Academic | Activist | Author
(Monrovia, Liberia) Speaking to Liberian writer and activist Robtel Neajai Pailey, one can glean the strong disdain she has for the kickbacks and bribery that are ubiquitous in all sectors of Liberian society.
“I find it disgusting working in that environment,” the Oxford-educated academic said in a phone interview last November, referring to corrupt settings in general.
It is a view she espoused in a New York Times op-ed she wrote and in the below TEDxEuston talk.
My intellectual curiosity was piqued at an early age when I discovered words followed by stories. I devoured books one by one, and couldn’t get enough of them. I was in middle school when I started to deconstruct ideas, ask critical questions, and wonder why things were the way they were. In high school, my analytical skills were further sharpened, but I didn’t study in a culturally affirming environment. I went to a predominantly white all girls’ college preparatory school in Washington, DC, USA, and remember feeling like ‘the other’ most of the time.
This is a fear echoed by London-based Liberian academic, activist and author Dr Robtel Neajai Pailey, who told Christian Today: "I fear for this outcome because it will undoubtedly sow the seeds of division in a country that is already very fractured."
Pailey added: "Besides, we need to focus on more important priorities, like improving the lives of the 64 per cent of Liberians who live in abject poverty. After all, poverty knows no religion. Given that political stalwarts such as Liberian president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Governance Commission Chairman Dr. Amos Sawyer have publicly rejected the proposition to declare Liberia a Christian state, I can only hope that grassroots public education campaigns will avert a possible 'yes' vote."
From activists to a Premier League footballer, the Financial Times' Africa team picks the continent’s rising stars.
In a landmark report to be published on March 17, the Sustainable Development Institute (SDI) argues that Liberia earns so little from its iron ore exports.
Robtel Neajai Pailey says one of the ways of eradicating corruption completely is by educating children about its damning effect.
A Liberian academic, activist and author with a transnational mindset, Robtel Neajai Pailey claims that she "exists and thrives on three continents simultaneously." She shares her story about growing up in Washington D.C. and a project to raise awareness among children about the scourge of corruption on the African continent.
Watch a debate about democracies in Africa hosted by the BBC's Alex Jakana.
Robtel Neajai Pailey has written for publications across the world, including the International New York Times, and news and opinion website The Daily Beast. Once a hard-hitting opinion columnist for the independent Liberian newspaper New Narratives, she has provided Liberians with the information they need to demand accountability from their leaders.
Read MoreRobtel Neajai Pailey’s Gbagba is definitely a Liberian story. Equally so, it is African and universal simultaneously because it addresses corruption, the enemy of economic progress and social development everywhere. For children, particularly in developing countries, Gbagba is a compulsory read. Pailey skillfully unmasks corruption through the focused eyes of twin characters, Sundaymah and Sundaygar.
Liberian author and Tutu Fellow Robtel Pailey was inspired to tackle corruption after experiencing it first-hand in the country’s scholarships programme.
The new Band Aid song will raise a lot of money to help the victims of Ebola in west Africa. There's not much doubt about that. So why do some people object to it? We hear from Robtel Neajai Pailey, who is from Liberia and works as a researcher at the School of Oriental and African Studies, as well as Harvey Goldsmith, one of the world's great producers and concert promoters.
Another much needed intervention by celebrity fund raisers, or does it – as some critics argue – perpetuate the image of Africa as a land of disease and famine?
[Full episode: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04sncx3]
Sorting out the science from the scare tactics - we examine the Ebola stories coming out of Africa.
Martha McGill was already losing faith in Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf before Ebola started its rampage across the West African nation.
BERLIN — Italian mothers in suburban Rome recently organized a petition drive to keep a 3-year-old black girl from attending kindergarten after her family traveled to Uganda — a country thousands of miles away from the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.
The New Economy speaks to Robtel Neajai Pailey, PhD candidate at SOAS, University of London and Liberian native, about how the impact of the Ebola crisis in West Africa is stretching beyond the humanitarian field and into economic territory.
Robtel Neajai Pailey is a Liberian academic, activist and author of the anti-corruption children's book, Gbagba.
Robtel Neajai Pailey, PhD
robtel@robtelneajaipailey.com
