FATHER Lee Cahill, one of five Irish SMA priests evacuated from Liberia at the weekend, said yesterday that the people of the capital, Monrovia, were being subjected to unspeakable horrors as the ethnic faction fighting continued to escalate.
Father Cahill, the regional superior of the SMAs in Liberia and Sierra Leone, said that everywhere in the capital, armed gangs were in evidence. It was unsafe to wear jewellery, such as a watch, or to drive a car.
"Anything of value would be taken, so when we had to go out we took care to remove our watches and to go on foot," he said. "The faction fighters, some as young as six, have been dehumanised by the warlords. Human life is cheap in this situation. Everywhere, buildings, including commercial and residential properties, have been looted and destroyed. There is no order any more.
On Thursday morning last, Father Cahill said, the Irish priests had no idea that they were about to be evacuated. "Then I got a call on the radio telling me to assemble with the rest of our people at a certain point not far from the residence.
"We went to the point from where buses took us to a beach compound. American helicopters then took about 60 people in all on a two hour flight to Freetown in Sierra Leone. That evening we were in Dakar," he said.
Two other Irish priests, Father Matt Gilridre of Gafwa, and Father Gerry Collins of Drenagh, Co Cork, arrived in Cork with Father Cahill on Saturday, while Father Jim Hickey of Dublin and Father Frank Hynes of Sligo, who were also evacuated, travelled on to the US.
Of the seven Irish SMA priests in Liberia, only two now remain. They are Father Tony Jennings and Father John Kilcoyne, both from Co Mayo, who are safe and well, about 90 miles from the capital.
Father Cahill said that the SMA objective was to return, to Liberia as soon as the situation allowed. "Much of the publicity has centred on the Irish priests. Unfortunately, this has meant that the Liberian people, the people who we were serving, have been forgotten. Our aim is to go back as soon as we can and to that end, we are on standby.
"The people in the capital are being terrorised by marauding gangs. They are unable to leave their homes. There is great fear and uncertainty, they have no one to fall back on in their suffering. In their attitude to people and in the way they behave, the fighters represent nothing less than evil incarnate," he said.