A House with Two Rooms - The Advocates for Human Rights

• The Government of Liberia should engage in a national consultative process focused on
developing a strategy for protection and promotion of indigenous languages as well as a
framework for ensuring that linguistic barriers do not prohibit Liberians from effectively
exercising their rights and benefiting from opportunities.
• The Government of Liberia should ensure that protection of indigenous languages is
embedded in appropriate legislation, including the constitution.
Protection of Minorities: Religion
• The Government of Liberia should “take effective measures to prevent and eliminate
discrimination on the grounds of religion or belief in the recognition, exercise and enjoyment
of human rights and fundamental freedoms in all fields of civil, economic, political, social and
cultural life” 372 in full-consideration of the directives in the Declaration on the Elimination
of All Forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief as well as the
African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights. 373
• The Government of Liberia should “make all efforts to enact or rescind legislation where
necessary to prohibit any such discrimination, and…take all appropriate measures to combat
intolerance on the grounds of religion or other.” 374 In particular, national holidays and official
government closures should be evaluated in light of discrimination on the basis of religion
or belief. 375
• To ensure that the Liberian constitutional and legislative system provides adequate and
effective guarantees of freedom of thought, conscience, religion, and belief to all without
distinction, the Government of Liberia should ensure provision of effective remedies in cases
where the right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, or belief, and the right to practice
freely one’s religion, including the right to change one’s religion or belief, is violated. 376
Protection of Minorities: Disability Access Rights
• The Government of Liberia should ratify and incorporate into Liberian law the Convention
on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities and
its First Optional Protocol. 377
• The Government of Liberia should institute appropriate measures for the rehabilitation of
mentally or physically disabled persons, especially children and youth, so as to enable them
to the fullest possible extent to be productive and participating members of society. These
measures should include the provision of treatment and technical appliances, education,
vocational and social guidance, training and selective placement, and other assistance required
to create social conditions in which the handicapped are not discriminated against because
of their disabilities. 378
468