report is consistent with Experian’s, finds that Libfor’s exports to a single company last year were valued at US$71,447.

An internal document shows Libfor predominantly exports Iroko, a high-quality timber species selling for US$390 on the world market. Due to its durability, it is used in shipbuilding, outdoor construction and furniture.

The Iroko information is consistent with the one provided by the Ministry of Commerce, Experian and Trade Vision. The document suggests that Libfor predominately smuggles Iroko in different sizes via the Freeport of Monrovia 7.6 miles away.

Libfor’s setup matches a class A sawmill, which means the company has deprived the government of US$2,500 for each year it has operated. The same with export fees, local communities’ benefits and other payments, including for an environmental permit.

‘Black manager’

Libfor Forest Corporation, solely owned by Amara Fofana, a Liberian, was established in 2021. It is the one that has conducted the smuggling, the national and international trade databases.

But Süleyman Karabacak, a Turkish national, is Libfor’s practical owner.

Fofana recruits workers and runs the business’ errands, based on a previous DayLight investigation. Karabacak, on the other hand, manages the business, including finances and exports.

In 2023, Fofana signed a contract with Sierra Leonean chainsaw millers for illegal activities in Nimba, exposed in the investigation. The newspaper had published the bogus contract and oversized timber the chainsaw millers produced, compelling Fofana to admit to the wrongdoing. The contract also had Karabacak’s contact number, which a call app identifies as “Turkish buyer.”

“It is the white man who owns the company. Fofana is just the black manager,” one source said. “It is Süleyman [Karabacak] who has the money, who owns the machines.”

Karabacak also co-owns Libfor Forestry Inc., another company created on December 21, 2023, and registered earlier this month, per its article of incorporation and business registration certificate. Its other owner is Ibrahim Halil Sever, whose nationality The DayLight could not determine.

Before Karabacak, Hasan Uzan, another Turk, ran Libfor, Riverview residents and people familiar with the company, told The DayLight. Uzan was blacklisted by the Forestry Development Authority in 2023 for illegal logging in Nimba County. The sources identified Uzan in a picture with another Turk when police arrested the pair.

Photographs and videos The DayLight shot and obtained further unravel Libfor’s criminal world. Workers work with machines to rip thick, heavy timber into different dimensions. Loads of sawn wood adorned various locations, with a Caucasian person’s foot and fingers in some of the pictures. In another picture, men weld a truck destined to transport timber.

Screenshots of sawn timber export record of Libfor Forest Corporation also known as Libfor Forestry Inc. by British firm Experian

Drone shots of the sawmill corroborated the photographs and videos. They show guards manning the facility as men work. In one video, a person can be seen throwing something at the drone as it hovered over the walled property that headquarters Libfor.

‘In the bush’

But where do Libfors source their timber? Does it smuggle in sawn wood, too? The answers lie in our previous investigation of the company, interviews with customs and immigration officers, sources knowledgeable about Libfor’s activities, and public databases. Our 2023 investigation uncovered that Libfor had 20 chainsaws and deployed six Sierra Leoneans to operate them. The men, who were unregulated migrants, harvested some 460 pieces of Iroko in Karnplay in Nimba’s Gbeh-lay District.

Workers of Libfor workers operate a mobile sawmill to rip oversized timber in the company’s year in Riverview, Caldwell.

“We hauled some on the road, and the rest are in the bush,” Aruna Kamara, one of the men told The DayLight.

The Iroko timber were three inches thick, one inch more than the approved dimension for chainsaw-milled timber supplied domestically.  Oversized timber are relatively a new illegal trade known across the industry as “kpokolo.”

By that time, the Forestry Development Authority (FDA) had banned kpokolo after permitting it for over a decade. That ban would be followed by a prohibition on the issuance of permits that fueled the illegal trade, according to minutes of one of the FDA’s recent board meetings, seen by The DayLight.

Fofana, the company’s frontman, claimed that the men had failed to follow instructions. Libfor made furniture to compete with Lebanese merchants. He had recruited the Sierra Leoneans because “There are no good operators in Liberia.”

But he somersaulted when confronted with the contract Libfor had given the men, instructing them to cut timber three inches thick, 13 inches wide and 15 feet long.

“I will reduce it because I can’t fight the government,” Fofana said at the time. He later claimed he reduced the wood, Smart News reported.

Fofana provided no evidence the timber were reduced or used to make furniture. Unfortunately, The DayLight did not have any evidence that Libfor was exporting wood at the time. Drone shots and pictures The DayLight obtained last December show oversized timber in Libfor’s yard. In one of the pictures, two men operate a mobile sawmill with kpokolo fastened to it.

“First they used to bring round logs for sawing but now they saw the wood in the bush themselves,” one source said. “They only [rip] it into smaller sizes at the sawmill.”

