By Amos Harris
Across Liberia, particularly in Montserrado County’s 17 districts and deep into rural communities, a silent war is being waged. This war isn’t fought with guns, but with needles, pills, and powdered substances. It is a war claiming the bodies and minds of Liberia’s young people, as illegal drugs become more accessible than clean drinking water. This national catastrophe has spiraled into a full-blown emergency, yet the response from government and institutions remains apathetic and disturbingly performative.
The streets of Monrovia tell a story the government refuses to hear. Along sidewalks, under bridges, and in abandoned buildings, Liberia’s forgotten youth—locally referred to as zogos—battle addiction, mental illness, and a total absence of hope. Their condition has shifted from tragedy to normalization, as society grows numb to their suffering. What’s worse, some politicians now shamelessly exploit their vulnerability for propaganda purposes.
A particularly disturbing episode played out recently at the private residence of President Joseph Nyuma Boakai. A crowd of disheveled young people, many visibly struggling with addiction and mental instability, were paraded as cheerleaders for the President’s leadership. They held placards with slogans like “No President na bring development like President Boakai” and “Dey eat 6 years but you will eat 12.” These messages may have sounded like political support, but they were hollow cries from a generation crushed under the weight of neglect.
This was not a celebration. It was a national disgrace—a display of desperation manipulated into a spectacle. These young people need rehabilitation, not rebranding. They require mental health care, not political placards. Their image should shame us into action, not be used as pawns in the circus of Liberian politics.
Civil society leaders and political observers rightly condemned the event as exploitative. “This isn’t development. This is desperation dressed up in praise,” one commentator noted. It reflects a growing trend where politicians, instead of tackling the root causes of youth vulnerability, use their suffering as a prop to score political points.
But Liberia’s drug crisis did not begin with this administration, nor will it end without a bold, comprehensive national strategy. The streets are flooded with kush, tramadol, cocaine, heroin, and synthetic drugs. Drug trafficking has found fertile ground in every township and district, often protected by the very people meant to fight it. Community leaders, under economic duress, sometimes accept bribes to turn a blind eye. Worse, members of the Liberia National Police have allegedly become allies of traffickers, offering protection in exchange for cash.
Drug hubs, known locally as ghettos, operate in plain sight. These are not just breeding grounds for addiction—they are social graveyards. Here, the youth find false belonging, crime becomes currency, and young women fall into exploitative “relationships” with traffickers, trading affection for protection.
Where are the institutions? What has the Ministry of Health done to address the spiraling mental health emergency? Where the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, as thousands of children live, beg, and die on the streets? Why are there no fully functional, government-run drug rehabilitation centers in a country drowning in addiction?
Mental illness, exacerbated by substance abuse, is now visibly widespread. And yet, those suffering are dismissed as “crazy people,” left to rot in the streets like garbage. Liberia’s mental health sector is underfunded, understaffed, and overlooked.
This is not just a public health issue—it’s a national security crisis. It’s a human rights crisis. And it’s a crisis rooted in policy failure, systemic corruption, and decades of lip service.
As the 2025 election season draws closer, politicians will reappear with promises, foundations, and fabricated solutions. But Liberians must ask: What has been done between election cycles? Where are the shelters, the rehab centers, the job training programs, the reintegration plans?
The government must declare the drug crisis a national emergency—not just in rhetoric, but in law, policy, and budget. There must be a coordinated, well-funded plan to:
- Dismantle drug trafficking networks
- Rehabilitate and reintegrate users
- Train mental health professionals
- Establish safe shelters for at-risk youth
- Launch nationwide prevention campaigns
- Hold complicit police and public officials accountable
Liberia cannot afford to lose another generation to drugs. The cost is too high. The time for slogans, placards, and performances is over. This is a plea not for pity but for policy. This is a call not for campaigns but for conscience.
Liberia stands at a dangerous crossroads. It’s time to choose whether we continue down the path of indifference or chart a course of action that protects our youth, restores dignity, and reclaims the soul of our nation.