50 Fun Facts About Liberia

What is the capital and largest city of Liberia?

Founded in 1822 at Cape Mesurado, it holds roughly a third of the national population.

Liberia's capital is named after which US president?

The American Colonization Society founded the settlement in 1822 for formerly enslaved and freeborn African Americans.

Which organisation, formed in 1816, began sending free Black Americans to West Africa in 1822?

It was made up mostly of Quakers and slaveholders, and backers included Lincoln, Henry Clay and James Monroe.

How many freed and free-born African Americans moved to Liberia between 1822 and 1861?

Another 3,198 Afro-Caribbeans joined them, and their descendants became the Americo-Liberians.

On what date did Liberia declare its independence?

The United States did not recognise the new republic until 5 February 1862.

Who was elected the first president of independent Liberia, serving from 1848 to 1856?

Born free in Norfolk, Virginia, he emigrated in 1829, was governor from 1841 and returned as seventh president in 1872.

Liberia holds what distinction among African republics?

It is Africa's oldest continuously independent country; only it and Ethiopia escaped the Scramble for Africa.

The Portuguese named the Liberian shore Costa da Pimenta after which product?

The "grain" was melegueta pepper, abundant in the region.

How many stripes does the flag of Liberia have?

They stand for the signers of the 1847 Declaration of Independence; a single white star sits in the blue canton.

The Liberian flag is occasionally called by what nickname?

It was adopted on 24 August 1847 and closely resembles the US flag that inspired it.

Which political force dominated Liberian politics from 1877 until the 1980 coup?

Its 1927 election was called one of the most rigged ever, with the winner credited with 15 times more votes than there were voters.

Which American company took a 99-year lease on a million acres of Liberia in 1926 to grow rubber?

British export duties on rubber drove the deal, which came with help clearing Liberia's debts.

Who was Liberia's longest-serving president, in office from 1944 until his death in 1971?

The "father of modern Liberia" announced an Open Door policy in 1944 that drew foreign investment.

Which master sergeant seized power in the 1980 coup, becoming Liberia's first indigenous leader?

The Krahn soldier's men killed President Tolbert and executed most of his cabinet on a Monrovia beach.

Doe's 1980 coup ended how many years of Americo-Liberian rule?

The settler elite had held power since independence in 1847.

Who captured and executed President Doe in the capital in September 1990?

His INPFL was a breakaway faction of Taylor's National Patriotic Front.

Charles Taylor's rebellion began the First Liberian Civil War in December of which year?

Backed by Burkina Faso and Ivory Coast, it ended with his election as president in 1997.

Roughly how many people died in Liberia's two civil wars?

That was about 8% of the population, and the economy shrank by 90%.

Charles Taylor was sentenced to 50 years in prison in 2012 for crimes committed in which conflict?

He had funded the RUF rebels with blood diamonds and illegal timber, and resigned in 2003 to exile in Nigeria.

Who was elected in 2005 as the first female president in Africa?

The Harvard-trained economist and former finance minister served two terms, from 2006 to 2018.

Which Liberian activist led the women's movement that helped end the war in 2003 and shared the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize?

Women of Liberia Mass Action for Peace piled pressure on Taylor; her memoir is Mighty Be Our Powers.

Which former footballer was sworn in as Liberia's president in January 2018?

He is the only African to have won the Ballon d'Or and FIFA World Player of the Year, both in 1995.

Liberia's footballer-president won the Ballon d'Or in 1995 while playing for which club?

Arsène Wenger had brought him to Europe at Monaco in 1988; he later won Serie A twice in Milan.

Who defeated Weah in the 2023 election and was sworn in as president in January 2024?

The 2005 election had been the first in which the president's party lacked a legislative majority.

The 2014 Ebola outbreak reached Liberia from which neighbouring country?

By 17 November 2014 there were 2,812 confirmed deaths in Liberia.

Liberia's flag-of-convenience registry is the world's second largest after which country's?

Some 3,500 vessels, about 11% of the world's ships, fly the Liberian flag.

What is Liberia's official language?

More than 20 indigenous languages are also spoken by 16 officially recognised ethnic groups.

Which is Liberia's largest ethnic group, at over a fifth of the population?

They live mostly in Bong County and central Liberia and form the largest single language group.

Alongside its own currency, which foreign currency is legal tender in Liberia?

The country used the US dollar outright from 1943 to 1982, and the economy remains heavily dollarised.

Into how many counties is Liberia divided?

The oldest, Grand Bassa and Montserrado, date from 1839; Nimba is the largest and Montserrado the smallest.

What is the highest point lying wholly within Liberia?

Also called Wologizi, it rises about 1,440 m; Mount Nimba is higher but sits on the tripoint with Guinea and Ivory Coast.

Liberia holds roughly what share of the remaining Upper Guinean rainforest?

In 2014 Norway paid $150 million in aid for Liberia to halt all logging.

Which small, nocturnal mammal, native mainly to Liberia, is one of only two living species in its family?

Its scientific name is Choeropsis liberiensis; small populations survive in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Ivory Coast.

Sapo National Park, Liberia's first protected area, was proclaimed in which year?

It holds West Africa's second-largest area of primary rainforest, after Taï in Ivory Coast.

Which river forms Liberia's main northwestern boundary?

The Cavalla River bounds the country's southeast limits.

Liberia was one of only 32 nations at which 1919 gathering that founded the League of Nations?

The German bombing of Monrovia had been its only direct battle of the First World War.

Liberia's Freeport and Roberts International Airport were built under which US wartime programme?

The country backed the US war effort against Nazi Germany and reaped American investment in return.

How many senators sit in Liberia's Senate?

Two per county; the House has 73 members, and the vice president presides over the Senate.

The Liberia national football team has reached the Africa Cup of Nations finals how many times?

The appearances came in 1996 and 2002; football is by far the most popular sport.

In a 2010 survey, what share of Liberians said they had paid a bribe, the world's highest?

President Sirleaf had declared corruption "the major public enemy" on taking office in 2006.

Which two secret societies, for men and women, do many Liberians belong to?

About 86% of Liberians are Christian and 12% Muslim; commerce is banned by law on Sundays.

Which country pressured Liberia into surrendering territory to Sierra Leone in the 19th century?

France likewise annexed land for Ivory Coast in the north and east.

Liberia's most celebrated novel, Murder in the Cassava Patch, is by which author?

Heavy stews spiced with habanero and scotch bonnet chillies, eaten with fufu, are staples of the cuisine.

Between 1989 and 1995 Liberia's GDP fell by an estimated what?

It was one of the fastest economic collapses in modern history; GDP per capita had peaked in 1980 at a level comparable to Egypt's.

The US did not recognise Liberia's independence until which year, after the Southern states seceded?

Recognition came on 5 February 1862, fifteen years after Liberia's declaration of independence.

In Liberia's notoriously rigged 1927 election, the winner's vote was over how many times the electorate?

The result showed the grip of the True Whig Party, which dominated politics from 1877 to 1980.

Which mountain on Liberia's border with Guinea and Ivory Coast is taller than any peak wholly inside the country?

At 1,752 m near Yekepa, Nimba is also the tallest mountain in Guinea and Ivory Coast.

Under Liberian customary law, a man may have up to how many wives?

Customary law operates alongside statutory law; the University of Liberia, the oldest in the country, opened in 1862.

Which is Liberia's largest county by area?

Montserrado, home to Monrovia, is the smallest county but the most populous.

Liberia imports roughly what share of its staple food, rice?

That dependence makes the country extremely vulnerable to food shortages.