ECOMOG soldiers always disgraced themselves first before they would begin to disgrace those they were deployed to help. How long did Lieutenant-General Arnold Quainoo remain in his post as ECOMOG commander in Liberia before he surrendered his headquarters to Prince Johnson, a known warlord, to slaughter the Samuel Doe presidential party he was hosting? He had been in Liberia fewer than three weeks. He arrived in Liberia in mid-August 1990. On September 10, 1990, General Quainoo was holed up at the fortified ECOMOG base in the Port of Monrovia, waiting for his ship to come in to take him home to his native Ghana. He probably had no plans for keeping warring factions apart, and perhaps felt he might lose his life to another mistake of similar magnitude.
Gen. Quainoo's departure was followed by a half dozen fire-breathing Nigerian commanders in successive order. But each was compromised by either bribes or the structural ineptitude that was evident before he arrived. All this never prompted any soul searching in ECOWAS.
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