Official Thieves: Liberian Customs Extortion Scheme

Finance Minister Amara Konneh - Presiding over a rogue ministry and customs

A Government represents the interest of the people. It protects the citizenry and provides opportunity for social, economic and political growth among the people. The social contract that binds the governors and the governed does not only mandate the governors to put the people first, but it also makes a clear distinction between what goes for the people and for aliens. It is that distinction that makes the citizens to feel a sense of belonging to the state.

But this whole thing about protecting the people, providing them with opportunity for growth, seeking their wellbeing, etc. are not parts of the government of Liberia’s priority. The Liberian government’s policies, actions and operations clearly place the people at a disadvantage. When the price of a bag of rice is sky-rocketing, when young girls are reverting to prostitution due to poverty, when young men are looking up to armed robbery as a means of survival, when unemployment is taking an upward steep, when infant mortality is increasing, when aliens are having free ride, all the Sirleaf administration is concerned about is to institute an administrative policy regulation that seeks to punish citizens because they brought vehicles older than ten years into the country. My family was victimized by the official thieves are the Freeport of Monrovia Customs Collectorate, when they double taxed my four vehicles and every item in a container my wife and I had transported to Monrovia. Here is how.

Review of facts I, II and III
Again let’s review previous facts. It is now established that the Customs officers at the Freeport of Monrovia, led by a greedy woman identified as Amanda Roberts, overcharged my Ford Explorer. The Customs taxed my Ford Explorer twice, and after all the calculations, the government of Liberia owes me $832.07 on the Ford.

READ ARTICLE – FACT I

The Customs also overtaxed my Toyota Pickup, and after the calculations it was also established that the government owes me an additional 549.57. The total of what the government owes me on the Ford Explorer and the Toyota is $1,381.64, representing the total overtax amount.

READ ARTICLE – FACT II

But that is all. Additionally, the government also overtaxed my Nissan Pickup. After charging my Nissan twice I realized that the government taxed $579.28 more than we should have been charged. So if you add that to the amount owed my family on the Ford Explorer and Toyota, the total would be $1960.92. This amount is the excess of the money my wife paid on three vehicles (Ford Explorer, Toyota Pickup and Nissan Pickup).
READ ARTICLE – FACT III

Fact IV: Over-taxing My Ford Contour
Now that we have reviewed the previous articles, let look at how the government of Liberia punished my family when it levied huge tax twice on my Ford Contour Sedan. I like to interject here that one of the reasons they heavily overtaxed the Ford Contour is because my wife called it “Sedan”. The Customs officers who appraised the vehicle considered “sedan” to be some kind of heavy jeep or (truck as we call it in the US). Every time my wife made the correction that a sedan was not a jeep, the officers would argue it is. So they levied huge tax on it, not once but twice. At this time, the customs officers were not only charging the Ford sedan based on the age, but also because it is a “sedan”, and in their understanding, a sedan is a big vehicle in the jeep family. As you may know, all the while, the container was not yet opened for them to see the kind of vehicles in it. They were acting based on the bill of landing, which has on it the names of the vehicles and their make and model.

READ ARTICLE WITH EVIDENCE HERE

On December 27, 2013, the Customs charged $403.18 for my Ford Contour Sedan. Upon submission of the receipt to Amanda Roberts at the Freeport, she snapped. Amanda hearing Ford Contour Sedan, she said it was a valuable vehicle so it needed to be taxed more. The previous charged was based on the Kelly Blue Book value of $2106. In my mind and by the value, the first levy was fair.

But just before my wife could leave her office, Amanda told her, “I will add more money.” Again, as my wife tried to argue that it was unfair to continue to levy double charges on her vehicles, the Customs Collector threatened that she may lose her whole container if she did not pay the second levy. And that levied was twice the previous amount - $1,156.57. This latest tax levy was not based on any value. Certainly it was not ten percent of $2106, neither was it even twenty percent, just in case Amanda was levying a second 20 percent. The total amount paid on the Ford Contour was $1559.75. Since the vehicle was within the 20% punitive tax range, it was expected that the total tax amount would have been $631.80. That means the Customs levy the first ten percent and another 20 percent. As it is the government of Liberia owes my family $927.95.

