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 REMARKS
BY H.E. PRESIDENT ELLEN JOHNSON SIRLEAF VISITOR OF THE UNIVERSITY
OF LIBERIA
ON
THE OCCASION OF THE INAUGURATION OF THE THIRTEENTH PRESIDENT
OF THE UNIVERSITY OF LIBERIA DR. EMMET DENNIS UNIVERSITY
OF LIBERIA MAIN CAMPUS
MARCH
23, 2009
On
this auspicious occasion marking the Inauguration of the Thirteenth
President of the University of Liberia, I am pleased to respond
to the request of the University that I speak, in fulfillment
of my customary duty as the Visitor of the University of Liberia,
on the significance of the University in national development.
In
this respect, I would like to outline the significance of
the University in our national development by tracing its
origins, contributions, challenges and prospects for our national
reconstruction, development and renewal.
As
you can observe in the brief history of the University of
Liberia in the back of this program, UL traces its origins
to Liberia College. Liberia College was incorporated by an
Act of the Legislature of Liberia in December 1851. The University
of Liberia, therefore, is the second oldest institution of
higher learning in West Africa---- second in rank to Furah
Bay College, now the University of Sierra Leone. The Trustees
of Donations for Education in Liberia laid the Cornerstone
and financed the first building on January 25, 1858. Underlying
this effort was the belief that: "The Republic of Liberia
ought to have within itself the means of educating its citizens
for all the duties of public and private life."
Professor
Simon Greenleaf, the Harvard College law professor who drafted
Liberia's Independence Constitution of 1847, led the effort
to establish Liberia College.
In
1862, the first President of our Republic, Honorable Joseph
Jenkins Roberts, was inaugurated as the first President of
Liberia College. With Roberts and two professors--- the Revs.
Alexander Cromwell and Professor Dr. Edward Wilmot Blyden--
and seven students, Liberia College opened its doors in February
1863.
For
most of the next 90 years, the college struggled with great
obstacles to maintain its existence and integrity. As the
sovereignty of the Liberian state remained challenged, so
was uncertainty about the survival of Liberia College. The
college was forced to close its doors on at least three separate
occasions during this period. The Liberian State and the College
managed to survive, however. Graduates were few, but the role
that the leadership of the college played in Liberian society
was significant, as were the contributions of its graduates.
Philanthropists,
beginning with the Trustees of Donation for Education in Liberia,
provided a welcome, but limited resource for the College until
the Tubman era (1943-71), when financial resources became
available to the Liberia State, following the successful cultivation
of rubber and the discovery of iron ore deposits in Liberia.
Favorable
prices for these commodities in the 1950s raised Liberian
public sector revenues more than eight fold in a decade.
The
effects on the larger society of the resulting favorable terms
of trade monetized a hitherto barter economy, leading to phenomenal
public sector growth. That growth resulted in higher demand
in the public sector for managerial and technical labor. Further,
the need for capacity in the technical positions established
in the new sectors caused the Liberian Government to appreciate
the need for higher education through a national university.
Consequently,
in 1951, the Legislature of the Republic chartered the University
of Liberia.
Whereas
Liberia College had been established to prepare the nation's
Clergymen and public officials, the national University among
other goals, sought to become a: "…center of learning
with high academic standards which is dedicated to the pursuit,
promotion and dissemination of knowledge with emphasis on
practical knowledge which is immediately useful to economic,
social and cultural development needs."
Liberia
College and the University of Liberia have made significant
impact on the Liberian society. Leaders of the College were
frequently the leaders of the nation. In the 1870s, the College's
leadership was at the center of national political developments,
a fact reflected in President Joseph Jenkins Roberts' retirement
from the presidency of the College to assume the presidency
of Liberia for the second time in 1876.
Other
national leaders who served the College as President included
Professor Dr. Edward W. Blyden, the erudite Pan-Africanist
scholar, diplomat and political activist, who served as a
Secretary of State of Liberia. Liberia's former president
Garretson W. Gibson was also President of Liberia College.
President Arthur Barclay, the first graduate of Liberia College
in 1873, was president of his Alma mater from 1901 to 1902,
and again from 1914 to 1917. Arthur Barclay succeeded J.J.
Dossen, the future Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Liberia.
At the conclusion of his term as President of the College,
Barclay was succeeded by Charles D. B. King, who himself served
as President of Liberia between 1920 and 1930.
President
Charles D. B. King's Secretary of State, Edwin J. Barclay,
a graduate of Liberia College in 1903, succeeded him as President
of Liberia. Edwin Barclay, as King's Secretary of State, negotiated
the Firestone Plantations Agreement of 1926.
Leaders,
graduates and former students of the University of Liberia
also contributed significantly to African development. University
and College graduates, who served the nation, also served
Africa and the larger international community. Prior to Ghana's
independence in 1957, Liberia was the foremost activist promoting
and financing the Africa independence movement. From Nmandi
Azikwe to Sam Njoma; from Nelson Mandela to Robert Mugabe;
from Julius Nyerere to Jomo Kenyatta; from Ahmed Ben Bella
to Ahmed Sekou Toure;
from
Hastings Kamuzu Banda, to Kwame Nkrumah and Sir Alhaji Abubakar
Tafewa Belewa, each came to consult Liberian leaders; most
enhanced their leadership through interaction with Liberia's
former Secretary of State J. Rudolph Grimes (Alumnus of Liberia
College Class of 1943) and William R. Tolbert (Class of 1934).
