Liberia: "Lurd Rebels Gashed My Body"
January 10, 2007 allafrica

Taylor rebel kicking civilian and they were responsible for most of the autrocities.

For the second day running in the public hearing ritual before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), continuous finger-pointing against others considered as vile men have taken center stage.

On the first day of the process, Tuesday, January 8, 2008, a noveau riche and top Liberian musician, Marcus Davis, alias Sundaygar Dearboy, was accused of ordering the raping of a 16-year old girl who reportedly died as a consequence of the fighters' rigorous exertions.

But yesterday, witnesses related their stories of woe, one after the other upon the truth pedestal before eagerly gazing commissioners and other concerned Liberians.

From the stories told, at most, none pricked the consciences of the quiet audience than the testimony of a woman, Amelia Demsea, who alleged that rebels of the Liberia United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) gashed her body several times for undisclosed reasons while she was captured by them before they finally letting her go.

J. Edwood Dennis reports from the TRC hearings.

Amelia Demsea, is roughly in her middle 40s, but despite the relative youthfulness that she should be enjoying, she carries multiple fiendish scars all over her body that she ascribes to gashes inflicted by the LURD forces. Amelia, who told the TRC that the sores have partially healed, also disclosed that the severe gashes culminated in what she calls "cancer".

Wearing a red sweater over a mixed colorful cloth (lappa), Amelia though pale and sickly defied her troubling condition in the western provincial city of Tubmanburg, Bomi County, where she takes medical treatment, to proceed to the Monrovia's hearing center at the historic Centennial Pavilion on Ashmun Street in central Monrovia.

"I came to tell my story and am happy that I've been given the chance, "Amelia said. "As I stand before you here, I'm dying slowly," Amelia said on Day Two of the hearings. Though she was visibly moved, her mood was contented that something would follow the presentation that had taken her from Tubmanburg to Monrovia.

But that something did not appear to be anything that she could readily say since the process does not seem to have room for providing direct redress as may be expected in a regular court proceeding. "My people, some people chose death; some people chose short sleeves or long sleeves, and other people chose smiles, but I was lucky to choose design," Amelia narrated.

She then defined the various rebel terms as follows, 'short sleeve 'as an option means the civilian is authorizing the rebels to cut off one limb from the elbow; 'long sleeve' means that the captive takes the painful choice for the rebels to cut off either a hand or foot from either the shoulder or thigh; 'smile' means to the captive agrees with the rebels that his lips both lower and upper lips be cut off to expose the teeth.

On the other hand, Amelia's preference for 'design' meant that the rebels were permitted to gash her with any sharp instrument like knife or cutlass all over her body for a number of times.

"So when I chose 'design' the [LURD] fighters used a kitchen knife to design my body by gashing my skin, cutting under the left and right sides of my breast, further chapping the skin of my back and other body parts," Amelia said.

As Amelia went through her sad episode, a spate of quietude engulfed the hall, and even previously unmoved commissioners and general public now wore pensive looks with bleary eyes indicating the similarity of the human condition whenever in captivity.

Some onlookers at the process were unusually quiet; others held their mouths in bewildering disbelief. A young female was seen weeping while another shook her head in apparent anger.

"The rebels wrote the type of punishment on paper as to what they could do and they insisted that the papers be placed in a box. Everyone captured by the rebels had to pick one paper as if a lucky ticket. Anything you choose, whether that's short sleeves or long sleeves, anything, is what they will do to you," she further narrated.

It is apparent that Amelia Demsea's crime is that she is of the Mano ethnic group of Nimba County. The LURD forces were mainly dominated by Krahns from Grand Gedeh County and the Mandingos, original foes of the Mano and Gio tribes of Nimba.

The feud between Krahns/Mandingos on the one hand,and Gios/Manos on the other came to a head during the war in 1990s.

The victim said that she is taking medical treatment in the same city that LURD, and then headed by Sekou Damate Conneh, used as its main base. The United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) is in control of Tubmanburg, Bomi and the entire country.

Amelia Demsea said she and a friend, only identified as Bindu traveled to Gbah, Bomi County in search of goods when they encountered rebels of the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) in June 2003