Liberia's first and foremost independent daily, Daily Observer, has named the country's Finance Minister Amara Konneh and Central Bank Governor J. Mills Jones as its 2012 persons of the year.
In an article announcing its choices for person of the year, the newspaper's senior editor, Ms. Fatoumata N. Fofana said "As in 2011, we again thought we were going to have an
easier task selecting our Person of the Year. In our assessment of
government officials, private sector stake-holders, civil society
organizations and opposition politicians, we combed through our notes
gathered over the year to try to build a composite picture of each
person’s performance."
She continued: "In our analysis of both personalities, we came to the conclusion that
indeed the effects these two financial engineers have had on the economy
over the course of the year can be quantified. They could be measured — for Jones: increment (increase) in the Central
Bank’s reserve from five million United States Dollars (US$5 million)
[since 2006] to around three hundred million USD (US $300 million) as of
August 2011; the launching of a Loan Extension Assistance Facility
(LEAF) in the amount of LRD$200,000,000 (Two Hundred Million Liberian
Dollars) for Microfinance Institutions, Credit Unions and Village
Savings and Loans Associations, only to mention a few of his
achievements.
"On the other hand, Finance Minister Amara Konneh is leading the charge
in ensuring that Liberia becomes a middle income country 2030 (2012 -
2017). He found and forged a new beginning in reshaping the way aid is
administered in Liberia; along with the President, the then Finance
Minister, Augustine Ngafuan (now Foreign Minister), his predecessor,
Finance Minister Antoinette Sayeh, and CBL Governor Jones, Minister
Konneh played an exceedingly impressive role in completing the
benchmarks for the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative.
This resulted in the waiver of $4.6 billion in external debt from the
World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other lenders. Mr.
Konneh led the development process for Liberia’s threshold country
proposal and negotiated with the United States Millennium Challenge
Corporation for the approval of a US$15 million grant to improve land
rights and access, increase girls’ primary education completion rate,
and developed a trade policy regimen consistent with regional standards."
In practical terms, she said, these economic architects have valiantly paved a
pliable roadmap for Liberia’s economic-revitalization, which is
commensurate (matches) with Liberia’s development diplomacy---the
contemporary (today’s) focus of this war-ravaged country’s foreign
policy.
In a nutshell, she added, for striving to begin the task of placing the Liberian
economy back in the hands of Liberians; for spearheading the rebuilding
of key infrastructures across the country, the Observer is pleased to
name Finance Minister Konneh and CBL Governor J. Mills Jones as our 2012
Persons of the Year.
According to Editor Fofana, from a shortlist that included veteran educator and Peace Activist Mary
Brownell and Nobel Laureate Leymah Gbowee, Central Bank Governor Mills
Jones and Finance Minister Amara Konneh have for the first time been
named the Daily Observer's Persons of the Year.
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