PHOTO: Family members of slain Pres Tolbert and other executed officials lay wreaths on their grave April 12
By Augustine Octavius, augustineoctavius@gmail.com
Tuesday, April 12, 2022 made it 42 years following the bloody military coup that saw the assassination of Liberia’s 19th President William R. Tolbert, Jr. and many other officials of his former ruling True Whig, Party (TWP) government.
The coup was led by 17 enlisted men of the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL) under the command of the late Master Sergeant Samuel Kanyon Doe.
Children of the slain officials said they are still hoping that the government would give the late President Tolbert and others a decent and befitting burial one day.
The spokesman of the family of the 1980 coup victims, Dr. Richard Tolbert, the son of the President Pro Tempore of the Liberian Senate, Frank Tolbert, termed the area on which the remains of the victims of the military coup were buried as a disgrace to a whole nation.
Dr Tolbert spoke at an interview with newsmen shortly after laying wreaths on the Memorial Triangle mass grave located at the Palm Grove Cemetery on Center Street in Monrovia.
He added that these statesmen should be remembered because they laid their lives and sacrificed their blood in order to avoid for this country,
According to Dr. Tolbert, about 26 persons who were killed as a result of the April 12, 1980 military bloody coup were buried in the mass grave.
“We come here every here to at least pay our respect to our fallen President William R Tolbert, former Chairman of the Organization of African Unity and President of the 30 million World Baptist Alliance and others statesmen who lost their lives during the military coup,” he said; adding: “some of those who were killed buried in the mass grave are General Charles Railey, Commander of the Executive Mansion Guard; an officer of the Special Security Service, Gabriel Moore; and Lieutenant Railroad Vesehley, of the Armed Forces of Liberia and Momoh Tolbert, the son of the late President who ran towards him as he was shot.”
Also speaking, the daughter of the General Charles Railey, the Commander of the Executive Guard Battalion, Precious Railey Dennis, narrated how her father was killed.
According to her, the family has returned to the Executive Mansion from a program organized by the Providence Baptist Church and observed that the entire gate was without any security personnel.
“During the early hours of the April 12, 198, we were waken by heavy sounds of gun fire and so, my mother crept on her knees and woke me up. “
“When we got up, our daddy, General Railey was already up being escorted by some of the soldiers who were believed to be working with him.”
Mrs. Dennis, then 14 years, explained that General Railey was killed by the soldiers when he was shot four times just before their bear eyes behind the Executive Mansion.
On April 12, 1980, 17 noncommissioned soldiers under the banner of the People’s Redemption Council, announced on the state radio that the TWP government has been overthrown, declared dust to dawn curfew and ordered boundaries by air, land and sea closed.
Few days later, a military tribunal set by the PRC found some of the officials of the TWP government guilty of corruption, nepotism and abuse of public office and executed 13 of them.
Those executed were Frank E. Tolbert, brother of President Tolbert and President Pro Tempore of the Senate. Richard A. Henries,Speaker of the House of Representatives ; and E. Reginald Townsend , National Chairman of the True Whig Party.
Others are P. Clarence Parker II ,Chairman of the National Investment Council and Treasurer of the True Whig Party; James A. A. Pierre , Chief Justice of the Supreme Court; and
Other officials executed Joseph J. Chesson Sr. ,Minister of Justice; Cecil Dennis , Minister of Foreign Affairs; Cyril Bright , former Minister of Planning and Economic Affairs and John W. Sherman — Assistant Minister of Commerce and Trade.
The rest are James T. Phillips , former Minister of Finance, former Minister of Agriculture; David Franklin Neal , former Minister of Planning and Economic Affairs; Charles T. O. King — Deputy Minister for Agriculture and Frank J. Stewart Sr. , Director of the Budget
Others who accompanied Dr. Tolbert to the memorial triangle were Stephen Tolbert and the son of AB Tolbert.