A group under the banner Liberia Coalition of Human Right Defenders (LICHRD) is engaging the Government of Liberia on the legislation of a draft human right defender’s policy aimed at protecting activists across the country.
LICHRD’s Chairperson, Neidoteh Torbor, said defending the rights of human beings in the country amidst growing threats and insecurities, require government involvement in order to achieve its missions signed at international conventions and treaties.
Torbor said the 1986 Liberian Constitution has a focus point on fundamental human rights but did not specify the scope for which the national human right defenders’ policies has been drafted to support the working enshrined in the constitution.
According to him, the protection of those in these areas matters because they are the ones who go into direct contact with perpetrators while fighting in the interest of victims, and in some cases the defenders become target and at times fall prey to human right violators.
He noted that it is time that the government stands by its words after attaching signature to international conventions and treaties by making the policy a law so that perpetrators will not use the many influences that exist in silencing the defense of human rights in Liberia.
“The drafted national human rights defender policy is currently in the office of the Minister of Justice. For the sake of effective and efficient defense of the rights of citizens, the government has to use the instruments in that policy as tools in protecting the journalists, the lawyers and many other activists that have case to pursue as a means of defending others rights,” Tobor told a team of journalists in Monrovia.
Explaining further, the activist maintained that the time is now to have such an instrument legislated because the President Joseph Boakai has signed the establishment of the War and Economic Crimes Court that will see many activists pushing the advocacy of victims against some war and economic criminals that have some political or financial influences.
“The activists are vulnerable without this policy and defending human rights is even risking stakeholders more. With the establishment of the War and Economic Crimes court signed by the president, we need this policy to protect us in defending the right of those victimized and seeking justice,” he said.\
