The Challenges and Opportunities of Security Sector Reform in Post ...

commitment of the present security sector reform regime, are two policy issues that need
to be addressed in order to place peacebuilding on a sustainable track in Liberia. 92 The
seeming short/medium-term approach which outsourcing to a PMC implies goes against
the long-term attention that effective democratically governed security sector reform
requires. As the ICG has aptly posited:
… a security sector engagement of fifteen to 25 years with a smaller financial and
operational footprint is more likely to build a durable peace. Training militaries is a
tricky process. If done on the cheap and too briefly, foreign trainers may merely
turn abusive security forces into more efficiently abusive security forces, without
improving how they relate to government or civilians. 93
4.4. The Limits of Parliamentary Oversight
The legislature is crucial in transitions because it should be a principal mechanism for
checking the excesses which characterised the authoritarian and dictatorial regimes of the
past. The legislature is therefore the engine of democracy, and the level of democratic
and good governance in any system is a direct function of its ability to conduct oversight
functions. Parliamentary oversight is a major means of operationalising the fundamental
democratic principles of checks and balances and separation of powers. The Parliament
needs therefore to be well positioned to play its role in ensuring the alignment of the
security sector with the core values, principles and practices of democratic governance.
This is the essence of security sector reform. The inclusion of a transitional legislature
within the CPA is therefore commendable and should, all things being equal, enhance
popular participation and oversight of the reconstruction process. However, the Liberian
transitional legislature has faced various challenges which have the net effect of retarding
its ability to perform its oversight functions. This remains a difficult challenge to the new
administration.
Firstly, the heterogeneous composition of the transitional assembly has had a debilitating
effect on its performance. Given that the NTLA is an inherent part of the CPA,
membership in the transitional legislature is not through elections but rather through a
negotiated exercise. It can be argued therefore that some members of the NTLA are illsuited
to parliamentary responsibilities and lack the support and mandate of Liberians.
For example, allegations of corruption and malpractice have been rife within the
legislative arm of the transitional government. Following an investigation by a special
committee, the Speaker of the National Transitional Legislative Assembly and his
Deputy, the Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, and the Chairman of the
Rules and Order Committee were suspended for fiscal and administrative improprieties.
Moreover, some of its prominent members, including the suspended Speaker of the
NTLA, are widely accused of committing gross human rights abuses before and during
the war. 94 Others elements within the NTGL and NTLA are perceived to represent no
92
For more detailed analysis of PMCs in Africa, see Abdel-Fatau Musah and J. Kayode Fayemi, Mercenaries: An
African Dilemma, Pluto Press, London, 2000; David Francis, ‘Mercenary Intervention in Sierra Leone: Providing
National Security or International Exploitation?’, Third World Quarterly, Vol. 20, No. 2, 1999. For a broader
perspective, see Peter Singer, Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, Cornell University
Press, Ithaca and London, 2003; David Shearer, ‘Private Armies and Military Intervention’, IISS Adelphi Paper No.
316, London, 1998.
93
International Crisis Group Report No. 87, op. cit., pp. 20-21.
94 International Crisis Group Report No. 75, op. cit., p. 24.
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