Tracking Criminals or Dying Innocents?

My mom, Mrs. Fanta Kone-Fofana (MashAllah!!!)

  

At about 8:30 am on May 22, 2012, I arrived at the Loguatuo border post from Man, the western capital of Cote d’Ivoire, en route to Monrovia. With me was my mom in a critical health condition, in need of urgent medical attention.  She had been told by some physician's assistant in that mountainous city that she had a sore/ulcer in her chest and, being a diabetic patient, the entire family was terrified.

Heading to Man

I was informed about this development by 6pm on Monday. I immediately dashed out of the office, got home, grabbed a bag with only a blouse and a pair of jeans and headed for the Red Light commercial district, where all sorts of vehicles are boarded for rural Liberia. Red Light also happens to be the area where cars are boarded for the town, Loguatuo, bordering Liberia and Cote d’Ivoire, through Nimba County, northern Liberia.

Unfortunately, it was so late. So, I had to spend the night and got going the next morning as early as 6am. Thankfully, I arrived in Man by 11pm. I immediately dashed into my mom’s room and met her lying helplessly on her bed, unable to move any part of her body, sweating profusely and coughing endlessly. A round of coughing lasted no less than two hours.

I became even more terrified by that sight. I began fishing into her closet, grabbed a few clothes, took her to the bathroom and managed to give her a cool bath to calm the fever. I then changed her clothes and the beddings and put her back in bed. I couldn’t wait to see the day light for us to begin our journey back to Monrovia, where, for some reasons, I believed we would have accessed some level of advanced medical care than the one in Man. Due to the hasty nature of my parking of clothes, I mistakenly took a piece of paper I thought was mommy’s refugee attestation card.

The Trouble in Loguatuo

Mommy and the rest of my siblings (including Sally, my oldest sister; Morris, my oldest brother; and Amadou, my baby brother) have been residing in Cote d’Ivoire since fleeing into that neighboring state in search of peace, security and safety – to escape the turmoil in our homeland in 1990. After 22years of residence in that country, and having lost everything to the Liberian civil war, mommy has been hesitant about returning home, Liberia. However she had to, this time because she was desperately in need of medical care to save her life.

As God would have it, we began our journey the next morning as early as 6am in a chartered private car. We traveled the 102km distance, passing through Danane and Gbinta, with exceeding ease. No custom, or immigration or police officer on the Ivoirian side of the journey bothered us. What was enough for them was the sight of a dying woman in desperate need of urgent medical attention. In fact, we were allowed to cross through to the Liberian side of the border with our chartered vehicle by the Ivoirian officials without a word. They only prayed for us.

The main bridge connecting Liberia with Cote d’Ivoire was destroyed during the heat of the civil war. In the contemporary context, to access Liberia from Gbinta (the Ivorian side of the border), one has to cross the narrow River Nuan over a shaky log. 

Liberia’s official point of entry [from Cote d’Ivoire] in northern Nimba County is a small town that was previously a booming city before the onset of the country’s civil war. Most of the buildings in the town are typical mud-brick huts. The main immigration inspection point at Loguatuo is a huge hall demarcated into sections to include the customs, laissez passer and health posts.  Immediately adjacent this main hall is a newly erected structure that now houses the office of the Immigration commander. 

Once in Loguatuo, the trouble began. The officials of the Liberian Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization (BIN) at the Loguatuo border insisted the dying woman came out of the car to explain to them her mission to Liberia. In the first place, the woman could not author her words, she couldn’t walk, couldn’t sit. She was only lying down in the car; hence the even more reason to charter a vehicle throughout the entire journey.

All the way I tried explaining to the officers that mom had been residing in Cote d’Ivoire as a Liberian refugee, but due to the critical nature of her condition, I took the wrong documentation about her status in that country, instead of the attestation given her by the UNHCR.

…..A Scam?

All they did was slammed my explanation; terming it as a fake story. According to them, it was a scam put together by me and mom. They added that my mission was to “import” an illegal migrant in the country. In fact, interesting enough, they got into an intense argument with me regarding my relation with the woman in question. They argued that the woman was never my mom.

At one point, one of them rushed to the car and asked mom to get out and come to see him in his office. I immediately intervened and said, “You can’t do this. This woman can’t walk. Don’t you see for yourself?”

He turned and yelled at me, “Keep out of this. If you say she can’t walk, then I will have to interview her here.”

He began probing mom. By the time she responded to his second question, she was completely out of breath, fighting to regain her breath and struggling to hold herself up. The sight of mom in such condition got pool of tears streaming down my cheeks. I again came in and told mom to never respond to any of his questions. I turned to him and asked him to direct all his questions to me. He refused and said mom and I were acting.

The Ivoirian driver of the chartered vehicle had gone above and beyond the call of duty to convey my mother and me to the Liberian side – something that drivers like him wouldn’t normally do for their passengers.  They would typically deposit their passengers at the Ivorian check point and let their passengers walk across the bridge to the Liberian point of entry.  But as gracious as this driver was, he, too, was becoming impatient and needed to return, deeply frustrated about the attitude of the BIN officers. At this point, I became too hopeless, because that meant mom would be placed on the bare floor because we were still a few meters away from the parking lot, where we could board a cab for Monrovia.

When mom finally regained her breath and calmed down, I tried getting her out of the car so that we could both sit on the floor with her head resting on my laps.

The Timely Intervention

Outraged by the unfolding event, every other traveler and by-standers began raining insults at the BIN officers. They insisted mom remained in that Ivorian car while they arranged for another cab to transfer her in. Confused over how deeply involved even some residents of Loguatuo had become in the matter, the BIN officers referred me to their commander, who simply asked me the name, date of birth and age of mom. I provided him with this bio info in a split second. They then threatened to report me to my office, the Daily Observer that I had bad morals – only because I kept telling them that they were only bent on killing my mother, my only source of hope, psychological and emotional support.

However, overwhelmed with the compounding crowd’s demand that we should be let go, we were let to continue our journey. By then mom’s condition had further deteriorated to the extent that she wouldn’t eat anything I gave her. All she did was to stare at me.        

What struck me most about the technicality employed by these immigration officers was that these are the very people who sit at that border and see drugs and human trafficking ongoing across that porous border without lifting a finger. What did they want to proof by attempting to murder an innocent woman in the name of the law? What were they up to?

Thankfully, we arrived at the John F. Kennedy Medical center in Monrovia by 8:30 that night. Mom was admitted and treated for diabetes, chronic blood anemia, among other medical complications. After 15 days of admission, she was finally discharged, feeling much, much better.  The experience at the hospital, mind you, is a story all by itself.