It was a privilege. I was invited to the National Capacity Development Summit on Tuesday the 22nd of June. The event was held in Monrovia's city hall. I helped out with a few tasks, took notes on the day’s events. I got to hear many top-ranking members of the government speak including the Vice President and the Chief Justice.
'National Capacity' is like human capital or work skills. A serious problem facing Liberia is a lack of skilled labor in important sectors, especially health and education. To remedy this the Ministry of Planning and Economic Affairs, working with others, spent 18 months interviewing people across Liberia to draft up a plan to increase National Capacity. The summit marked the end of the process and the public sharing of their findings in a document called the NCDS, National Capacity Development Strategy.
In the morning before the guests arrived, during setup, two men from the city hall work crew made an attempt to hang a large banner that read “National Capacity Development Summit”. The banner would’ve hung up on the back wall of the room providing a nice backdrop for the table of distinguished guests. After trying and failing to hang the banner for an hour, as the guests started to arrive, the two men decide to unhook the banner from the sagging side and tuck the banner around a corner and out of sight.
When the summit broke for lunch the two men who tried to hang the banner in the morning came back and succeeded. As a metaphor you can’t get much better.
Did they know how to hang a banner at the beginning of the summit? No. Did they get the job done on time? No. Did they keep trying until the job was done? Yes.
Two Liberian men developed the capacity to hang a banner during the National Capacity Development Summit.
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