By Wade C.l. WilliamsAnyone harboring or encouraging suggestions that the U.S. military is in Liberia on a mission to facilitate the overthrow of the democratically-elected government headed by President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf should forget about it, according to U.S. Ambassador to Liberia, Deborah Malac. The U.S. envoy has made it emphatically clear at a news conference Monday that U.S. troops are in the country strictly to help Liberia battle the deadly and menacing Ebola outbreak and nothing more.
Said Ambassador Malac: "I hope you will help us get the message out about what the role of the US military forces who are coming to Liberia actually is. Let me be very, very clear and it should be subject to no questioning or doubt. They are here to provide additional heft to the efforts that is already ongoing to fight Ebola (period)!
They're not here as a show of force; they're not here to push against or change the government. I want to be very, very clear; everybody laughs and thinks that we're not serious, but I know that conversation is going on out there and I want to be clear. They're here to help us fight Ebola."
'Absolutely Not True'
Added Ambassador Malac: "They bring additional logistic capacity. They bring greater heft and energy and ability to get things done; particularly when you have these infrastructure constraints and other things. They can move things around. I don't want to see anywhere in any newspaper or hear on any radio station that the US military has come in because the US government has a secret plot to overthrow the government here in Liberia; that is absolutely not true. "
President Sirleaf is being represented at the General Assembly by Foreign Minister Augustine Ngafuan. The clarification from the Ambassador lays to rest heightening speculations which have been in the air for months that the troops from America came to the Ebola-hit nations with an ulterior motive. U.S. President Barack Obama on Sept. 16, ordered 3,000 U.S. Soldiers in West Africa. In a speech at the United Nations last week, Mr. Obama criticized the international response thus far and said other donors--governments and organizations--need to step up quickly with aid.
"Right now, everybody has the best of intentions, but people are not putting in the kinds of resources that are necessary to put a stop to this epidemic," he said. More nations urgently need to contribute goods and services like health care workers, equipment and air transport, he said.
The U.S. response was preceded by a September 9, 2014 letter sent to President Obama by President Sirleaf in which the Liberian leader implored Obama for help in managing Liberia's Ebola crisis, cautioning that without American assistance the disease could send Liberia into the civil chaos that enveloped the country for two decades.
President Sirleaf wrote: "I am being honest with you when I say that at this rate, we will never break the transmission chain and the virus will overwhelm us." The President also requested 1,500 additional beds in new hospitals across the country and urged that the United States military sets up and run a 100-bed Ebola hospital in the besieged capital, Monrovia.
President Sirleaf went to great lengths to lament that her administration risks losing the gains made in a still-fragile environment as the outbreak threatens to reverse progress made by her government. "Without more direct help from your government, we will lose this battle against Ebola. A WHO investigation conducted with other partners and our own Ministry of Health and Social Welfare projects thousands of cases over the next three weeks."
A week later, Obama during a speech at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, announced a more aggressive American response to the disease, declaring that the U.S. will construct a US$22 million, 25-bed hospital for Foreign health workers only. However, after the announcement was greeted with a lot of backlash, the U.S. shifted position to say that the hospital will now be used for all medical workers in Liberia.
Working Together to defeat Ebola
Maj. Gen Darryl Williams, Joint Task Force Command, United Assistance, who is leading the U.S. military response in Liberia told reporters Monday that the U.S. military is bringing in Mobile Ebola Testing Labs and other Supplies to Fight Ebola. The US Navy General said "As our military forces continue to flow in, we will continue to work together, so that we compliment each other's abilities and efforts to support the government of Liberia".
He said the U.S. Navy will be partnering with the Liberian army in accomplishing the mission to defeat Ebola. Said Maj. General Williams: "We will also be partnering with the Armed Forces of Liberia and they're eager to help their fellow countrymen. Our soldiers, sailors, airmen, marine, are working side by side with our Liberian Host and build on our already special relationship. It is only through working together that we can hope to be successful against this deadly foe".
U.S. military C-17s landed at Roberts International Airport over the weekend carrying key pieces of U.S. military equipment to aid in the anti-Ebola fight: two mobile Ebola testing labs and equipment to build the 25-bed field hospital for health care workers.
The mobile labs will be placed at the Ebola Treatment Centers (ETUs) at Island Clinic and in Bong County, and are expected to be operational this week. The labs are a huge step in stopping the spread of Ebola, because they reduce the time needed to determine if a patient has Ebola from several days to just a few hours. The labs will be operated by members of a U.S. Navy Medical Research Unit.
The 25-bed hospital arrived as U.S. Seabees broke ground on the hospital site in Margibi County. Originally designed to treat military service members in combat zones, the facility will be staffed by the U.S. Public Health Service and will be used to care for health workers in Liberia.
The 25-bed hospital and mobile testing labs are part of the U.S. effort to help the government of Liberia and other Ebola-affected countries contain the Ebola virus, save lives and alleviate human suffering. Other U.S. activities include setting up a logistics base to facilitate the flow of military personnel, supplies, and equipment into the affected region, helping to build 17 Ebola treatment units, and training for hundreds of health care workers.
More than 3000 Dead
The outbreak has now killed more than 3,000 people in West Africa out of 6,263 cases in the five West African countries affected by the disease as at the end of September 26. Liberia, which has more than half of the deaths of the total number in the affected countries, reported 99 more deaths in Liberia since September 17, compared to four new deaths recorded in Sierra Leone since September 19 and only three new deaths in Guinea since September 20.
Last week, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control laid out a scenario under which it suggested that cases in Liberia and Sierra Leone could rise to between 550,000 and 1.4 million by January if there are no "additional interventions or changes in community behavior. The range of estimated cases -- from 550,000 to 1.4 million -- is wide because experts suspect the current count is highly under-reported.
The official death toll from Ebola in West Africa has climbed to more than 2,800 in six months, with 5,800 cases confirmed as of Monday, the World Health Organization said. But the CDC estimates that if 70% of people with Ebola are properly cared for in medical facilities, the epidemic could decrease and eventually end.
The clarification from the U.S. Diplomat comes on the heels of a peaceful anti-corruption protest at the United Nations by Diaspora-based Liberians calling for Sirleaf's resignation. The protest was held under the auspices of the Movement Against Corruption in Liberia (MOLAC) and Concerned Liberians Against Corruption and Impunity (CLACI) and brought together Liberians living in the United States.
A position statement of the group calling on the President to resign, says they also staged a peaceful protest in Liberia alongside with the New York protest and insist they will continue to stage a peaceful protest until President Sirleaf steps down. Protesters say they were pressing for Sirleaf to step down because she has failed to prosecute corrupt officials and signed 68 illegal contracts that gave out the country resources without securing Liberia's share.
Ellen Corkrum, a naturalized Liberian American, one of the campaigners for the resignation of the President Sirleaf says the Liberian leader has failed her people. "In Liberia, President Sirleaf has failed us. We witnessed a Military quarantine and not a medical quarantine. The world, and we, watched three of our children being shot in West Point and the death of our fifteen year old, Shaky Kamara. "
"This was yet another ploy by the Liberian government to incite fears in us and to keep us, Liberians, from standing up for our basic human rights. Our own military that should protect us, rather, has implemented deadly force against us our children during this critical time of unendurable health, intolerable sanitation, prolong hunger and abysmal leadership" stated Corkrum.