Will Supreme Court’s Imprisonment Mandate against Samukai, Others Be Enforced?

With just six days left for the six months period for former Defense Minister and Senator-elect of Lofa County, Brownie Samukai, and his two co-defendants to make payment of the fifty percent (50%) of the total amount of US$1,147,665.35 illegally withdrawn from the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL) pension scheme, there is no record to show that the trio have met up with their obligation.

Out of the US$1,147,665.35, Samukai, together with his two former deputies -- Joseph F. Johnson, former Deputy Minister for Administration, and J. Nyumah Dorkor, former Comptroller -- are to pay the amount of US$573,832.68 within a six-month period to avoid Imprisonment, according to the Supreme Court’s mandate to Criminal Court ‘C’. 

Being aware that the six-month payment period would end on August 25, the defense lawyers quickly wrote Criminal Court ‘C’ for additional six months to enable them raise the fifty percent, blaming the outbreak of the COVID-19 as a cause of their shortcomings in meeting the deadline.

Surprisingly, the defense team has withdrawn its expansion request with no reason provided for the decision. However, it appears that they were either prepared to meet up with the payment or ready to go to jail.

Recently, the  Supreme Court  upheld Criminal Court ‘C’s judgement that declared the trio guilty of misusing the soldiers welfare money but with modification that they should pay the fifty percent within six months to avoid two years of Imprisonment as ruled by then Judge Yamie Quiqui Gbeisaye.

In that modification, the Supreme Court explained that since Samukai, Johnson and Dorkor were jointly declared guilty, they were to jointly pay the fifty percent, and not for a single individual to pay his share of the misapplied money.

The reason was that during the trial, none of the defendants, including Samukai, did inquire as to what portion of the money each was reasonable to pay.  Instead, each of them said they jointly used the money based on an instruction from former President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, which implies that they jointly took the responsibility of using the soldiers’ money and, as such, they have to pay it together.

The question that remains unanswered, therefore, is whether the Assigned Criminal Court "C" Judge, Ousman Feika, who was not part of the decision to send Samukai and his co-defendants to jail if they were to default on the payment period, can brave the highly charged political storm to send the Lofa County senator-elect and his co-defendants to prison by August 25 as mandated by the Supreme Court.

According to the then indictment, the Ministry of Defense, in August 2009, established the mandatory fund scheme and began deducting from the salaries of members of the AFL for what was supposed to be a supplementary pension benefit. Those amounts included US$460,000 in one account and US$687,656.35 in another, making the total sum US$1,147,665.35.

The indictment cited misuse of the fund, including Samukai paying US$50,000 as death benefits to the family of a late Nigerian General, Suraj Abdurrahman, who headed the Liberian Army. 

The move was controversial because Abdurrahman did not contribute to the fund while with the AFL. Therefore, critics believed he should not have been a beneficiary.  Samukai was also accused of having made other subsequent withdrawals from the fund that were not in line with the intended purpose.

When the defendants took the witness stand, they testified that they opened the account not only as a pension fund for AFL personnel, but to also meet up with other budgetary constraints. 

Samukai admitted withdrawing and using the funds, but said he did it in his capacity as Defense Minister and the money was used in the interest of the AFL. 

Moreover, he said both former President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and President George Weah agreed that the government would pay the money back into the account.