A Patriot’s Diary
With Ekena Nyankun Juahgbe-Droh Wesley
Amid the clueless government’s poor diplomatic cum media machinery, they hastily ran with what should have been a low-key visit of the Director of Langley-based Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Did the Americans make any baseless pronouncement? Weah’s immature close associates sought to hype what was totally unnecessary. Surely, this is what we are bound to get when an inexperienced leader is sandwiched by Rookies.
Nope! The Americans know far better to engage in undue publicity. President Weah and his naïve handlers preferred to unprofessionally let the cat out of the bag. Weah is surrounded by nincompoops! Students of politics, African and Oriental studies would never have become obsessed with CIA’s boss, Burns’ unpublicized visit to Liberia as it were. The American Embassy in Mamba Point made no such disclosure.
High-profiled Presidential guests are often treated and handled discreetly particularly at the instinct of the a responsible president. Does Weah know who or what must be treated discretely or otherwise? Mind you, Weah is not just a fool as assumed or in the real sense of the word. As President, he has and continues to play host to special envoys, and guests alike who are most often than not unannounced for all the classified or perhaps specific reasons. How come the Chief of the CIA whose peculiar visit to President Weah was never informed by any sort of media advisory from the Americans? Simply put. The Americans know better! Had the Secretary of State arranged a planned visit, the U.S. Embassy would without doubt issue a media advisory.
So, who initiated such undue publicity? President Weah’s office is to blame for what should have been a ‘need to know basis’ or handled so discreetly was apparently blown out of proportion. Had the State Department led the charge, it would have been an entirely different situation. Simply because – the State Department deals with Inter-state or if you may, handles bilateral matters. Perhaps Weah and his advisers failed to appreciate what the CIA is all about. Wow! What manner of advisers anyway? Square pegs in round holes; folks that would sheepishly tell the President what he wants to hear rather than what he ought to be told.
In a bit of schooling for President Weah and his lieutenants, at the CIA, their core mission is to preempt threats and further U.S. national security objectives by ostensibly – Collecting foreign intelligence that matters; Producing objective all-source analysis; Conducting effective covert action as directed by the president; and Safeguarding the secrets that help keep our Nation safe.
Essentially, though, the Agency also seeks to meet the intelligence needs of today and tomorrow, by leading specialized, multidisciplinary Mission Centers to address high-priority issues including nonproliferation,… Build strong partnerships between intelligence collection disciplines, among others.
Where has Weah and his henchmen crossed the line that would provoke the Riot Act being read from the lips of the CIA’s briefing room after all? The Americans and their allies have since the climax of World War II devised creative strategies to holistically safeguard their national security interest against foreign threats. The advent of the Cold war further intensified a more aggressive and responsive approach to ensure whatever threats there are to the U.S., its people and allies are carefully analyzed, processed and responded to either diplomatically, revolutionarily or otherwise. America values its lead role within the comity of nations very strategically and as such remains on the full alert to safeguard such critical interest as it were.
What could be the likely smoking gun? Lest we forget, Liberian soil played host to what was the Omega Navigation Tower; a technological surveillance monitoring system that was responsible to gather strategic intelligence data expedient to America’s national security interest. Whatever the threat that once existed seems no more. One can imagine the demobilization of the facility under the reign of Madam Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.
A lot has happened in the last five years in Liberia that has crucially impacted America’s national security interest. Mind you, America and her allies are vigorously leading an expensively tedious war against terroristic threat, drugs, money laundering and illegal arms proliferation across the world. With the guarded technical assistance of the United States of America, an unimaginable cum whooping $100 million worth of cocaine operation was busted in Liberia. The container stashed with the cocaine arrived from South America to the Freeport of Monrovia and was cleared without any detection only to head to a warehouse along Japan Drive in Monrovia before it was busted. What happened to Customs, NSA, Police and other gatekeeping security infrastructure or mechanisms at such a major port of entry?
With an eagle eye, the Americans are able to obtain relevant intelligence regarding terroristic threats, traces of money laundering and trappings of illicit drugs movements across transatlantic borders. President Weah was privately briefed during CIA’s Director Burns visit to the Liberian capital. But Langley’s briefing room was ultimately critical and circumstantial.
Weah will go down in history as an epitome of the ‘first in everything.’ Surely, World Best, The only African soccer star to become Europe’s Best and of course Africa’s Best. He will be remembered as the first ever footballer to become an elected President anywhere in the world. And now, the first President in world history to become Langley’s most high-profiled presidential guest for all the wrong reasons. There is nothing to celebrate about the latest grotesque embarrassment. A disgrace and an affront to the office of president of the Republic of Liberia. An aura of consternation is pricking diehard and fanatic in CDCians as it were. They simply won’t be perturbed amid their inherent fanaticism.