Most of these leaders were initiated into the fraternity of
the University of Liberia honoris causa honor society.
Let
me also mention a few of the most important roles Liberian
leaders - graduates of the College or the University -played
in African affairs. William R. Tolbert ,Jr. (Class of 34),
as Tubman's special Envoy, was pivotal in ending the Biafran
War when his shuttle diplomacy resulted in the famous meeting
in Monrovia between Dr. Azikwe and General Yakubu Gowan. Rocheforte
L. Weeks (Liberia College Class of 1944 and President of the
University of Liberia from 1959 to 1972) and foreign Minister
of Liberia (1972), was a member of Liberia's legal team who
appeared before the International Court of Justice in the
case against South Africa's illegal occupation of the then
Southwest Africa (Now Namibia).
W.
Oliver Bright (Liberia College Class of 1956) and D. Franklin
Neal (Class of 1952), under Secretary of State Grimes' leadership
and supervision, drafted the Charter of the Organization of
African Unity (OAU, now known as the African Union). An unsolicited
draft of the Charter submitted as a working document, inspired
the proponents, thus ending the fractious division between
the Monrovia and Casablanca Powers. Neal also supervised the
drafting of the Treaty of League, the agreement that created
the Economic Community of West African States, (ECOWAS). A
former dean of the College Business and Public Administration
of the University of Liberia, A. Romeo Horton, who became
the first Managing Director of the ECOWAS Fund, formed part
of the small group that drafted the instrument for establishment
of the African Development Bank.
The
significant contribution of this institution to national life
have continued unabated. During the Liberian civil war, a
large number of graduates of the University continued to accept
the call to national service.
Many
of its alumni, former professors and deans, assumed pivotal
roles in the Liberian peace process, including Professors
Amos C. Sawyer, and the late Professor Wilton Sankawulo, who
served as Interim Heads of State of the Republic.
The
civil war has reduced the capacity of the University of Liberia
to respond adequately to the production of competitive human
resources that can generate and manage sustainable social,
economic development activities in Liberia.
The
University also experienced extensive damage to its physical
plant and facilities during the period of war and civil unrest
in the country.
For
example, more than 90% of the University's facilities, including
computers, books, and typewriters were looted and pillaged.
More than three-fourths of its library collections of about
2 million volumes of texts, periodicals and rare books were
ruined. 70% of the Main campus's science complex and 50% of
the medical dormitories were damaged. The percentage of damaged
facilities was as high as 80% in many buildings on the medical
campuses while the Fendall campus, where the University had
relocated before the war, was destroyed, the minimum damage
done to any single building more than 85%. The University's
cadre of 1,400 teaching, research and administrative staff,
including 500 internationally trained faculty, substantially
dissipated in number to about 307 as a result of the brain
drain.
The
challenges to restore the University to a quality institution
of higher learning is daunting but it must be done. Although
we have destroyed and limited facilities we must respond to
enrollment that has increased from pre-war level of 9,500
to about 18,000 today.
To
address these problems, coupled with our concern for the significance
of the University in post-conflict development, I pledge my
Administration's support in restoring fully the training and
research activities at the University. To complement our support,
I invite the thousands of UL alumni at home and abroad, private
sector, the diplomatic corps, and other development stakeholders,
to join our effort in rebuilding University of Liberia. We
will be counting on their generous and humanitarian support
to the University.
In
return, I expect the University to be able to assume a leadership
role in providing research and analytical inputs to our post-war
reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts under the "
Lift Liberia Program" otherwise known as the Poverty
Reduction Stategy.
In
these days of global economic meltdown, and the resulting
national budgetary constraints, I advise the Board of Trustees
and the University Administration to remain steadfast in the
capital campaign started by the previous administration. I
understand the University now has US$2.3 million in its
Endowment fund that is managed in the United States by the
Trustees of Donations for Education in Liberia.
Let
me thank the Trustees for this and other fund raising support
to the University.
At
the same time, I would like to thank the over fifteen cooperating
universities, other institutions and Governments in Africa,
Europe, Asia and the United States that are helping the University's
resource mobilization and training.
The
Government of the People's Republic of China stands out with
its contribution of US$22 million grant that is now financing
the construction of a new University campus at Fendall. This
was a clear decision made by this Administration in keeping
with the commitment to improve higher education.
This
was a clear decision despite other alternative claims such
as the renovation of the Executive Mansion. At the same time,
the Chinese Government has already constructed an engineering
lab, a soil-testing lab and a computer lab at the UL Fendall
Campus.
The
US Government in a spirit of cooperation, is preparing and
equipping the Engineering Building at Fendall for which we
are very grateful.
We
also welcome the 4 million Euros grant of the Government of
Italy, which will be used to assist with the reconstruction
of the A. M. Dogliotti College of Medicine of the University
of Liberia.
The
University today is rebuilding after a civil crisis, although
it remains understandably, a shadow of its most recent past.
However, new hopes have been awakened by its new Strategic
and Endowment Plans and its new leadership.
Let
us all do our part - students, professors, administrators,
leaders in ensuring that the University of Liberia produce
graduates that can compete professionally anywhere in the
world, and that means, that students, also have their part
to play. That there will be no more buying of grades. That
there will be a commitment to be true academic students, by
studying. Our challenge is to try and provide the facilities
for you. Your challenge is to make use of them, so that you
can become quality graduates that can serve your country in
the leadership role.
Thank
you all for being great partners in the building of our nation.
I
thank you!
History
excerpts taken from President Sirleaf Address to the University
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