Now let’s see how much the Government of Liberia crooked my family of. Add $927.95 to $1960.92, the total over taxed amount was $2,888.87. This amount is what the government owes my family, and we want this money back.

Now that we have concluded our presentation of the facts and documents on the four vehicles in the container, I will present to you how the Customs at the Freeport overcharged every item in the container. In fact, each of the items was charged twice. Even the one stereo tape set my wife carried to put in our house for our personal used was taxed twice. But after they taxed it and we paid, the same Customs officers stole it plus other items, making us to lose huge number of our person effects.

The question is, with this punitive tax regulation, couple with the blatant over taxing of our materials, is the government working in Liberians’ interest? I will tell why the government decided to treat my wife that way. Well, she carried my last name, so it was obvious. Let’s connect the dots later after the facts are presented to the public.

Sirleaf Admin.: Heartless Regime, Vulnerable And Hapless Citizens

Finance Minister Amara Konneh - Punishing citizens with unjustifiable tax is his priority

One of the many orotundity comments President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf made recently during her interaction at the CENPID hatai center in Monrovia was to urge Liberians to love their country. She chided her critics saying that they criticize too much for everything. For her, the way to make Liberia move forward was to sing praises on radio, television, newspaper, internet, etc., and not “talking bad, bad things about the government…” as she put it.

When I watched the video posted by journalist Mamadee Diakite, my heart nearly stop pumping blood through my veins. I could not imagine that Madam Sirleaf of all people would think that because Liberians are talking about the errors of the regime the country would remain dormant, stagnant and dull. I have heard and read many unintelligible comments from people, but to hear our president think of us so low and condescendingly is worrisome and shameful.

How in the world the President would expect Liberians to rain praises on her government when she and her Finance Minister, Amara Konneh, are carving administrative policies and regulations with the sole intent to punish Liberians. For instance, think about the Finance Minister’s “Administrative Regulation”, which instituted punitive tax regime for “vehicles ten years or older”. Take note, the government is not talking about vehicles that are not “road worthy”, it is talking about old vehicles. What remains unanswered is who does this law benefit? That brings me to my presentation of the third fact, when the government of Liberia overcharged my Nissan Pickup recently at the Freeport of Monrovia, in a bid to impose a “punitive tax” on my four vehicles.

Fact III: Over-taxing My Nissan Pickup
Before discussing the third fact, let’s review previous facts. We have known that the government of Liberia over-taxed my Ford Explorer. Currently, the Government of Liberia owes me $832.07 on the Ford, which represents the excess of 111.49 on 363.39, the 32.88, the extra 469.80, and the excess of 217.90 on the first 469.80 which the Customs Collectors claimed was 10% of $2519.00 (The 10% should have been $251.90).

 

The government also owes me and additional 549.57. This amount is the extra money my wife paid to the Central Bank of Liberia at the insistence of the Customs Collectorate at the Freeport of Monrovia. The total amount I should have paid was $546.30, which included a 10% duty and another 20% punitive tax. Instead, Customer Collector Amanda “Roberts” charged my wife $1095.87, which included an excess of $549.57. So if you combine what the government over charged my wife on our Ford Explorer ($832.07) and what it over charged on our Toyota ($549.57), the total over-tax amount for the first two vehicles is put at $1,381.64. This is just for the first two vehicles. Now let’s look at how the government over taxed my Nissan Pickup, then we will discuss my Ford Contour later.

My Nissan Pickup was old and found itself in the 20% punitive tax range. It is a 1988 model. This vehicle is in perfect shape, as all the others. In fact, I was driving the Nissan in the United States without problem. But for the government of Liberia, it does not matter how road worthy a vehicle is, once it is older than ten years, the owner must be punished for bringing it to Liberia. So my wife and I were punished by our own government for our vehicles. But in the process of punishing us, the customs officers stationed at the Freeport of Monrovia over taxed us. We paid twice for the Nissan Pickup 05 TN.

