Liberia 2006

by Joel Rookwood

Soccerphile's Joel Rookwood spent part of November helping to run football coaching education programmes in Africa, visiting different projects for children, including ex-child soldiers, in Liberia. This is his account of what happened…

Teams4U ran its first football-based project in Liberia in November, working in partnership with Samaritan's Purse. The focus of the trip was to work with young people in the three principle cities, namely the capital Monrovia, as well as Buchanan and Gbarnga. The programme was supported by two leading English Premiership football clubs, Liverpool and Newcastle United.

A dozen British coaches travelled to Monrovia, where the ten-day football tour was launched. The objective was to meet the needs of the youth of Liberia, illustrating compassion and warmth to deprived youngsters, whilst instilling a message driven to facilitate both the empowering enhancement of skills as well as character development.

The value-driven coaching philosophy which was implemented related to self-discipline, truthfulness, appreciation and respect, which fittingly enough was simplified into the acronym 'STAR'. This was however occasionally translated by our Liberian counterparts on the field as an approach representing 'not technical coaching, but fun coaching!' The objective on a macro level was to use the medium of football today so that the nation's future would be impacted by and founded on citizens of character.

The project focused on youngsters from a variety of backgrounds, with the one key communal factor being the mutual experience of war. Some of our work was with former child soldiers, which represents one of a number of horrific products of the fourteen-year conflict in a country that in just a fortnight revealed a history and a people that were both tragic and beautiful in equal measures.

We learned much about Africa, God and also ourselves in that time, and saw once again how his provision in the lives of those who follow him never falters.

As the country seeks to continue its progression in the attempt to minimise the negative after-effects of a culture of predominantly internalised conflict, instilling hope of a future serves as a fundamental component of this development.

From conversations we had with some Liberians who had been deeply impacted by the war, it was clear that for more than a decade, the consciousness of the people in terms of their daily lives, rarely extended beyond thoughts of mere survival. With the newfound stability that is a function of peace, unity and understanding however, comes a hope for a future. It is precisely this hope which the programme seeks to develop.

The national language in Liberia is English, although with fifteen dialectical derivations in common usage, none of which resembled anything similar to that spoken in Britain, there were notable language barriers experienced. This however, forced the team to be receptive to other forms of communication, notably that assuming non-verbal formats, and left us relying on mastering the national handshake and developing other ways of reaching the youngsters.

But as Carl Buechner once said, "They may forget what you said, but they will never forget how you made them feel". On reflection, this reliance on actions not words proved a notably positive aspect of the trip, and a principle mode of connection that transcended international and social boundaries.

The project started with a three-day coaching programme in a national stadium in Monrovia, and continued south to Buchanan, before heading towards the Guinea border and the unpronounceable town of Gbarnga.

Over 1400 children were reached by the tour, with ripple effects hopefully spreading much further still. In a country of less than three million people, the overall consequences of the project could be considerable in the long term. In addition the team visited the 'THINK' rehabilitation home for female ex-combatants as well as Rainbow Town orphanage, where our time was mostly spent interacting with the young people housed there.

For the football programmes, numerous local coaches and coordinators had been selected in order to continue the work started here, with the subsequent aim being to develop a league in the capital, and then depending on the success of this venture, possibly in the other two locations at a later date.

Children were registered by the Liberian representatives, with the latter now taking on the mantle, assuming a large proportion of responsibility for facilitating the resultant league programme. The local coaches also received some training from their British colleagues, and were encouraged to assume increasing levels of involvement as the project developed, so to facilitate the effectiveness of the subsequent management strategies put in place.

Whilst the programme could be considered to have been extremely beneficial, its true worth can only be measured as a reflection of the success of the project in the longer term. The nation is nicknamed the lone star, although it is clear that only through a unified and collective approach, utilising the STAR philosophy, can this nation really begin to shine.

Joel Rookwood

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