Defence Ministry to spend $1 million on armed forces

Liberia’s government is to spend US $1 million to restructure its armed forces, news organisations reported on 2 March.

Quoting Defence Minister Daniel Chea, the pro-government Radio Liberia International said the money would go to a restructuring commission headed by cabinet Director-General Blamo Nelson.

A document produced by the restructuring committee states that the military which, for now is limited to the army, will be reduced from 11,000 to a little less than 6,000 -- 5,150 in the army along with a 600-member navy and an air force of 240.

Broadly, the reorganisation of the military will involve demobilisation, retirements and then restructuring to give it a national character. Just before the civil war, the armed forces comprised people from late president Samuel Doe’s Krahn ethnic group. After the civil war the military was made up of loyalists of various civil war factions, including former members of the Liberian Army.

A political analyst told IRIN on Tuesday that the numerical dominance of the Krahns in the military will likely be reduced to attain greater representation of other ethnic groups.

President Charles Taylor has sought money from the international community to restructure and modernise his military, so far without success. Recently, he said he would begin the process despite the lack of external support.

Liberia’s military has traditionally been trained by the United States which provided it with its doctrine. The political analyst told IRIN that Washington showed interest in the military’s reorganisation but that there had not been any public indication of this interest since a clash on 18 September 1998 between government troops and supporters of Taylor-rival Roosevelt Johnson, who had sought refuge in the US Embassy.

Under a peace accord signed in Abuja, Nigeria, the West African peacekeeping force, ECOMOG, was supposed to have restructured, recruited and trained the AFL. However, Taylor objected, saying it was the sovereign right of Liberia to decide who would train its military.