Editor\u2019s Note: This is the first of a two-part series, which exposes an illegal logging operation.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n COMPOUND NUMBER ONE, Grand Bassa County \u2013 Two hundred and sixty pieces of thick, square timbers lay by a roadside in Zoegar Town, one of 18 sections in the Doe Clan. Twenty-five more are scattered in the forest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The woods were harvested in two former logging concessions in Compound Number One, Grand Bassa. They are the products of an illegal logging operation being conducted by a businesswoman named Binta Bility<\/a>, an investigation by The DayLight found.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe pile of [timber]\u2026 is for one Binta Bility,\u201d said Volygar Garblah, the Chief Elder of that region. Garblah said she had asked to harvest red hardwoods in two former concession areas and he and other chiefs worked out a payment scheme with her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSometimes the sticks are from two or three sections in Doe Clan. When she went to Fubahn, the people charged her, from Kpelleh Town way they charged her also, and men were used to haul the timber from there,\u201d Garblah said, adding Zoegar Town and Dumue Town were also involved in the illegal activities. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The operation she runs is commonly called \u201cKpokolo,\u201d a new form of illegal logging across the country, which targets expensive hardwoods that are smuggled out of the country in containers. The woods are used for railroad tiles and bridges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bility denies any wrongdoing. But dozens of interviews with chiefs, elders motorcycle-taxi drivers, and the illicit loggers point to her. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Felling trees without a permit or from an illegal source is a grave offense in forestry. She faces a huge fine and a prison term if convicted by a court.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2018My Daughter\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Bility started working in the Compound Number One area in 2020 with planks but decided to switch to timber last year, according to Garblah. He said he had known Bility since she helped him pay for his medical bill some time ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cShe is my daughter. She said, \u2018Please give me a place to pack my logs, and after that, I will come for us to talk,\u2019\u201d Garblah told The DayLight. After our talk, then, I later talked with the section people.\u201d He said they did not have a written agreement with her. <\/p>\n\n\n\n An orange and green 1996 MAN truck was parked at Gbarblah\u2019s home with an improvised wheelbarrow, commonly called push-push in its trunk. Its license plate reads \u201cC3742.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe car is for Binta but she left it with me,\u201d Garblah said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The forest where Bility operates was known in the logging industry as Timber Sale Contract Area Two and Timber Sale Contract Area Three. They were operated by Renaissance Group Incorporated and Akewa Group of Companies, respectively, before being canceled last year along with eight similar contracts following years of failure and illegitimacy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Harrison Togbah, who identified himself as one of the forerunners of the illegal operation, said there were 17 workers, including some townsmen. He added that \u00a0Bility gave the team pictures of the hardwoods to cut and that they had worked for six months.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s the first consignment wasting outside there,\u201d he said in reference to the woods on the road to Zoegar Town. \u201cWe made the arrangement that out of 200 pieces [of timber], she will be able to give me US$700.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Togbah showed our reporters Bility\u2019s mobile phone number he saved as \u201cBoss Lady.\u201d Togbah and Bility had communicated 36 times, according to Togbah\u2019s call history. The number on his phone matched the one our reporters had used to contact her earlier on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Massa Sawo, Togbah\u2019s supervisor, confirmed she is their boss. Sawo declined to take further questions when quizzed on the illegality of their activities. \u201cAsk Binta herself,\u201d he said and hung up the phone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2018Just Sample\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The people in Lolo Town showed they were as fond of \u00a0Bility as those in Zoegar Town.\u00a0 A woman, who did not give her name, called \u00a0Bility \u201cmy ma,\u201d when our reporter showed her the picture Bility uses as her Facebook profile.<\/a> Other residents, including Solomon Kpolon, an elder of Lolo Town, also identified Bility as the woman in the picture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We visited the illegal logging site near the Worr River, a good distance from Lolo town. It was an old camp Bility had set up for her chainsaw milling operation, according to the townspeople we interviewed. There were an abandoned, makeshift warehouse still locked and an apartment camp house. Cassava, potato and pineapple thrived among the invading, wet bush. Leftover woods dotted the area. Twenty-six timbers measuring seven feet long and 10 inches wide are next to a felled tree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe kpokolo in the bush\u2026 are samples. [She asked us to do the sample so that] if someone she can bring the person here to see it,\u201d said Stephen Bull, who said he headed the operation at that site and had known Bility since 2020. He even called out her number offhand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bull added that it took up to 15 men to place the woods in the push-push our reporters saw in the back of the truck at Garblah\u2019s house. Thereafter, the vehicle takes the illegal timbers to the central location in Zoegar Town, according to Bull.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We found a phone number written with charcoal on the plank wall of the warehouse at the camp belonging to Kantee Zabeh. Zabeh, who said he was 20 years old, claimed to be Bility\u2019s son in a phone interview. He gave her address as 21st<\/sup> Street, something Togbah had earlier told our reporters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Garblah said the woods were meant to be exported. \u201cBility told me that the place she usually sells the timber is where the fighting is taking place in Europe, so this is why the woods have not gone yet and [are] still packing over there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n By law, chainsaw milling is illegal but is permitted because the woods are supplied to the local market. The FDA has a system where fees are collected at various checkpoints, while it formulates a regulation for that kind of logging.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But kpokolo is illegal. Such timbers are exported outside of the official system that tracks woods from harvest to shipment, a crucial principle of Liberia\u2019s forestry reform. Bility is not registered in that system known in the industry as LiberTrace<\/a>, according to Gertrude Nyaley, the technical manager of FDA\u2019s legality verification department (LVD). The DayLight had made a formal inquiry on the businesswoman\u2019s status. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This investigation comes more than two weeks since leaked videos and pictures revealed similar operations run by an FDA ranger, who has now been suspended. The agency has alarmed over the smuggling of wood in containers, which it says makes it difficult to track down. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Bility denies she runs unlawful activities in Compound Number One. She challenged the fact the villagers revealed she was the mastermind of the illegal harvesting. \u201cStop disturbing my line but you are free to report whatever you [want] to,\u201d she said in a WhatsApp chat. \u201cI know I\u2019m not doing any illegal logging.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cGood luck, dear,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI just can\u2019t stop laughing,\u201d she said in another WhatsApp chat with several laughing emojis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bility still carries on with her operations. In our second round of interviews with Garblah, he told The DayLight she called him and asked whether he had spoken with us. A motorcycle-taxi driver, who did not want to be named for fear of reprisal, also said she dropped off a worker in the area on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When told that Bility denies working in that part of the country, Bull gave a wry smile. \u201cFor her to deny that she is not working here is not right,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/stage.thedaylight.org\/wp68\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/Binta-2.png\")
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