Barclay Karnley
MONROVIA: Bomi County Senator, Edwin Melvin Snowe, has formally written the Plenary of the Liberian Senate, seeking its intervention to ensure that the Palm Grove Cemetery is relocated.
Senator Snowe indicated that the Palm Grove Cemetery which is located in central Monrovia, Liberia’s Capital, is in a very deplorable state.
According to the Bomi County Senator, the current state of the Palm Grove cemetery in central Monrovia poses serious health hazards for residents of Monrovia, a situation, which the Senator said, shows negative image of the country.
According to Senator Snowe, the cemetery and dilapidated structures in Central Monrovia are posing serious threats to the welfare of residents in Monrovia and its environs.
‘’We have not braved the storm to either relocate the palm grove cemetery or do something about it, so my proposal here is that, let’s take that political step, because if you go to the cemetery, I think it is causing more health hazards than being there as a cemetery,” he asserted.
Palm Grove Cemetery is located in downtown Monrovia, the Capital City of Liberia.
During the erstwhile Administration of Liberia’s former President, Dr. William Richard Tolbert (late), the cemetery became the focus of the National Decoration Day, which continued to be observed after Tolbert was murdered in a 1980 coup military d’état.
The 1980 bloody military coup was led by a junta, styled: ‘People’s Redemption Council (PRC)’, then, headed by M/Sergeant, Samuel Kanyon Doe and 17 enlisted officers of the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL).
President Tolbert’s lifeless body was dumped into the Palm Groove Cemetery.
Once the country’s national cemetery, the Palm Groove Cemetery was, however, threatened with removal in June 1982 by Monrovia municipal authorities.
In a complaint to the People’s Redemption Council (PRC), the city noted that the cemetery was being used as a waste dump and was so filled with graves that new burials were being conducted unsafely, even though increasing numbers of local residents were being buried in Paynesville.
The authorities requested permission to close the cemetery to new burials and to move the cemetery to a new location, away from its original and current Center Street site.
The Palm Grove Cemetery hosts the graves of some great Liberian statesmen and women including former Presidents- Joseph Jenkins Roberts, William R. Tolbert, and Hilary Teage.
Other dignitaries who passed to the great Beyond and were buried there include but not limited to Martin Freeman, former President of the University of Liberia and Henry Highland Garnet, former African-American Abolitionist and Minister of Education.
But nearly two decades since the end of the country’s fourteen-year brutal civil war, the cemetery is now a place of ill-repute. For some, it is a toilet; for others a dwelling.
For a troubled segment of our society, commonly known as ‘Zogoes’, it is a place where drugs and human bones are consumed together and the zogos used the graves as their residential place.
But, for the larger segment of society, it is a dumpsite that everyone seems to be waiting for someone else to clean up.
The Palm Grove Cemetery, which was enacted by the Legislature on January 29, 1870, on two acres of land, was threatened with relocation, according to a June 1982 complaint filed by Monrovia municipal authorities.
In the complaint to the People’s Redemption Council, the city noted that the cemetery was being used as a waste dump and was so full of graves, making it unsafe to conduct new burials.
They even requested permission to close the cemetery and have it relocated to a new burial ground, away from its original Center Street site but that did not happen.
During the administration of President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, another plan to relocate the Palm Grove Cemetery was halted, this time by the Senate.
According to records, the Senate halted the process on grounds that the cemetery was established by law for the permanent hosting and the final resting place for people described as “distinguished citizens, respected patriots, and ordinary citizens.”
The cemetery was enacted under the name: “The Palm Grove Cemetery Company of Monrovia” with functions including the right, from time to time, to purchase, receive and hold any real estate, not ex¬ceeding ten acres of land, that may be contiguous to the said cemetery, for the purpose of enlarging the said cemetery, as considered desirable by them and may sue and be sued in any of the courts of this Republic having requisite jurisdiction.”
The law establishing the cemetery continues: “All persons purchasing burial lots in the said Cemetery shall become members of said corporation, and shall hold said lots for fee simple: nor shall said lots be seized, attached or sold in law or equity, either for the debts of the company or of the individual owners, but the owners may at any time dispose of their rights in said lots provided that at the time of such disposal they shall have settled all claims due by them to the said company.”
Its earlier board managers were C. B. Dunbar, H. W. Dennis, and W. M. Davis. It is unclear what has become of the Cemetery company.
At the moment, garbage lines the street not less than three feet high. The large garbage bins placed outside tenant buildings for waste collection overflow spread disease and filth, leaking with fetid water.
The garbage encroaches on the right of way for motorists and is now a scavenging ground for an absurd assortment of discarded items.
With the stench oozing from burst septic tanks from upper Center Street, the Police, too, are not exempted from the daily health hazard posed to them and the many other residents who live or do business along the street
It may also be recalled that during the erstwhile Administration of Madam Mary Taryonoh Broh when she served as Head of the Monrovia City Corporation (MCC), the Palm Groove Cemetery was renovated, beautifully decorated and fenced.
It was even protected by MCC security personnel. But Since Mary Broh was transferred to serve in other public capacities, the cemetery has not been properly maintained.