Sierra Leone  

Different sources said Libfor also gets its timber from Gbarpolu and Sierra Leone.

In an audio recording obtained by The DayLight, Foday Kallon, a cross-border trucker, can be heard explaining how he transports wood from Sierra Leone. Kallon says he does not present any documents to Sierra Leonean immigration and customs officers at Bo Waterside, Liberia’s western border with Sierra Leone the border. He only pays customs duties on the Liberian side of the border.  

The DayLight interviewed Kallon via WhatsApp and he added more information. He revealed that he had transported timber up to 80 inches in thickness, sourcing the wood in Kono and other parts of Sierra Leone.

“When you buy the wood, you need to hire a car from me and you pay me.  I can carry your wood from Sierra Leone to Liberia. I, Mr. Kallon, will be there for you anytime you are ready. I will invite you to Sierra Leone or if you want to see me in Liberia, we discuss how you will pay, and how we will come and buy the woods. You and I can come to Sierra Leone and buy your wood and I will transport your wood from Sierra Leone to Liberia,” he told our reporter.

Liberian and Sierra Leonean immigration and customs officers, who asked not to be named as they were not authorized to speak, corroborated Kallon’s account. We obtained a picture of timber in a truck that eyewitnesses said Libfor imported over the weekend.

This supports a 2018 World Bank report that found Liberia imported over US$10,580 worth of timber from Sierra Leone, the third-largest importer of Sierra Leonean timber after China (US$20,295) and Belgium (US$14,230).

Sierra Leonean authorities did not respond to queries from a DayLight associate. The DayLight has reached out to the Liberia Revenue Authority and will update this story with the LRA’s response.

‘We can’t sleep’

Riverview residents have had issues with Libfor for causing noise pollution and spoiling the community’s road. The community—close to the St. Paul River, giving it a waterfront scenery—has watched as Libfor scars the secluded, suburban community.

Mary Toe, an elderly woman who lives behind Libfor’s fence, complained about the noise from the woodwork.  “I can’t sleep at night,” she told The DayLight. “The people work all night.”

Other residents backed Toe’s comments.  Hassan Kamara, a concerned youth, said Libfor’s container truck spoiled Riverview’s main road, sparking a protest.

French, Turkish, and Dutch

Libfor sheds light on the widespread irregularities and the general downturn of forestry.  A recent review of the sector found only five out of 11 logging companies were active, and that none met legal requirements to operate. Liberia Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (LEITI) reports that the sector generated US$7.65 million from July 2021 to December 2022, a far cry from 8.5 million in 2018 alone.

Sierra Leonean Timber blocks such as these are smuggled to Liberia on container trucks

The Regulation on Establishing a Chain of Custody requires all timber harvested, transported, processed, exported, or imported to pass through Liberia’s timber tracking LiberTrace. Trading outside LiberTrace is an offense, with violators facing a prosecution, forfeiture of their vehicles and equipment, and a prison term, according to the Regulation on Confiscated Logs

Libfor did not answer questions The DayLight posed to it. Karabacak claims he only speaks French, even though documents prove he speaks and writes English.

So, The DayLight translated the questions into French, Turkish and Dutch, the two nationalities of Libfor Forestry Inc. Nevertheless, Karabacak did not respond.

Instead, Karabacak informed Fofana, who called the newspaper and scheduled an interview that day. However, Fofana, too, did not turn out. He evaded an interview in Cape Mount and two schedules for Monrovia.

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

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


By Esau J. Farr


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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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


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

About US$3M Made From Planks Unaccounted For At FDA

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Top: A poster showing former Managing Director Mike Doryen and his deputy Benjamin Plewon, Edward Kamara and chainsaw milling activities. The DayLight/Rebazar D. Forte


By Esau J. Farr


MONROVIA – Titus Buah was very excited about his new assignment as the supervisor for a checkpoint in Big Joe Town, Grand Bassa County. It was a busier, bigger and more beneficial assignment for a checkpoint contractor with the Forestry Development Authority (FDA).

But Big Joe Town was unlike his previous assignments. In Saclepea and Sanniquellie, Nimba; Belefanah, Bong; and Zwedru, Grand Gedeh, he sent fees he collected from plank dealers to a mobile money number assigned to the FDA. Now, he had to report to the FDA and Benjamin Plewon III, then Deputy Managing Director for Administration (DMDA).

“The DMDA himself called me to report the money.  He gave me seven different numbers I used to send the money on,” Buah said.

“I was required to produce L$50,000 from the first to the 15th of every month and another L$50,000 from the 16th to the end of the month,” Buah added without providing any evidence.

In the last six years, Buah and other checkpoint contractors collected an estimated US$2.95 million, according to records of the Liberia Chainsaw and Timber Dealers Union (LICSATDUN). The record shows that the amount was collected from five of the dozens of checkpoints countrywide, and did not include a US$120 plank businesses pay. 

