Tamba Jean-Matthew
May 2010
Liberia's anti-corruption commission has asked President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf to drop her support for officials accused of swindling public funds into their personal accounts.
For several weeks now, the anti-corruption commission has been battling to pin down the country's finance minister who is accused of stealing millions of public monies.
While Finance Minister Steven Ngafuan struggles to counter the allegations, he has this week received a presidential backing to the discontentment of the graft commission and the general public.
President Sirleaf in a public discourse intimated that the minister could not be held responsible for the theft and urged the commission to refrain from "irresponsibly" haunting innocent people.
Minister Ngafuan who is a close ally of the president, replaces a female and another sidekick of the president who has taken up a senior post with the World Bank.
But the graft commission officials insist that the institution will pursue clamping down on corrupt officials both in public and private sector until the war-battered country is ridden of the large chunk of mischievous elements in line with its mandate.
The commission since its inception nearly four years ago, has successfully roped in and pinned down several corrupt officials of President Sirleaf's government including ministers and directors.
Two months ago, the country's Information minister was found guilty of swindling public funds following an intricate process which insiders say the president could not stop.
When president Johnson-Sirleaf aspired for the position five years ago, she vowed to stamp out corruption both in public and private sphere in the country where the commission says the vice is increasingly becoming endemic.