On December 27, 2013 my wife was told to pay the amount of $454.24 to represent a General Sales Tax (GST) of $192.68 and a punitive tax of $249.10. It was obvious that my wife paid because from the previous experience, she dare ask how they levied the charges. Having presented the flag receipt at the Freeport Customs Collectorate for approval to get our Nissan out of the Port, Amanda Roberts did the obvious. She told my wife that there would be additional tax levy. And she did.

Then on January 2, 2013, Amanda levied an addition punitive tax and general sales tax that my wife had already paid. She charged $533.07 punitive tax and $34.87 for GST. Although she mustered the courage to put a faint protest, my wife succumbed and paid the extra tax. The container was at the verge of running into storage. So the prudent thing my wife did was to cooperate and pay any and all unreasonable and over taxation just to clear the container to avoid storage. It is the storage that containers accumulate that made a lot of people to lose their containers and their contents to the Freeport of Monrovia. We were not about to be this kind of victim.

Now here is the crafty thing the customs officers did. They did not print out the value of the Nissan as they did with the Ford Explorer and Toyota Pickup. They simply levied the taxes without telling my wife how they are levying the punitive 20%. According to the protocol, they should be charging based on the value of vehicle. But this time around, Amanda and her office staff thought it was fine to simply levy the tax anyhow. But if you check the value of the Nissan .5 TN 1988 on Kelly Blue Book, you would realize its value is at $940.00. Therefore, a ten percent general tax would have been $94.00. And additional 20% punitive tax would have been $188.00. Hence the total amount we should have been charged was $282.00 to have the vehicle cleared. Instead, the government charged us $861.28. If you subtracted $282 from what we paid, the government owes us an excess of 579.28.

There are several things that came into play here. Firstly, the Ministry of Finance issued the Administrative regulations on October 14, 2013 and began implementing it on December 8, 2013, that is within 24 days without sufficient publicity and education. That regulation was not published on Internet or in the local newspaper for everyone to know. It was surreptitiously passed onto the customs officers at ports of entry. I just wonder how the Minister of Finance expected us in the diaspora to know that he had passed a regulation that went into effect within 24 hours.

The other point is, I would think the government of Liberia should be concerned with “road worthy” vehicles. They should ensure the vehicle is good enough to put on the streets. That is very important! The age of the vehicle does not have anything to do with its road worthiness. Our vehicles were not only serviced before putting them on the container to be taken to Liberia, I personally drove them for months to ensure that they are good enough to drive in Monrovia. One of reasons I did that was the kind of roads in Liberia. If the vehicles were not road worthy, it would be a wasteful venture to pay money to transport a vehicle that would not last for two months and break down. That is key as well.

In the third facts presentation with documents and receipts, I will show you how Amanda and the Freeport Customs Collectorate levied taxes twice on our Ford Contour. I will present the facts for the public to know we are being mistreated while we are trying to contribute to the development agenda of our country.

Liberian Government Robbed My Family

 

Fact II: Over-taxing My Toyota Pickup
In presenting the first layers of facts, I would like us to review our previous fact, which had to do with the government of Liberia overcharging my Ford Explorer. As at present the Government of Liberia owes me $832.07, which includes the excess of 111.49 on 363.39, the 32.88, the extra 469.80, and the excess of 217.90 on the first 469.80 which the Customs Collectors claimed was 10% of $2519.00 (which should have been $251.90). This $832.07 I am asking the Ministry of Finance to reimburse me because there was no reason whatsoever for the Customs Collectors to have charged my wife. A government helps strengthen its citizens not break them down. If we must not ask what our country should do for us but what we must do for our country, then the government should not take from what it should not. We need every dime to help with the development agenda of the country. Having said that, let’s go to “fact two” which brings into the picture of my Toyota Pickup.

ALSO READ ARTICLE HERE

Levies on the Toyota Pickup
My pickup was old. That means it fell within the 20% punitive tax range. Since my wife applied for waiver, granted but was not respected by the Customs Collectors, we braced ourselves to pay whatever punitive tax. I must interject here again that it is not a good thing for a government to levy “punitive tax” on its citizens. The sound of it does not even look like our government thinks any better of us. You don’t punish your citizens. Could they have called it “extra levy”, instead of punitive tax?