But there is no known trace of how the FDA used the money—not in reports by the Liberia Revenue Authority (LRA), which collects the government’s revenue, or the Liberia Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (LEITI), which publishes public payments.   

The last administration of the FDA reported US$2,500 and L$7 million from chainsaw milling for 2023, according to sources familiar with that report. That is a wide gap from the US$464,325 chainsaw milling generated last year, based on LICSATDUN’s records.

The Managing Director of the FDA Rudolph Merab did not respond to questions for comments nearly a month later.

‘Somehow embarrassing’   

The lack of accountability and transparency in the use of the funds bothers LICSATDUN, which has 250 registered members across the country.  

The union has exerted efforts in the last six years to formalize chainsaw milling, which contributes between US$1.4 and US$1.9 million annually to the government, according to a 2017 report. Though largely unregulated, chainsaw milling is the sole timber supplier in local markets. The report found the subsector values between US$30 million and US$41 million.

In 2019 the LRA opened a sub-office at FDA’s headquarters in Paynesville and started to collect US$0.60 on every plank transported.  However, the next year, the tax agency closed the facility after it became too costly to maintain, according to Kaihenneh Sengbeh, the LRA’s manager for communications, media and public affairs. Sengbeh said the facility rarely collected any taxes.

The Liberian government generates between US$1.4 million and US$1.9 million from chainsaw milling, according to a 2017 report. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

In the absence of the failed scheme, chainsaw millers continue to pay US$0.60 to the FDA, which manually issues them waybills or authorization to transport timber. This has fueled corruption and given rise to the trafficking of block-shaped timber commonly called kpokolo.

“If [the] LRA is involved, then we feel that this money is channeled through the government’s revenue,” said Julius Kamara, LICSATDUN’s president.

“It is somehow embarrassing to our members. If the FDA comes out to say that ‘You people are not paying a cent to government,’ the only [defense] we have is the waybills.”

Efforts to regulate chainsaw milling have been unsuccessful, leaving the subsector unaccountable more than two decades since it emerged.

He said the LRA and FDA were discussing the latter institution’s takeover of the chainsaw milling revenue but had not concluded. 

“Furthermore, [the] FDA is formulating several regulations,” Sengbeh told The DayLight. “When put into effect, [the chainsaw regulations] will allow LRA to better administer taxation within the subsector.”

The FDA has attempted to draft a chainsaw milling regulation on three occasions but has completed none. In 2011, the agency drafted the first regulation but could not enforce it. It tried again in 2019 but got the same result. Finally, it formulated the Chainsaw Milling Regulation in 2022. However, the government has yet to gazette it, a requirement for enforcement. 

The Forestry Development Authority does not regulate the chainsaw milling industry. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

Under the proposed 2022 regulation, the FDA will issue chainsaw milling permits and pay fees through a special, transparent channel.

‘In his bedroom’

Buah and other checkpoint contractors provided a likely insight into how the FDA likely misused chainsaw money in the last six years.

The DayLight had caught up with Buah after he appeared on Forest Hour on Okay FM when he and other contractors were agitating for compensation.

In the interview with The DayLight, Buah said on one Sunday morning in 2019 he reported L$50,000 in Plewon’s bedroom.

“It was the first time I was like a king sitting on a table because I [had] carried corrupt money,” Buah said. He added that “[Plewon] gave me L$10,000 and said, ‘Pay your way and go back.’” Plewon and Doryen did not respond to questions about their responses to this and other allegations in this story.

Buah said over the years, FDA checkpoints were shared among top managers of the agency. And checkpoint staff had to befriend the top managers—and, in some cases, their relatives—to be assigned and maintained at a given assignment.

Other checkpoint contractors—Benjamin Taryon of Maryland, Aaron Mulbah of Bong and Arthur Miatona of Grand Gedeh—corroborated Buah’s account.  

Up: Former Managing Director of the Forestry Development Authority Mike Doryen. Here: Former Deputy Managing Director Benjamin Plewon

For instance, “Managing Director [Mike Doryen] [had] checkpoints like (Klay and Ganta) under his control that [made] report to him monthly,” Taryon said. “The Deputy Managing Director [Benjamin Plewon] as well and Edward Kamara.” Edward Kamara did not reply to questions in a hard-copy letter and an email. Nearly a month after he received the communication, he emailed this reporter, asking him to instead write Merab, whom the reporter had already written.

Allegations of the FDA’s misuse of chainsaw fees first appeared in 2020. A FrontPage Africa investigation alleged that the FDA was collecting hundreds of thousands of Liberian Dollars but was not depositing the same into the government’s revenue. For instance, more than half a million Liberian Dollars was generated by Klay Checkpoint alone in Bomi for January.

