By Arthur G. G. Jarwleh, An Independent Political Analyst
In Liberia’s contested governance space, few phrases are as politically potent—and as frequently abused—as “not culpable.” When uttered by an institution clothed with anti-corruption authority, the phrase can be deployed not merely as a legal conclusion, but as a political instrument. The recent attempt to recast the fate of the former Director General of the Liberia Agriculture Commodity Regulatory Authority (LACRA) through this prism is a textbook case of such maneuvering.
Let us begin with the chronology—because chronology is where the revisionism begins to unravel.
The President of Liberia acted first. The dismissal of the former LACRA Director General did not follow an audit, nor was it triggered by prosecutorial pressure. It was an executive decision grounded in whistleblower complaints, internal reports, and credible warnings that governance at LACRA had gone awry. In systems that value institutional integrity, such signals are not ignored until a forensic audit arrives; they are acted upon to prevent further damage. That is precisely what occurred.
Only after the removal did the General Auditing Commission (GAC) institute a formal audit of LACRA. And when the audit report emerged, it did not embarrass the Presidency by contradicting its action. Quite the opposite: it validated the concerns that had necessitated the dismissal.
The GAC identified irregularities, control failures, and procedural breaches consistent with the substance of earlier complaints. In effect, the audit confirmed that the President had acted prudently, not precipitously.
That should have settled the matter—at least in governance terms.
Instead, the debate was reanimated when the Liberia Anti-Corruption Commission (LACC) reportedly concluded that the former official was “not culpable.” This finding has since been elevated—strategically—into a claim of moral vindication, institutional absolution, and even presidential error. That leap is not only dishonest; it is dangerous.
The LACC’s mandate is criminal, not administrative. It asks a narrow question: Is there sufficient evidence to prosecute under criminal statutes? A negative answer to that question does not negate audit findings, erase governance failures, or retroactively strip the President of the authority to remove an official whose stewardship had compromised institutional confidence. To pretend otherwise is to collapse the entire architecture of public accountability into a single prosecutorial gatekeeper.
More troubling is the attempt to place the LACC above the audit process itself. The LACC is not a supreme audit institution. It does not set accounting standards, test internal controls, or conduct systematic financial compliance reviews. The GAC does. Its findings stand unless challenged through transparent, professional rebuttal—not through press-friendly declarations of “no culpability.”
This is where politics enters decisively.
The LACC is not operating in a vacuum of public trust. Its history—marked by selective pursuits, long-delayed cases, and a striking gap between investigations announced and convictions secured—has already raised questions about institutional consistency and independence. In such a context, its pronouncements, especially in high-profile cases involving politically exposed individuals, are inevitably scrutinized for motive as much as merit.
And motive matters.
The rebranding of a “no culpability” finding into a “clean slate” narrative serves specific interests: reputational rehabilitation, political repositioning, and the quiet delegitimization of executive authority. It invites the public to forget the sequence of events, to ignore the audit validation, and to accept that absence of criminal prosecution equals excellence in public management. That is a profoundly corrosive proposition.
Public office does not operate at the margins of criminal law alone. Administrative accountability is a higher standard. An official may fail that standard—through mismanagement, disregard for procedures, or erosion of institutional trust—without ever meeting the threshold for criminal conviction. Democracies that understand this do not wait for handcuffs before acting; they protect institutions first.
In the LACRA case, the President acted on warning signs. The audit later confirmed those signs. The LACC’s subsequent conclusion did not overturn that reality; it merely assessed a different question, through a different lens, with different evidentiary thresholds. To elevate that assessment above all others is not accountability—it is selective amnesia.
What is ultimately at stake here is not the reputation of one former official, but the coherence of Liberia’s accountability system. When criminal investigations are used—intentionally or otherwise—to rewrite administrative history, institutions are weakened. Whistleblowers are discouraged. Audits are trivialized. Executive authority is second-guessed not on constitutional grounds, but on political convenience.
The former LACRA Director General may insist on vindication. But vindication requires more than a prosecutorial shrug. It requires transparent engagement with audit findings, credible explanations for governance lapses, and acceptance that public trust, once broken, is not restored by technicalities.
Until then, claims of exoneration remain what they appear to be: a political strategy masquerading as accountability.
