MONROVIA – Listening to Finance and Development Planning Minister Augustine Kpehe Ngafuan on ELBC on Monday, September 8, 2025, one could almost believe that Liberia’s financial challenges boil down to misplaced requests and poor coordination. But behind the polished rhetoric and carefully crafted explanations lies a much deeper problem, one that exposes the cracks in our governance and questions the sincerity of this administration’s priorities.
The University of Liberia (UL), the country’s flagship institution of higher learning, is once again at the center of controversy over funding. This time, it is the matter of a $500,000 request which Minister Ngafuan insists is “off budget” and therefore cannot be approved without legislative sanction. According to him, Senator Nathaniel F. McGill, who chairs the Senate’s Committee on Education, “alone cannot authorize such expenditure.” On the surface, Ngafuan is right, as budgetary allocations should follow due process. But the real issue is not about procedure; it is about political will and misplaced priorities.
Ngafuan’s defense would carry weight if the government itself had not set a precedent of bypassing procedure when convenient. He openly admitted that $400,000 was spent to fund the Lone Star football team’s trip to Tunisia, which was also outside of the budget. By his own account, this was done because the government could not afford the embarrassment of Liberia missing an international tournament. So, when the country’s only public university pleads for funds to keep its operations afloat, why is the urgency different? Why is the pride of football deemed more pressing than the dignity of education?
The University itself has spelled out exactly why these funds are critical. In a letter dated September 5, 2025, addressed to Honorable Nathaniel F. McGill, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Education, UL President Dr. Layli Marpayan emphasized the importance of timely intervention to ensure the continuity of academic operations. According to the letter, US$251,000 is required to settle Semester I salary arrears for adjunct faculty for the 2024/2025 academic year, while US$199,000 would partially cover outstanding payments from the recently concluded Vacation School Semester. The remaining US$100,000 is earmarked to begin essential bathroom renovations. These are not luxuries; they are urgent needs tied to salaries, basic infrastructure, and the dignity of the institution.
The comparison is striking, and it raises a fundamental question about the government’s values, whether it is better to score goals abroad than to empower the next generation at home. Ngafuan’s words reflect a dangerous trend, the willingness to bend rules for political optics while clinging to procedure when it comes to substantive development needs.
Even more troubling is Ngafuan’s announcement that the Ministry will “reverify all names on the University of Liberia’s payroll” in September. While payroll verification is a standard and necessary exercise to eliminate ghost workers, the timing and framing of this decision suggests something else, a scapegoat strategy. Instead of confronting the broader failure of fiscal planning and prioritization, the government is shifting the burden onto the University itself, as if inflated payrolls are the main reason Liberia’s education system remains chronically underfunded.
The truth is that UL’s financial woes are not new. For years, the institution has been starved of resources, its faculty underpaid, and its infrastructure left in decay. Students frequently protest for basic necessities, including electricity in classrooms, affordable tuition, and reliable internet access. The $500,000 request should not be viewed as an extravagant demand but rather a cry for survival. Yet the government, through its chief financial steward, has chosen to downplay this urgency.
The hypocrisy becomes clearer when one considers the political undertones of Ngafuan’s statement. By highlighting UL’s decision to bypass the Ministry and appeal directly to the Legislature, he frames the University’s actions as a breach of protocol. But could it be that UL leadership has lost faith in the Ministry’s willingness to respond? Could it be that the University, tired of the endless bureaucratic merry-go-round, sought alternative avenues out of desperation?
At its core, this controversy is not about numbers; it is about priorities. Liberia’s leaders must decide whether education is a national emergency or a side issue to be debated after football trips and political settlements. Minister Ngafuan may argue that his hands are tied by the law, but laws in this country have too often been stretched or broken when the political will exists. If rules could be bent to fly the Lone Star to Tunisia, why can’t they be bent, even temporarily, to keep the University of Liberia functional?
This column is not a call for recklessness or disregard for legislative oversight. It is a call for honesty and consistency. If the government insists on strict adherence to the budget, then it must stop making exceptions for political convenience. If it values accountability, then it must apply it uniformly. Anything less amounts to selective governance, where football fields are prioritized over classrooms, and prestige matters more than progress.
Minister Ngafuan’s explanation on state radio may pacify some listeners, but Liberians deserve better than half-truths. The University of Liberia’s survival should never hinge on political calculations or public relations. It should be a given, a cornerstone of national development. When future generations look back, they will not remember how many goals the Lone Star scored in Tunisia. They will remember whether their government chose to invest in their education.
Until then, the contradiction remains glaring; in a country where football receives emergency funding and the University of Liberia receives excuses, one wonders whether Liberia’s leaders truly believe that education is the backbone of national progress, or merely a talking point reserved for speeches on Independence Day.
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