Sengbe K. Khasu discusses what may only be considered the 'Liberian Condition'.

Sermon Title: “Occupy Until I Come” (text and verse forgotten). Circa 1980.

We are at Sophie’s Ice-Cream Shop playing truant from church again when she preached this sermon. The pastor’s eldest son and grandchildren. Scandalous.

The blood clot bubbles up an artery and lodges itself someplace in her brain, seizing her tongue. Saints take her into the upper-room. They lay hands on her. They exalt.

Rebuke. Speak in tongues. Some face the wall. She dies.

They say it was a miracle. An act of God.

My grandmother was one of many units that make up the place called Liberia. She died of a stroke. It was the “how,” the symptom, not the cause, as some would like to believe. The Liberian Condition was the “why,” the cause.

I am fruit of her fruit. My human constitution, which governs my health and well-being, I get partly from her. My full-time occupation these days is making sure I cure this condition at least in me.

This grandmother, the one I was closest to, not the quiet Muslim woman we giggled at when she spoke Vai to us or the grandfathers, men bearing surnames that could never be their own even if passed down several hundred years from the time of the Providence landing.

This grandmother, she was a Bassa (her father or grandfather may have been from Jamaica, West Indies). A nurse. Administrator of a school for the poor. She loved us dearly and took mess from no one. But “Pentecostal minister,” “Christian,” “Prayer warrior,” would be her primary identity. Her life story is what I must use to focus my personal discourse in this post-conflict period (although I have come to learn we have had many post-conflict periods before). She is my chart.

I count back my grandmother’s age from my father’s. She is a 20th Century born woman. To Bassa people. And perhaps, a West Indian ghost.

I imagine her as a child the same age as I was when she died. Ten going on eleven.

Whuh you parents pray to? Whuh dey worship?
De people beat you to come to de pray to de strange man?
You was scare?
Da who name you Rebecca so? You pa?
I wonder how long it took before she learned to discard herself in order to survive in ““Sweet Liberia”? She cannot tell me. She has been dead nearly a quarter century. But I imagine the instant her native soul was “won.” I imagine that moment multiplied a million and more ways and times everyday for nearly two hundred years.

Liberia. “Sweat land of Liberty.” “Africa’s oldest republic.” “Founding Member of the League of Nation.” Liberia. The only African country without at least one nationally spoken African language.

We hide our ancestral gods and goddesses under soggy mattresses. But our delusions of grandeur and inferiority has burst once again for all to see. With the exception of one group us. I hear this time is different.

I look forward to getting on the ground and being a part of repairing what was broken when the souls were “won.” My grandmother would be so upset at me were she here. She would be hurt. Angry. But most of all, she would fear for my salvation. Others will do it for her. Cousins, aunts, uncles. The ol' man will understand even if he is initially stunned. Someone close has already given up on my salvation. They will not bother to read the rest.

But the truth of the matter is all that matters: we have deluded ourselves into a quandary. And the net creation of our delusions of grandeur/inferiority is plain for the world to see. Every Liberian life contains a small perfect atom within it. And I am aware that ever so often that atom bubbles over and bursts like a vessel set to some remote timer, visible to all others except us.

I do not believe our Liberian Problem stems only from our traumatic conception. And I refuse to believe in our position in the 500 year plus old “New World Order” (must remain static in order to maintain harmony in some minds. And in the main time, we should all be good global citizens and go through the motions).

It is the role we’ve played to date. And risk playing unless we change character(s). And I do not just mean individuals. That step comes only after we reclaim our sense of self. Some would say we are doing that. We have got trained Liberian minds on the ground, the first woman President (again one of our glorious firsts), we have foreign investors. We have a new resolve.

Then why do we continue to avoid the business of dealing with our real truths? That our history is rife with all that we have seen the last twenty years. And more. You want so-called ethnic cleansing? Gaze into our past. Cannibalism? Presidential coups real and make-believe? Start with E.J. Roye, the fifth President. He was killed shot while swimming to a ship or dragged through the streets of Monrovia, depending on who is telling long before “native people” were even recognized under the Liberian brand.

And what about our habit of calling Papa America to help? Goes back to the very first attack of the deadly “fever” and marauding “heathens” years before the start of official Dependence in 1847. Would we have “acted up” as usual if we sobered to the fact that America’s lack of response has been their consistent response every single time since 1821?

Okay, so they usually respond when our mouth is dragging, as the saying goes.
Would we tear shit down if we realised “de Poppay” was not coming. Or maybe he did. Ol’ man Jimmy did. And those young surfer dudes who declared our graveyard beaches home to the best waves in the world. And they would know. They claim to have hit all the top resorts around the world when on breaks from the Ivy League schools of the West.

We are where we are because of our Constitution as a people. Because of our actions (or inactions). I’m not apologising for the bad behavior of outsiders. I just want to acknowledge our role in the whole play.

We keep looking for reasons to be “saved.” I have lived amongst tribesman from the dominant Tribes of Europe and Asia for most of my life now. I know them well. They are not better nor less diverse as a people. They have many languages. They have beheaded cousins and clansman for centuries. Their brains are not sharper. They do not work harder. Their “kpahn-kpahn” not more potent. They are more honest with themselves. And their agendas around the world. They spend no time devising ways to fool us. We do that quite well ourselves.

I look at my grandmother. I see the girl who probably went to live with some “Congo” or Americo-folks. I pass no judgment. It is the past. It cannot be changed. But nature is not kind to animals who forget or refuse to be themselves. I am reminded of what a close friend recently said to me: you torture a tree you corrupt the fruits. Corrupted fruits over a period of time will be accepted as what has always been. A body out of touch with its cognitive memory functions is connected to nothing. It is incapable of self-preservation. At best, it depends on others for everything. Here is the Liberian Condition. The African in general. Stuck chasing stimuli from outside in order to feel “alive” - even if it kills. More “book,” “big-big house dem,” “prayer vigils,” “fancy embroidered paper engraved Harvard degrees,” and cell-phones. We do this over and over again blindly--we pray to God or Allah when we need brain surgery and then blame certain death on “sumu” or “juju.”” A nation of pathologically delusional people would.

Battles fought for your soul don’t hurt when fought by people who not just look like you but to whom you belong. And in the ‘80s the crusade raged on. We enjoyed it tremendously. Saturdays spent with the world’s greatest grandmother involved matinées at Relda Cinema, sometimes two. And for me, a large bowl of fufu and soup. Then came the spider stories told on the porch by older cousins. Now what kid in his right mind would mind a long Sunday afternoon in church after that? An aunt calls to tell me she has heard my father is a fixture in the old church on Sundays. “The Lord gets you when it’s your time, Sengbe.” I take that as a warning and call the guy up. He admits his backslide. I tell him he is such a disappointment. We laugh about the changing of familiar roles. He tells me he has changed his mind about church. That I must begin to go; his mother would rage hell if he showed up on Judgment Day without any of her grandbabies. We laugh again. But there will be no more talk about it. The Liberian Condition is the “why.”

* Senghbe K. Khasu is a screenwriter, film director and musician living in New York City.

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