Liberian President in TT business?

LIBERIAN PRESIDENT Charles Taylor, who is due to give up the presidency tomorrow, has interests in a Port-of-Spain business organisation. This was the revelation yesterday from one of the embattled president’s Trinidadian relatives, June St Louis who claimed that through his Tobagonian-born father Charles Frederick Taylor Sr, the Liberian President was involved in the operations of a Port-of-Spain businessplace. However St Louis was uncertain about what type of business it was. She told Sunday Newsday there was nothing exclusive about last week’s newspaper reports of Taylor’s “Trini roots” because media interest on that subject dated back to 1997 and her mother Jane (Taylor’s first cousin) has the articles to prove that. St Louis revealed that during the last six years, Taylor sent money and newspapers to his relatives in Trinidad via a female relative who made regular trips to the Liberian capital of Monrovia during that time period. She added that this relative died two years ago.

Asked about her feelings about Taylor’s resignation, St Louis replied:“I have no thoughts about that.” She expressed no interest in the local media frenzy being whipped up about Taylor. “I would like to see him to go back to our roots,” she said.  St Louis stated that in the interim she would like to meet with Taylor’s third wife, Trinidadian Bernice Yolanda Emmanuel, and tell her that she is not Taylor’s sole relative in this country. She added that Taylor has relatives in San Juan and Gasparillo and for her part, she wants Taylor to tell her about their family in Africa, in order to pass on that knowledge to future generations of their clan. Taylor will hand over power tomorrow to a transitional government under Liberian Vice-President Moses Blah and leave the country, ending a three-year battle by rebel forces to oust him from power and 14 years of war in the West African nation. He has also been charged by a United Nations-backed war crimes court for arming and training guerilla forces in neighbouring Sierra Leone in exchange for diamonds. A peacekeeping force, comprising soldiers from the United States and several African nations, is currently in Liberia to ensure a peaceful transition of government and assist in the restoration of democracy there.