The investigation also alleged that Doryen and Plewon wrangled over the checkpoint funds.    

“The top hierarchy at the FDA [has] been mismanaging this money and diverting it to their personal use instead of depositing into government’s revenue account,” FrontPage quoted an anonymous source.

Doryen denied the allegation at the time. He accused the sources FrontPage Africa cited of wanting “to continue benefiting from the spoiled system.”

‘Campaign money’

Edward Kamara has been accused of pocketing fees collected from chainsaw milling activities countrywide. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue

Buah, Taryon, and another checkpoint contractor Aaron Mulbah said Edward Kamara invited checkpoint contractors to a meeting in Paynesville ahead of last year’s elections.    

“Edward Kamara informed checkpoint staff and supervisors to work harder because the money they were about to generate was for campaign use,” Taryon said. Checkpoints were tasked in line with their monthly capabilities, Taryon and Miatona added.

“I don’t think that money was used for campaign purposes. The [managers] themselves used that money. It was just a strategy,” said Taryon, saying the money was hand-delivered, not paid via mobile money.  

The checkpoint staffers were not just mere pawns in the scheme. They were involved in corruption, according to Buah.  He admitted that he pocketed checkpoint fees for several years. He singlehandedly built the FDA’s sub-office in Belefanah at the cost of US$6,400, sharing pictures of the building with The DayLight.

“I had to do one or two corrupt practices [to survive],” Buah said.  

In November last year, Buah appeared on Forest Hour on Okay FM, saying he was open to an audit.

“My challenge I will give the incoming government is before you take a seat in the FDA, please audit us. I am included…and the audit must start with me,” Buah said.

Buah furthered: “Please audit me to get the right things done at the FDA checkpoint.” (Merab has spoken about a payroll audit, not chainsaw milling or other areas)

As of January, the FDA owed checkpoint staff 22 months arrears, summing up to more than L$2 million (US$103,000), based on The DayLight’s calculation.


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

Logging Company Paid US$1,000 Fine For Forgery in 2019, Document Reveals

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Top: A drone shot of Kpelle Village, one of the communities affected by Akewa’s operations in the Gola Konneh Community Forest. The DayLight/James Harding Giahyue


By Emmanuel Sherman


MONROVIA – In 2019, Akewa Group of companies, a Nigerian firm operating in Margibi and Grand Bassa County at the time, forged another company’s document to acquire a new logging contract. The Liberia Revenue Authority investigated and found Akewa guilty of forgery. However, it remained unclear what punishment it took against the company.

Now, it has emerged Akewa paid a US$1,000 fine for falsifying a tax clearance of Tiger Quarry, a mining firm, according to the receipt of the payment. The DayLight had requested the document in a follow-up to an investigation report it published last year.

“The LRA professional ethics division (PED) conducted a full-scale investigation into the matter. The PED… recommended that Akewa Group of Companies pays the legitimate fine of US$1,000 in consonance with the Liberia Revenue Law,” said Kaihenneh Sengbeh, LRA’s head of communications.  Akewa made the payment on April 16, roughly one month after the scandal. The receipt categorizes the payment under “fraudulent clearance” penalty.

Akewa had presented the fake document to acquire the Gola Konneh Community Forest, a 49,179-hectare of forestland in the Gola Konneh District of Grand Cape Mount County.

Akewa Group of Companies paid a US$1,000 fine for forging a tax clearance belonging to another company.

The Forestry Development Authority (FDA) approved Akewa’s bid, breaking Liberian laws, including the Regulation on Bidder Qualifications. It bars a company or its affiliate who has been convicted or penalized in the last five years over forgery, bribery and other morality-related offenses.

FDA Managing Director Mike Doryen wrongly justified the agency’s decision in an interview with The DayLight mid-last year. “We prevented Akewa from doing further business until they could provide [their] tax clearance. They rectified it and they paid a fine and that’s how we resumed business with them,” Doryen said at the time.

Liberian laws require harsh punishments for forgery. Under the National Forestry Reform Law, a person faces a 12-month prison term for the offense or a US$10,000 fine, or both. That person faces up to five years in prison under the Penal Code for lying under oath.  

Akewa is one of the forestry’s most delinquent companies. In 2012, Akewa participated in the Private Use Permit (PUP) Scandal. The FDA awarded an estimated 2.5 million hectares of forestlands to fraudulent logging companies in forestry’s biggest postwar scandal. It had received a contract meant for only Liberians three years earlier.

Akewa is currently in a settlement with Beyan Poye Community Forest of Margibi County for the cancellation of its contract with locals. Three Nigerians co-owned the company: Abigail Funke Odebunmi (60 percent) Kenneth Amazeika (20 percent) and Timothy Odebunmi (20 percent).

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

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