My Toyota PC/HTP was made in 1991. It fell within the 20% punitive tax range. That means, the government would charge 10% of the value of the vehicle as normal duties, and levy another 20% as punitive tax for bringing it to Liberia. That’s 30%. We agreed. The Customs Officers told my wife to have her broker do the declaration and presented to them for assessment. Then the Customs appraised the vehicle’s value from the Kelly Blue Book. That is what they did to our Toyota Pickup. The assessment came up with four different levels of the value: Excellent value was $2496.00; very good was $2296.00; good was $2221.00, and fair value was $1821.00. The Customs chose the value of “fair” $1,821) to be the value that they will levy the first 10% and the punitive 20% taxes. Now by ten percent, the normal duty was $182.10 and the second twenty percent puts the amount at $364.20, making the total $546.30. This amount once paid the Toyota Pickup should have been released and cleared. Instead, the Customs office levied the charge of $593, which they claimed was 20% of $1821. They also charged for the GST (General Sales Tax) the amount of $54.66. They determined that the total money my wife should pay to clear the Toyota was $661.59. My wife went ahead and paid at the Central Bank of Liberia.

As she returned to the Freeport Customs Collectorate, Amanda grabbed the receipt from her and said, “This amount is small. I will put some more money on it…” She levied another $434.28. This time she probably just levied the charge without considering percentage. Then she told my wife, “Go and pay or be prepared to have the vehicle seized.” Out of frustration and anger, my wife also paid the money.

We all, citizens or aliens, should pay taxes that are set aside for duties. That is okay with us. But then the Customs officers are under duty to levy fair taxes, not overcharging customers like us. What makes this even more frustrating is that we came to the United States to hustle and return to contribute to our country. We cannot do so when our own brothers and sisters are ripping us apart with false charges and taxes. It is so wrong that someone will sit in her office and determine in her heart that everyone coming from America must be punished.

Besides, the whole idea of placing huge taxes on older vehicles or stopping them does not serve the best interest of the poor people. The Government is paying civil servants $125 per month and they want only new vehicles to be imported to Liberia. The Finance Minister perhaps has forgotten that these vehicles they are placing huge taxes on or banning are the same vehicles that help put our people one step beyond poverty line. We have our old vehicles in America and when we are returning to Liberia, our government is saying we should leave our vehicles behind and fight for taxi or fight to get on the bus in Monrovia. That does not make any sense at all.

In the third facts presentation with documents and receipts, I will show you how Amanda and the Freeport Customs Collectorate levied taxes twice on our Nissan Pickup. I will present the facts for the public to know we are being mistreated while we are trying to contribute to the development agenda of our country.

Government Of Liberia Robbed My Family

L-R: Finance Minister Amara Konneh, President Sirleaf and CBL Governor Mills Jones

Fact I: Over-taxing My Ford Explorer
In the last three days, I have endeavored to provide to the public very valuable pieces of information about how the Finance Minister of Liberia, Amara Konneh, thinks about the rest of us. We have discussed his draconian Administrative Regulation that seeks to punish, or rather that has been punishing, the rest of us since the coming into force on December 8, 2013 of the punitive tax measure. I have provided the document to that. I would leave that to the public to make their judgment.

ALSO READ ARTICLE HERE

In the next series of articles, I will be providing facts and documentary evidences of how the Government of Liberia has devised a means to rob its own citizens. And the point person is one Amanda Roberts, a Customs Collector stationed at the Freeport of Monrovia. Just as many people have suffered, my family was distressed by the ruthless blatant rip-off of every penny the government could imagine. My wife, who was the direct person they dealt with, was not only devastated, but she was disrespected, threatened and robbed of all the money she took to Liberia to finish our building projects. Here is how.

First punitive tax levy

 

Second punitive tax levy

I sent my wife to Monrovia with a 40-ft high cube container with four vehicles as well as bottle water, used clothes and used shoes for humanitarian purposes, and some other materials intended for our house that we are to shortly move in upon our returned to Liberia. Honestly, we did not know of any punitive tax regulation that was issued by the Minister of Finance on October 14, 2013, which came into effect on December 8, 2013 – that’s within 24 days when the ministry decided to implement a major regulation that would alter people’s lives. My container was loaded on October 27th and bounded for Monrovia. It arrived in Monrovia on December 23rd.

