Liberia: LPMC DMD Becomes Legal Counsel For Child Traffickers

Monrovia — LPMC Deputy Managing Director for Administration, Cllr. John Caranda, is said to have turned Legal Counsel for the group, West African Children Support Network (WACSN), but the Liberian lawyer say he knows nothing about the report.

Report gathered by this paper says the junior government official helped in resisting government’s attempts to seek the release of the 37 Liberian children who had been kept at the compound of the WACSN for the last several months without access to their parents, in violation of a Liberian government moratorium on adoption.

According to Front Page Africa, the LPMC Deputy Managing Director and other government officials allegedly stormed the compound of WACSN and vehemently resisted the removal of the children by representatives of the Ministry of Health, Save the Children UK and Don Bosco Homes in an attempt to effect the presidential order banning adoption.

Although five days later the 37 Liberian children who have been kept at the compound of WACSN were finally released and subsequently placed in the temporary care of Don Bosco Homes, public opinion stands that the action of the LPMC Deputy Managing Director including preventing the successful implementation of presidential order by providing legal services to a private group obstructing GOL represents sharp conflict of interest and undermines the effectiveness of the very government of which he (Caranda) serves as Deputy Managing Director for a Produce Marketing Agency.

This apparent sharp contradiction as it relates to governance which was common practice in the 60’s and 70’s until the advent of the April 12, 1980 coup that ousted the True Whig Party regime, is being viewed in several quarters as not only setting a bad precedent but clearly indicates selfish interest.

However when the paper called Cllr. Caranda last evening to verify the FPA report, he told this paper that “I don’t know anything about it, thank you” and switched his phone off. Further calls were made, but his phone was reported switch off.

Meanwhile, reports gathered by this paper say the administrative wing of LPMC which directly falls under Cllr. Caranda appears collapsed and stagnated since the Deputy Managing Director is said to be so much interested in rendering private legal services, thereby leaving the office always abandoned, meaning that he does not report to work.

“Cllr. Caranda is here at LPMC in theory and not practice as it relates to his job”, said one employee who wondered why the President could appoint someone who lacks every inch of interest in the job.

Several employees of the entity have since denounced the presence of the leant lawyer on grounds that he lacks good human relations and insults them at will.

They have since forwarded a petition to the Board of Directors of the public corporation during board chairmanship of former agriculture Minister Chris Toe.

Dr. Toe promised to have resolved the issue by mid-February, but the impasse still exists, employees say.