Coup at Dawn

A master sergeant seizes power

In its 133-year existence, the Republic of Liberia had never experienced a coup d'etat, a remarkable record given the turbulent politics of West Africa. Last weekend a group of noncommissioned officers and Liberian National Guardsmen conducted a bold dawn raid on the palatial executive mansion in the capital city of Monrovia. Their target: William R. Tolbert Jr., 66, Liberia's President and the current chairman of the Organization of African Unity. According to one account, Tolbert was shot in the face and killed. His wife Victoria and members of the Cabinet, the judiciary and the legislature were seized and imprisoned.

Radio broadcasts from Monrovia identified the coup leader as Samuel Doe, 28, an obscure master sergeant in the Liberian army who called his new government the People's Redemption Council of the Armed Forces of Liberia. Doe declared that he had overthrown the Tolbert regime because of its "rampant corruption and continuous failure" to solve Liberia's problems. Mindful that Liberia has always been one of America's closest African allies, Doe asked for a meeting with U.S. Charge d'Affaires Julius Walker. He told Walker that he was aware of America's "historic relationship" with Liberia, a country founded by former U.S. slaves in 1847. Expressing a desire for elections and a quick return to civilian rule, Doe reportedly named 15 officers and NCOs--none above the rank of captain--as "superintendents" to rule for the time being.

Tolbert's brutal downfall surprised few Liberia watchers. Though the country was long one of the most stable in black Africa, there was increasing dissatisfaction with Tolbert's autocratic ways and with the corruption and inefficiency of his top-heavy bureaucracy. Perhaps most resented was the dominance of the so-called Americo-Liberians, descendants of the freed American slaves who began settling on the western Guinea coast in 1822. Though the vast majority of the country's 1.7 million people are impoverished tribal Africans, most of the political power and wealth have traditionally been controlled by the "settlers," the Americo-Liberians. Tolbert's father was a former South Carolina slave who became a rich coffee grower and rice, farmer in Liberia. The son, a Baptist minister, was the country's Vice President for 20 years under the virtual one-man rule of President William Vacanarat Shadrach Tubman. After Tubman's death in 1971, Tolbert succeeded to the presidency and to the leadership of Liberia's only political party, the True Whigs.

Long simmering anger against the Tolbert regime erupted a year ago when the government proposed a hike in the price of rice from $22 to $30 for a 100-lb. bag. (The average Liberian earns $80 a month.) In Monrovia, 2,000 people gathered in protest. A student-led group of some of the demonstrators headed toward Tolbert's executive mansion. The President overreacted, ordering police and soldiers to shoot into the crowd. Forty people were killed and hundreds injured, which set off riots and looting.

Tolbert's violent reaction strengthened such opposition groups as the leftist Movement for Justice in Africa and the Progressive Alliance of Liberia. Last December, after a lengthy court battle, the alliance gained legal status as an opposition party under the new name of Progressive People's Party (P.P.P.).

Deeply alarmed by the P.P.P.'s call for a general strike to bring down the government, Tolbert ordered 33 of its top members arrested. According to Korlue Pyne, who led about 25 Liberians in a nonviolent post-coup takeover of the Liberian consulate in New York City, one of the new regime's first acts was to release the imprisoned politicians.

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