Now in Monrovia and making every effort to release the container from the Freeport before it accumulated storage, as she had only seven days to clear the container, my wife was faced with this draconian punitive tax regulation. At the Ministry of Commerce, she was asked to give reasons why the punitive tax regulation should not affect her. She wrote a letter requesting for reprieve, which was granted. That means she would not be punished for bringing in vehicles ten years or older. Whether that letter covered for the Ministry of Finance, I am not sure. But she was told to present it to the Customs Office at the Freeport and it would be honored. Unfortunately, the customs officers there told my wife, “Take this thing from my face…” So it was not honored. 

I called my wife and told her to cooperate with the customs officers since they are doing what they were told to do. She agreed and we braced ourselves to pay whatever punitive taxes required of our vehicles as per the regulation. All the vehicles were ten years or older.

Levies on the Ford Explorer
My Ford Explorer was made in 2002. So by 2013 it was nearly 11 years old. That puts it in the 10 percent punitive tax range. That means, the government would charge 10% of the value of the vehicle as normal duties, and levy another 10% for bringing it to Liberia as punitive tax. That’s 20%. We agreed. The Customs Officers usually asked all customers to have their broker do the declaration and presented to them for assessment. Then the Customs appraise the vehicle’s value from the Kelly Blue Book. That is what they did to our Ford Explorer. The assessment came up with four different levels of the value: Excellent value was $2869.00; very good was $2619.00; good was $2519.00, and fair value was $2094.00. The Customs chose the value of “good” ($2519) to be the value that they will levy the first 10% and the punitive 10% taxes. Now by ten percent, the normal duty was $251.90 and the second ten percent will be the same amount, making the total $503.80. This amount once paid the Ford Explorer should have been released and cleared. Instead, the Customs office levied the first charge of $363.39, which they claimed was 10% of $2,519. That amount was the GST (General Sales Tax). I have no idea how they derived that amount. They did not stop there. They levied $469.80 to represent the 10% punitive tax. I never seen how $469.80 would be ten percent of $2519!

After my wife paid the $856.68 to clear the vehicle, Amanda told her that the amount was small and so she was adding more money. She levied a second GST tax of $32.88 and levied the same $469.80 for the punitive tax, totaling $502.69. My wife protested but they threatened that if she does not pay they would seize our container. Out of fear of gross loss, she paid even before she called me. In actuality, we paid double for everything about the Ford Explorer. Now, when you combine the two separate payments for the one vehicle, it totaled $1359.37. This amount is 53% of the vehicle’s value ($2519) that the Customs officers accepted.

Again, for fear that she might run into storage and eventually lose the whole container to auction; my wife paid the double charges. Meanwhile, people in Amanda’s office were making sarcastic remarks about her coming from America and asking “plenty questions”. And Amanda told her, “You either pay or your container will be confiscated.” My wife called and told me everything that had happened. I was furious but I was from her. So I asked her to wait that I was going to call the Finance Minister’s office. I called and a lady answered. I told her I wanted to talk to the Minister and she asked me why. I explained to her. She told me the Minister was at the Executive Mansion to meet with the President. I called twice again but she said the Minister was still meeting with the President. So I did not get to talk to Minister Konneh.

 Then I called my friend and brother, Sidiki Trawally, who is the Director of Communications at the Ministry of Finance to inform him about what was going on. My friend answered and he said “Hey Gibson what’s up?” By the time I explained what was going on, my friend kept saying “hello, hello, hello…” He probably was not hearing me anymore. So I dropped the phone and called my wife. I told her to pay but she should make sure to collect every receipt on any and all payments. And she did.

In the second facts presentation with documents and receipts, I will show you how Amanda and the Freeport Customs Collectorate levied taxes twice on our Toyota pickup. I will present the facts for the public to know we are being treated just because we are trying to contribute to the development agenda of our country.