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Rubber Company managed to keep the discussions going for some
three years. A definite agreement was reached in 1976. The total
concession area was considerably reduced, the rent per acre
changed, but the most important "success" of the Government was
that Firestone agreed from now on to pay all taxes of general
application. An agreement which was classified during the
renegotiations as "anachronistic, obsolete and sometimes
offensive to the national sovereignty" (46) had (partly) come to
an end (see below for a discussion of the renegotiations).
FISCAL ASPECTS OF FIRESTONE'S OPERATIONS (47)
This section is limited to the activities and financial
contribution to the Liberian Treasury of the Firestone Plantations
Company, and the following discussion excludes the other Firestone
Tire & Rubber Company's subsidiaries operating in Liberia, all
wholly owned, in particular the Finance Corporation of America,
the United States Trading Company, the United States Liberia Radio
Corporation, the Bank of Monrovia, the Liberian Construction
Company, the Lone Star Transport Company, as wel,l as Firestone
Plantations Company's agencies for the Farrell Lines> the Elder
Dempster Lines, and the Barber Steamship Lines, its participation
in the Monrovia Port Management Company, and U.S.T.C.'s agency for
the Ford Motor Company.
As mentioned previously the problems arising out of the
interpretation of the 1926 Planting Agreement, most of them of a
financial nature, were many. In fact they cropped up almost
immediately after the signing of the Agreement and its approval by
the National Legislature. Already in 1927 there was an exchange of
letters between the Government of Liberia and the Firestone Plantations
Company over the dispute whether or not the latter had to
pay duties on kerosene, lubricating oil, and grease (48),
Firestone had paid consular fees upon all invoices of goods
shipped by it into Liberia from abroad since 1926. The exemptions
granted under the 1935 Supplementary Agreement to the Planting
Agreement, however, were much broader than those provided for in
the original contract and after an Act had been passed on March
15, 1932, raising consular fees for certification of invoices from
1 % to 1g$, Firestone in 1935 claimed that it was exempt from the
payment of these fees under the Supplementary Agreement,
The Government, on the other hand, held the position that the
payment of consular fees was not a tax or other charge, but a
payment for services rendered by the Liberian diplomatic mission
abroad. In those days Liberian consuls received a percentage of
these fees as part of their salaries, which may explain the
attitude of the Government better than its official point of view.
Eventually, Firestone under protest paid these consular fees and
the question was not solved definitely until the acceptance of the
Second Supplementary Agreement to the Planting Agreement of 1951
(see above).